The Visionaries: ‘Dungeon Synth’ Master Jute Gyte Exudes Empathy in Rare Interview
“If I’m focusing on sources of human suffering, then maybe it would be nice to put [part of the proceeds I earn from selling that] material to try to alleviate some of that suffering.”
-Jute Gyte
This year, The Bad Penny has had the incredibly unexpected, transformational, good fortune of interviewing more than 200 musicians across the globe. But as 2025 (mercifully) comes to a close, we’ve reflected on many of those conversations and come to realize that we connected with some truly exceptional human beings who just happen to make music.
These are individuals who often but don’t always work in isolation, truly treat making music as a cherished endeavor, take their work seriously, have a very strong work ethic and regiment – and, as a result, transcend the simple act of songcraft, recording and performing live.
To these remarkable individuals, music is not a diversion, and certainly not a means to striking it rich or becoming famous. They devote themselves to their craft because it is their vocation, their calling – not their calling card to getting signed to an oily record contract.
Last week, The Bad Penny unofficially launched a new series, which we’re calling “The Visionaries” – a term each humble subject of the series will surely reject, but sorry guys, them’s the breaks – with an uncharacteristically intimate look into the creative process and soul of underground legend Aaron Turner that Treble generously published.
For the first “official” edition of the series “The Visionaries” published on The Bad Penny, we are thrilled to present you a conversation with perhaps the most unsung drone-metal musician of the century, Jute Gyte (Adam Kalmbach). If his name doesn’t sound familiar, don’t be embarrassed; hell, this guy flies so low under the radar, he would probably rather you don’t know who is, so long as his music is getting out there and assuaging some music listeners (particularly those who gravitate toward challenging listens).
Kalmbach has never signed to a record label. He has never performed live. He puts out all his music – 39 releases by our last count, with the most recent being October 2024’s Synthemata – on Bandcamp at a pay-what-you-want price point. Kalmbach donates money he receives on certain days to Doctors Without Borders, Planned Parenthood and the NAACP Legal Defense Fund. As the cherry on top, he prominently declares his dedication to antifascism and antibigotry on the top of his Bandcamp page.
Is Jute Gyte the Messiah? Make up your own mind while reading this interview, conducted on October 20. For now, we’ll refer to him as one of The Bad Penny‘s “Visionaries.”
Hey, Adam. In preparing for this conversation, I found I became aware of you around 2006, when I started getting your Bandcamp updates. It was probably Stereogum‘s Black Metal Market [RIP] that turned me on to you, because they consistently recommended your releases, I believe. But I generally don’t see much news about you. Do you do a lot of interviews?
Not really. I think it’s been at least a few years since I’ve done an interview.
Is that right? Now I’m even more honored.
I mean, no one’s asked.
Really?
Which is fine. I mean, I’m open to them. I honestly think the last interview I did was probably four years ago.
Oh, my gosh. Well, I gotta say, in addition to loving your compositions and aesthetic, your regular Bandcamp email updates noting how much you devoted that given week to the most respected charities in the world propelled me to reach out to you. I don’t see other artists doing that, at least not publicly.
So not only am I partial to your outlandish and experimental music – which critics apparently call a marriage of “ambient black metal dungeon synth” with “generative microtonal noise xenharmonic” sounds – I also dig the way you’ve chosen to carry yourself as an artist.
A horrifyingly large number of musicians are getting cowed into shying away from what they believe in, which must – from a logical standpoint – affect their creative process. You, on the other hand, post statements on your social media accounts that clearly state your beliefs. The one on your Facebook, for example, clearly states that you believe in antifascism and antibigotry, that you donate all your sales on Bandcamp Fridays to Doctors Without Borders, and that you donate all sales on Juneteenth to the NAACP Legal Defense Fund.
Concluding the longest opening question I’ve ever posed in an interview, was the philanthropic component part of your initial vision for Jute Gyte as a project?
Not at all, really. During COVID, I noticed “Bandcamp Fridays,” when Bandcamp does not take their usual cut of the sales that an artist makes. The artist gets all the profit. And I noticed some artists were using those days, which [continue to be] well-publicized, to do charitable donations during the pandemic.
I thought that was a really good idea and a really simple way to accomplish something, to use my music to accomplish something good. I’d like to think I’m accomplishing something worthwhile musically, but that doesn’t really matter all that much. So it seemed like a good way for me to do something good using this back catalog I have, and to do it in a way that’s well-publicized without any effort on my part, really, and could be done pretty transparently.
For those first few years, I think I [donated proceeds from album sales to] Charity Watch [self-described as “America’s most independent, assertive charity watchdog]. [My goal in doing that was] trying to find reputable charities. I eventually settled on Doctors Without Borders, who obviously are performing an invaluable service. I think I’ll continue to donate to them for the future.
When did you decide on them as being your principal charity?
Maybe a year or a year and a half ago? I don’t recall [exactly].
