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Flow Motion
The second of Can's three Virgin albums, 1976's Flow Motion, is a divisive record in the group's canon. It was their most commercially successful album (the opening track, "I Want More," was released as a single in the U.K. and actually charted, thanks to its smoothly percolating near-disco groove, which makes it resemble a late-period Roxy Music hit), but many fans dismiss it as the group's feint toward commercial success. That fluke hit aside, the charge doesn't really hold water. There's a ne…
Saw Delight
1977's Saw Delight is the German progressive group's farewell. Percussionist Reebop Kwaku Baah and bassist Rosko Gee from a late-era lineup of Traffic to add a sort of Afro-Cuban jazz feel to their sound. Similarly, Rosko Gee's handling of the bass duties (which he performs superbly throughout, adding an almost Mingus-like rhythmic intensity to even the loosest songs) frees Holger Czukay to add electronics and sound effects to the proceedings. The opening "Don't Say No" recalls the controlled fu…
Out Of Reach
All but unknown to most but the most hardcore Can fanatics, 1978's Out of Reach is one of the group's rarest albums. This is due in large part to the fact that bassist Holger Czukay left the band before the recording sessions, and drummer Jaki Liebezeit has a greatly reduced role, leaving most of the rhythm duties to percussionist-come-lately Reebop Kwaku Baah. As on the group's proper swan song, 1977's Saw Delight, new bassist Rosko Gee largely leads the group, and his jazz-inflected playing is…
Can 1978
Mute brought back more Can than any krautrock fan could possibly handle with the 'Can Vinyl Box', which featured seventeen Can records reissued in one bundle; now each record is stepping out on its own. The self-titled 'Can' is the band's eleventh record, released in 1978 and unfamiliar to most. Like 'Out of Reach', little of the music, if any at all, is attributed to the band's founding member Holger Czukay, who stepped back in the writing and composing department. It would be Can’s last album …
Rite Time
'Rite Time’ was originally released in 1986 and has been evaluated as one of the classic Can albums. "An unexpected reunion from Can (made even more unexpected by the presence of original singer Malcolm Mooney, who left the band in 1969), 1989's Rite Time is in large part a return to form for the group, especially when one considers how weak Can's last few '70s albums were. Wisely, the quintet doesn't try to replicate the sound they created over two decades before on albums like Monster Movie. I…
Can
Mute brought back more Can than any krautrock fan could possibly handle with the 'Can Vinyl Box', which featured seventeen Can records reissued in one bundle; now each record is stepping out on its own. The self-titled 'Can' is the band's eleventh record, released in 1978 and unfamiliar to most. Like 'Out of Reach', little of the music, if any at all, is attributed to the band's founding member Holger Czukay, who stepped back in the writing and composing department.
The Singles
This unique document is the first time Can's singles have been presented together and shows the breadth of their influential career, from well loved tracks like Halleluwah, Vitamin C and I Want More to more obscure singles such as Silent Night and Turtles Have Short Legs. "Turtles Have Short Legs," was the band's third single released in 1971 and never appeared on a studio album. This was recorded around the time of the Tago Mago sessions with the line up of Holger Czukay, Michael Karoli, J…
1976
After the big success of our reissue of Günter Schickert’s amazing Samtvogel LP we present another of his projects, GAM - on which he joined Axel Struck and Michael Leske. A powerful trio of mindexpanding krautrock sounds formed in 1973, they recorded their first sessions in 1976, improvising directly to tape in Schickert’s basement - but these weren’t released until 1986, originally in cassette format - reissued some years later on CD. The sound of GAM 1976 differs a bit to that of Samtvogel. O…
44½ : Live + Unreleased Works
Art Zoyd - 44 1/2 : Live and Unreleased Works 12 x CDs + 2 x DVDs box set with book. 'Art Zoyd is a quartet, but their instrumental arsenal produces the sound of a mighty orchestra.' – The New York Times Originally founded as a psychedelic / progressive rock band in France in 1969, with the arrival of soon-to-be co-leaders Gerard Hourbette and Thierry Zaboitzeff in 1971 and then with the departure of the band's founder, the group radically changed direction. By 1975 they were no longer a ‘rock'…
Girlrls!
