Phantom Band

CD version. Originally released in 1981 on Sky Records, Bureau B reissues the second album by Phantom Band , a Cologne combo assembled by Can drummer Jaki Liebezeit . By this point in the band's history, ex-Can bass player Rosko Gee (earlier Steve Winwood 's bassist in Traffic ) had left the band. The surviving quartet managed without a bass for the most part (or substituted a keyboard) and invited spoken-word performer Sheldon Ancel to step up to the microphone. And while the debut album revealed many Caribbean or African influences and a generally positive frame of mind, Freedom Of Speech is a somewhat darker avant-garde rock manifesto, interspersed with individual dub or reggae pieces. Regular Phantom Band members alongside Jaki Liebezeit included keyboarder Helmut Zerlett , known to a wider television audience in Germany through the Harald Schmidt Show , percussionist Olek Gelba and guitarist Dominik von Senger , all drawn from the deep pool of Cologne musical talent which has given rise to so many projects over the past thirty years: Dunkelziffer , Damo Suzuki Band , Unknown Cases ("Masimba Bele"), Club Off Chaos , and Trance Groove , to name just a few. The CD booklet features comments by Asmus Tietchens .