András Dés is one of the few percussionists who have not only absorbed a whole arsenal of musical styles as a member of various bands, but have also founded their own ensembles. Dés, who has been living in Vienna for five years, has now formed a quartet with three Austrian musicians, Martin Eberle, Kenji Herbert and Philipp Nykrin, to capture the essence of European jazz: diversity, openness and the power of listening to each other. The unusual drum set is joined by trumpet, piano and electric guitar, and the way these three instruments are played often differs from what is customary. The musical components of this album are at least as manifold as the playing of the four musicians. The thinking of András Dés and his fellow musicians is defined just as much by many different trends in American and European jazz of the last few decades, as by earlier and contemporary classical music, the instinctively complex rhythmic structures of traditional musical cultures, or even the influence of various popular music styles, for instance, the elemental energy of rock music.

Unimportant Things concludes a trilogy of albums recorded by András Dés in various line-ups for BMC Records. The common feature of the three albums, which are based on very different concepts and moods, is that they all contain a good dose of spontaneity, this time because the bandleader did not insert free improvisational passages into his compositions, but linked them together. The eight compositions thus form a single musical sequence of about three-quarters of an hour, in which we proceed from island to island, from one adventure to the next, like Odysseus on his way home from Troy to Ithaca.