I seem to remember, about two or three years ago, that a lot of your efforts were going toward Planned Parenthood, another organization that used to be unanimously regarded as – and still should be – a worthy enterprise, before the rightwing effectively ostracized it to ruin.
You know, we live in a world where many charities have worthy causes. Maybe I’ll go back to donating proceeds to a different charity at some point. But at the moment, it felt nice to be able to set something and consistently donate to it.
How you decide upon which charity to focus on? Is it through reading the news or because you have a friend or colleague who maybe recommends an organization to you? Or is it something personal, maybe a personal attachment you have to certain areas of need?
So, essentially, I was looking for reputable charities. I think I used the website CharityWatch.org. And Doctors Without Borders is very highly regarded.
Before that, I was switching between charities every month. And it was just, I just wanted something, a charity that was doing good work that I could just donate to consistently. And that way I could have that information on my Bandcamp page and have it be accurate month after month.
Sounds like you’re pretty meticulous about keeping track of all the donations. Do you use a spreadsheet?
That would be a good idea. Honestly, I take a screenshot, and I make the post saying how much was donated. I’ve never added it up over time. That would be interesting. It’s been four or five years, because I started during the pandemic.
What reactions have you gotten from fans for your efforts?
Positive ones, I suppose. There’s sometimes [negative] comments. I should mention that I’m just really bad at interacting with fans. If you send me an email, I’m sorry, but it will probably take, like, years before I respond to it. I’m just not very good with that kind of thing. I’m not very interested in promotion.
Even with interviews like this?
You’re doing fine, man. You’re doing great. But when I see comments from fans…
Oh, I see. Do you feel like some of your material that speaks to a certain topic or field warrants encouraging listeners to donate to a charity that might fall under the auspices of that theme or concept?
In a general sense, the black-metal stuff – which is the only stuff with lyrics – it focuses on the more difficult aspects of the human condition more generally. And that material … artistically … working through those topics in that creative way has been helpful to me personally, but to be able to use that material and produce some sort of positive outcome in an extra-musical sense, that was one of the goals. That’s kind of a long-winded way to answer your question, but – not specifically, but in general, if I’m focusing on sources of human suffering, then maybe it would be nice to put [part of the proceeds I earn from selling that] material to try to alleviate some of that suffering.
Can you remember the first time in your life where you really kind of became sensitive or aware of human suffering? Was it a certain global issue or maybe something more localized, like a friend being bullied or you being bullied? Do you remember a moment where you kind of became aware of the damage that people can do to each other?
I can’t think of an individual moment. That’s an interesting question. I’ll think about that.
Do you feel like the theme of addressing human suffering has waxed or waned over the course of the catalog that you’ve created, which is quite impressive at this point? Are there certain records where you feel like maybe they more urgently address human suffering versus others that might be a little more perhaps cerebral or introspective, not as responsive to the outside world as maybe some others are?
What I’ll say is I think that there was a growing focus on those kinds of topics. It kind of culminated with [2017’s Oviri], which was just a real attempt for me artistically to try to face a lot of the more difficult aspects of the human condition without turning away. And that was a really difficult album to work on. But working on that album, I was able to integrate and just sort of accept those aspects of existence more. And in the last few albums, I’ve been kind of slowly turning towards other topics.
Did you feel that shift happening in terms of focus? Like, that you had said your piece on that topic, which I’ll leave up to the listener to interpret?
I think so. I think I felt like I had to get that out of the way, so to speak, to turn to other topics.
To what extent is the urgency of a topic a driving force behind you creating new material? A lot of times bands will write a record because they have a certain set of songs they’ve worked out through jamming or what have you. And they feel like they’ve got enough material to put together a record. For you, it sounds like it could potentially – and I don’t know this to be true – be a driving force, if you’re struggling with a conundrum. Is that at all accurate?
I think for me, the music and the lyrics are pretty separate. Because music is, on its own, pretty powerless to signify much. It’s essentially a numbers game. But my way of working has not been so different from what you described. You generate enough material that it seems to hang together. Sometimes I’ve done stuff where different tracks share common motifs or things like that. But generally, you can kind of sense when things fit together and you’ve pieced together something like a track list. In a general sense, the structure of a piece of music or a collection of pieces suggests how you might structure the lyrics. They’re separate in my experience as a composer.
What’s so striking to me about your process and the way in which you go about making your art is that it seems so deliberative and self-aware. Not necessarily self-conscious, but self-aware. There’s an intentionality that I always feel about your music. And yet, you’re so prolific. And so I wonder how those two things can coexist.
Black metal is a genre I love. And I saw all these different ideas that I thought could be fruitfully incorporated into it. And so there was almost like a list of things to try. Not all of them worked. But when they did, they became a new way of working. And they would then suggest further ideas or combinations. I worked at that point for a long time, but honestly, a lot of the low-hanging fruit is kind of gone now. So what I’ve been trying to do in recent years is to simplify.