Also for the first time on vinyl Girlrl, second album of Eiliff, is also a considerable album. It was recorded in famous Hamburg studio Windrose and was similar to the first album. Arguably their music was marginally more loud and direct, thus bringing their music marginally closer to rock. Intense chopping piano and organ, along with excellent drums and firm bass guitar providing a structure for a wealth of superb guitar from virtuoso Houschäng Nejadepour, and lots of smooth 'Mother styled' ele…
Eiliff
For the first time on vinyl Eiliffs eponymous album is a true classic for all lovers of early German rock music. Eiliff were formed in Cologne in the late sixties. Their powerful tour-de-force of complex progressive rock/ jazz-rock fusion can draw comparisons to King Crimson, Soft Machine, Van Der Graaf Generator, or, with regard to German Bands, Nine Days Wonder, Alcatraz oder later groups such as Thirsty Moon. Eiliff had a unique style based on their considerable individual talents. Their fir…
Utopia 1972
Recorded at the same time (July 1972) at the same studio (Bavaria Studios, Munich) as Amon Düül II`s well known and of their best efforts 'Wolf City', Utopia was a common project by Amon Düül II producer and musician Olaf Kübler (saxophone, moog) and Düül bass player Lothar Meid. Using the synergy of the parallel sessions with the Wolf City recordings, Olaf Kübler appreciated Düüls singer Renate Knaup-Krötenschwanz as singer of 2 of the album tracks and Düül heads Weinzierl and Karrer on guitar …
Phallus Dei
Amon (from the Egyptian sun god) Düül (a German-Turkish derivative of Moon) were a 60s student hippy commune based in Munich, in what was then West Germany. Among their various expressions of free living they occasionally performed rudimentary music where anything went, and being at all proficient was more of a hindrance than a way in to one of their performances, which were mainly for their own amusement anyway. Guitarist and violinist Chris Karrer, frustrated at the lack of direction, along wi…
Ak Musick
CD Edition. Mental Experience present first ever reissue of AK Musick, originally released in 1972. Radical, freaked-out sound with hints of free-jazz, improv and avant-garde, AK Musick was an improv collective assembled by clarinetist Hans Kumpf to "make music in a very democratic way". The five players had a classical education but they were also influenced by avant-garde composers like Helmut Lachenmann and Johannes Fritsch. Their only album, AK Musick, was recorded at the famous Bauer Stud…
Sternzeit
LP version. Bureau B present a reissue of Adelbert Von Deyen's debut album Sternzeit, originally released in 1978. Adelbert Von Deyen is a protagonist of the so-called Berlin School (Berliner Schule) of electronic music. On his debut album, he takes his time to develop sound structures, often drifting, floating blissfully into tonal interference. The listener also requires time and patience, but will be rewarded with a Zen-like state of contemplation. Adelbert Von Deyen's musical backstory follo…
Collage
After his adventure with My Solid Ground, Ingo Werner formed Baba Yaga. Named after the Slavic folklore character his new adventure seemed to be more a solo project. On this second LP Ingo Werner chose to join forces with santur, sitar, tabla player Nemat Darman, an Iranian musician who also contributed congas, cymbal, gong, timpani, drums and vibraphone, and record the whole album as a duo. Werner would play EMS, Davoli and Solina-string synthesizer, clavinet, electric piano and grand piano, be…
Featuring Ingo Werner
After his adventure with My Solid Ground, Ingo Werner formed Baba Yaga. Named after the Slavic folklore character his new adventure seemed to be more a solo project (he plays electric piano, piano, mellotron, synthesizer, organ, clavinet, bassoon and gong, besides being the composer of the music), but it is made with the cooperation of other musicians - most notably Bernd Weidmann who, in addition to singing and playing bass also contibuted with some lyrics. Other musicians in the recording are …
Faust IV
Exact replica, officially reissued by EMI. 180 gram audiophile pressing with printed inner sleeve; digitally remastered from original tapes. This reissue was "researched, spearheaded and co-ordinated" by Tom Recchion who has supplied rare artwork for the inner sleeve -- and, in general, this is a state-of-the-art edition. The fourth and final album to be released during Faust's original lifespan, originally released by Virgin Records in 1973. "As an album, IV matches the band's trajectory: Jumbl…
Impressions On Reading Aldous Huxley
Conceived as a studio project and conceptually inspired by the world of sci-fi novelist Aldous Huxley, Brave New World was created by Reinhart Firchow (recorders, flutes, ocarina, Stylophone, percussion, vocals), John O'Brien-Docker (guitars, organ, percussion, vocals, wind chimes) and Herb Geller (flutes, cor anglais, saxophones, organ). They where aided by Dicky Tarrach (drums, percussion), Lucas Lindholm (bass, bass fiddle, organ, piano) and Esther Daniels (voice). Irishman John O'Brien-Docke…
Cologne Curiosities:The Unknown Krautrock Underground, 1972-1976
“Cologne Curiosities” collects, for the first time on vinyl, all the otherwise unpublished/un-reissued material that firstly appeared on the three "Unknown Deutschland - The Krautrock Archive" CDs released on Virgin during 1996. These CD only releases were originally compiled by Trevor Manwaring (Paratactile, Impetus, Virgin, Harmonia Mundi) from tapes supplied to him by Toby Robinson. Toby - aka The Mad Twiddler, aka Genius P. Orridge - is well-known to Krautrock collectors as one of a number …