Joo Kraus' new album No Excuse is a musically colorful mix which contains socio-political discourse and most importantly: good vibes! Crossing genre boundaries and dissolving style labels - for Joo Kraus, this is a great passion. With his new album the multi-award-winning trumpeter lives out this passion to its fullest extent. Joo Kraus is Joo Kraus. What sounds so self-evident is by no means the case these days, because in the mercantile everyday life of the music industry, names are often reduced to brands. Not so with Joo Kraus. The fact that the trumpeter from Ulm made music history and earned himself a legendary reputation worldwide with the acid jazz duo Tab Two in the nineties is just as secondary to him as his well-known activity in diverse fields like krautrock, jazz, hip hop, latin, ambient and singer/songwriter. For his new album No Excuse, only one question counts: What do I have to say today? After a journey of almost forty years through almost all the vegetation areas of music, Joo Kraus no longer needs any explanations. The music can simply be what it is: one hundred percent Joo Kraus. Stylistic diversity has always been more important to him than being restricted to a specific genre. The unpredictable variety on No Excuse ranges from cool jazz to hip hop, from pop to singer/songwriter, from ambient to funk. The fact that the songs clearly bear the signature of Joo Kraus, despite all their differences, is mainly due to his trumpet. The trumpet acts as a mediator between the music and the ear. Its tone, at times reserved, at others suggesting curiosity, acts like a silent observer, almost on the fringes of the action, but influencing and supporting it decisively from this very position. No excuses, no explanations, no compromises! No Excuse is a life confession and at the same time the vision of a musician who reveals the human side of his art as openly and honestly as possible. Art is life, life is art. No Excuse!