So let’s say we have this lower strata of whatever I’ve been doing longest. And then I kept piling new ideas on top of that strata without ever removing the strata. I’ve been trying to remove the lowest strata and leave this to make simpler work based on the more recently developed methods. Which has proven a challenge. And I think has slowed my pace. But honestly, I’m OK with a slower pace at this point in my life.
I imagine you would be. I mean, who do you have to report to?
Yeah.
And you’ve really mastered the art of doing your own thing at this point, right?
I mean, I prefer to work. It has drawbacks, I’m sure. But it’s nice to be able to just be free to do what I want, when I want.
Do you have a manager, PR, booking agent, any of those sort of figures in your camp?
No, no. I don’t play live, so I don’t get booked anywhere. I just make the music and release it.
So, along those lines, at what points have you been surprised by your music getting out there and reaching someone, say, like me?
It’s really great to connect to people through art. I really like human contact through art across generations, sometimes across thousands of years. It’s really an amazing way of communicating. So that means a lot. To be honest, I almost never read reviews. It’s kind of stressful. And they’re not really for the artist. They’re for listeners or potential listeners. So I don’t pay a lot of attention to that intentionally. But in theory, it’s great. Once I finish something, I move on to what’s next.
Right. And because you don’t play live, there’s no obligation to revisit a lot of past material, right? Given the fact that you’ve been making music for so long now, do you ever start writing a song – or maybe even complete a song – and think, “Did I do this one before?” And go back over and see if anything in your back catalog matches or sounds similar to something “new” that you’ve made?
I never really worried about it. I think I’ve inadvertently used the same song titles before. I can live with that.
Which ones come to mind?
I couldn’t even tell you. Sometimes someone will ask me about something from an album that’s, like, eight albums ago, and I have no recollection of it. I have to make room for new stuff [in my mind]. I don’t even think about it once it’s done, really. I have to assume that, with people with large bodies of work, it’s not so uncommon.
Musicians experience different senses of catharsis: the writing of a song, the completion of a song, feeling good about the fact that a song has been created. There’s other artists who really get a cathartic sense of release when they put out a song or release it. There’s other ones who feel that sense of catharsis when they perform it live. It sounds like for you, the act of creating and recording is enough for you to have that release.
I think the greatest pleasure I feel is in doing the editing, processing, arranging, producing. I don’t really enjoy playing a guitar, for instance, all that much. I do it to get the sounds recorded so then I can manipulate the sounds and arrange them. That’s where a lot of the pleasure of music making comes from for me.
How have you been challenging yourself with each successive release? Or do you? Are you trying to learn new instruments or new sounds and incorporate them with every new record? Do you perceive each next release as an opportunity to challenge yourself for fear of repetition?
Sometimes I set goals like that. After the Oviri era, maybe [I wanted] to do tracks that sound like remixes where you don’t have access to the original track, but only the remix. Or to do an album where it sounds like each track could have come from a different album. So it’s kind of like maximizing variety. With [2023’s] Unus Mundus Patet, I was really just trying to do something that was formally like a second-wave black-metal album. You know, doing shorter tracks.
I’ve been doing long tracks for so long and I wanted to do something where I at least got one track under five minutes and do some synth interludes like the black metal I grew up listening to. To do it and try to see what I could do with that kind of form.
I’ve had the pleasure of interviewing Mizmor and Aidan Baker over the last year. They are solo artists who are extremely productive but also collaborate a lot. How do you feel about collaborations?
It’s not something I have a lot of interest in. I’ve attempted it a few times and … yeah. It doesn’t work very well with my way of working, which I’m sure is a personal [defect]. I prefer to just do it myself.
Do you have a structure? Do you work on your music at certain hours of the day or do you have a routine?
No, it just invariably happens. It’s just one of the things that given the time, I just do. It’s just been a practice for a long time.
Do you have a long-term goal or objective? Like, was there a certain number of releases you want to put out? Do you feel like you’re in a headspace where you want to keep doing it until it becomes boring to you?
When I was younger, I had goals like that, and I don’t really have those anymore. I just try to make something that I find interesting. And if it feels like it was successful, then I release it.
Do you learn from your own records? Which is to say, when you’ve completed something, do you find that you’ve taught yourself something that you hadn’t really known or been aware of before when you embarked upon it?
I think that must happen, but it’s usually a pretty negative experience. When I listen to a completed work, I can see all the gaps and the things that didn’t work out the way I wanted. And sometimes things work out differently in an interesting way. But often, the next thing I do is kind of a reaction against the previous one, which is a sort of progress. Also, by the time you release something, you’ve listened to it so many times that it’s lost its magic for you.
It can be kind of hard to imagine what it’s like for a third party to hear it for the first time. You have a very different relationship with the work than anyone else ever will, really. I make music. If it seems adequate, I release it. That’s really the entire model.
Go to Jute Gyte’s Bandcamp page for more on this one-of-a-kind artist.
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