I had never heard of Pim Jacobs when, unsuspecting, I accidentally hit one of those sites that discuss more obscure music releases or reissues and, although I can’t quite recall, the album was even offered for download. I quickly read through the veritable epitomizing of this reissue and started investigating in more detail. It’s become a habit to do that when I come across someone praising an album in no uncertain tone, especially if that someone – as a quick glance at the archives page of said site showed – had very similar listening habits.

It was a frustrating experience. As is often the case, the Internet turned up quite a bit of information, but all of it seemed, in one way or another, to have been copied from the same two sources, and those weren’t very elaborate.

It was also frustrating because from a quick glance at the hard facts – being European myself – I should have heard of Pim Jacobs before. I have spent half of my life listening to European musicians who toured through Scandinavia and Germany and I was even fortunate to meet and talk to many of them. Never once did that name come up. I don’t know how many musicians passed through Copenhagen’s famed jazz club “Montmartre”, a place I had almost familial ties to, and many of the countless musicians who did pass through must surely have played with Pim. I know they did because I later unearthed that information. Still, I have no memory of ever having heard anything about him. Continue Reading →