Jamie Cullum premiered songs from his upcoming album The Pursuit for the first time before a live audience last night in Berlin. The 200 guests welcomed him with open arms from the very first second the band came on stage. The 60-minute set presented Cullum as the singer, songwriter, enfant terrible, jazz pianist, and complete entertainer he is now known for all over the world. But still, he keeps on surprising me each time I hear or see him. The set started with Don't Stop The Music which is standard Rock/Pop Cullum fare with a twist. He has perfected the art of writing 3 minute pop songs and spicing them up with little snippets of piano, brass, or percussion twists. In the same direction, but harder and edgier, was the song Mixtape about those golden days when you were mixing your favorite songs onto a tape to present it to your friends or lovers or soon-to-be ex-lovers. The song Wheels was inspired by a riff that his nephew was playing to him on the piano wih his knuckles. I'm All Over It and I Think I Love both are destined to become Cullum standards in the future. Three standards rounded out the programme: Cole Porter's Just One Of Those Things and If I Ruled The World, both with catchy new arrangements and Stephen Sondheim's Not While I'm Around . I guess his raspy voice is able to spice up just about every song. Cullum had the audience on its feet with the encore, his hit These Are The Days.
Album release date is November 6th in Germany and other parts of Europe, and November 10th in the US.