Jazz drummer Andrew Drury insists he is just an old-fashioned musician.
“I’m really like an old school jazzer,” he said. “That’s how I think of myself. That’s my foundation.”
But this Prospect Lefferts Gardens resident composes music that is a far cry from jaunty trad jazz or even the speedy swing of be-bop. On Feb. 17, Drury will release two different albums — the group recording “Content Provider” and solo effort “The Drum” — at Roulette in Boerum Hill. And the tunes on both discs sound more like avant garde rock or haunted house soundtracks.
Drury also utilizes a number of non-traditional means to make his chosen instrument sound like anything but a drum kit. On “The Drum,” you’ll hear him coaxing loud screeches and deep drones from a floor tom using pieces of a faucet assembly, a sheet of aluminum, and a bamboo shish-kabob skewer. Okay, Drury admits, maybe he can be a little unconventional.
“I was like a scientist in a laboratory,” he said of his late-night sessions recording this album. “I wonder about drum teachers I had in the past. If they were alive today, what would they have thought about this?”
“Content Provider” was recorded with conventional quartet — including guitarist Brandon Seabrook and saxophonists Briggan Krauss and Ingrid Laubrock — but the music on the album still flies far afield from expectations. One track, “The Band is a Drum Set,” is dominated by atonal squeaks and blurts, while the Clifford Brown composition “Daahoud” is wrenched from its quick-paced bop roots and transformed into slow-burning blues.
And just to buck convention further, Drury is adding an extra degree of difficulty by self-releasing both albums, rather than working with an already established record label. But the stick-man said he is happier marching to the beat of his own drum.
“I didn’t even shop it around,” he said. “It’s good to have total control over the process and not have to wait months to get these out. The age of the labels is almost gone, so it makes a lot of sense to do this now.”
Andrew Drury at Roulette [509 Atlantic Ave. between Third Avenue and Nevins Street in Boerum Hill, (212) 219–8242, www.roulette.org]. Feb. 17 at 8 pm. $20, $15 members and seniors.
