CAN - SOON OVER BABALUMA @ 50

 

Released in November of 1974, CAN's fifth official studio album (excluding the aborted "Delay 1968" and "Soundtracks" compilation), Soon Over Babaluma, turns half a century old this month. In many ways, the album marks the end of the band's "classic" era, being the first to be recorded without vocalist, Damo Suzuki, and the last to be recorded using a 2 track recorder at their Inner Space studio. Subsequent albums would be created on a 16 channel system, which would drastically impact their compositional process, as they were afforded the luxury of overdubbing. It's something that would move them away from the immediacy of live improvisation, a key component of their early sound.

Even with the group still working within the limitations of 2 track recording, Soon Over Babaluma has a more refined and nuanced sound than their earlier work. For some, it was a softening that was unwelcome, but the album still offers some edge, particularly on the extended side 2 tracks, Chain Reaction & Quantum Physics. The songs on the first side, however, had much more of an accessible pop disposition, with Dizzy Dizzy kicking off the album with a bubbly, perky lightness. With Suzuki gone, vocal duties were taken up by guitarist Michael Karoli and keyboardist Irmin Schmidt, with both offering restrained, subdued performances that tended to blend into the music, rather than stand out. The end result garnered some ambivalence from music critics, who were unsure of the group's evolutionary intentions.

Personally, Soon Over Babaluma was my gateway into the band's work. As a rabid PiL fan, beginning in 1980, I'd often heard how CAN were a key inspiration, so they were certainly on the top of my list to investigate at my earliest convenience. However, it was not until July of 1982 that I was afforded the opportunity to finally check them out, when I came across this album in a little record shop in Banff, AB, as my family made their way from Thunder Bay, ON, to relocate in Powell River, BC. As such, it's always going to have a sentimental place in my life, though I might not consider it their greatest work. It's still on the higher end of the group's spectrum, albeit it marks the beginning of the end for the band's glory days as one of the world's most innovative and influential alternative rock bands.

CAN - MONSTER MOVIE @ 55

Released on August 16th, 1969, the debut studio album, Monster Movie, from German Krautrock pioneers, CAN, turns 55 years old today.

The band had formed the preceding year in Cologne, with founding members Holger Czukay (bass), Irmin Schmidt (keyboard), Jaki Liebezeit (drums) and Michael Karoli (guitar). Czukay and Schmidt were both from academic backgrounds and students of the composer Karlheinz Stockhausen, and were fascinated by the possibilities of rock and roll. Before the year was out, the quartet would add a fifth member with the recruitment of American vocalist, Malcolm Mooney. Together, they'd record their first album, Prepare to Meet Thy Pnoom, under the band name "Inner Space", but attempts to sell the record to any label were universally rejected, so the album was shelved and the group went back to the drawing board with a mind to craft something a bit more accessible. That first album would remain in the vaults until 1981, when it was finally released as "Delay 1968".

After abandoning their first recording attempt, the group accepted an invitation from a friend to move into his castle, Schloss Nörvenich, and use it as a recording studio. They also decided to change their name, with Mooney coming up with the suggestion to call themselves "CAN" because of its positive meanings in various languages. "Inner Space" wouldn't be abandoned completely, however, as it would become the official name for the band's recording studio, in its various incarnations, going forward.

While they were set up at the castle, they recorded their second album, which would be their debut release, Monster Movie. The LP brought together elements of psychedelic rock, blues, free jazz, world music and the influence of the Velvet Underground, for starters. It also introduced the band's distinctive approach to editing, with its side long track, You Do Right, being distilled to its 20 minute version from a jam session that originally ran for 8 hours. The end results were good enough for them to snag a contract with Liberty Records, and the LP was critically acclaimed upon its release. The image on the cover is a retrace of Galactus, as originally depicted by Jack Kirby (inked by Vince Colletta) in Marvel's Thor #134 - page 3, released in 1966.

Mooney's tenure with the band would be short lived, after the release of the album. He ended up suffering from e mental breakdown at one of their gigs when he began repeatedly shouting "upstairs, downstairs" for three hours, even after Can had stopped playing. On his psychiatrist's advice, he left Can and returned to the US at the end of 1969. He'd eventually return to the group, briefly, for their 1986 reunion album, Rite Time, though the group would disband again after the release of that album.

In terms of its legacy, Monster Movie established CAN as one of the leaders of the German experimental music scene of the 1970s, with their influence playing a major role in the development of post-punk aesthetics and styles in the wake of the punk rock explosion. Public Image Ltd's mammoth masterpiece, Metal Box, could be seen as a direct homage of sorts to their influence, especially with it being packaged in a metal canister. It's an influence and impact that continues to resonate through the outer reaches of contemporary alternative music to this day.

CAN - EGE BAMYASI @ 50

 

Marking half a century on the shelves this month is the third studio album from CAN, Ege Bamyasi, which was released in November of 1972. With the title and cover inspired by a can found by Jaki in a Turkish shop, Ege Bamyası translates as "Aegean okra”.

Prior to the release of the album, the song Spoon, was released as a single and became a German radio hit, reaching #6 on the charts by virtue of it being used as a the theme for a popular mini-series, Das Messer (The Knife). The success of the single helped to finance the lease of a large ex-cinema in Weilerswist near Cologne, which the band converted into part studio, part residence. The remainder of the album would be recorded there and the location would become their home base going forward, renamed “Inner Space”.

The album continued the group’s exploration of organic improvised jam sessions, with Holger Czukay handling the recording process. For this LP, vocalist Damo Suzuki remained as part of the band, though recording the album became somewhat sidetracked as Suzuki and keyboardist Irmin Schmidt became preoccupied by their obsessive chess games. This meant that recording became more frantic as time went on and the group ended up recording songs practically in real time. The single, Spoon, ended up being added to the album due to the shortfall of finished material in order to fill out the LP.

Despite the rushed nature of the album, critical reception was extremely enthusiastic and it has gone on to be recognized as one of the group’s finest LPs from this era. Over the last 50 years, it has become hugely influential in the realm of alternative rock music, inspiring artists around the world with its distinctive application of improvisation and rhythmic innovation.

CAN - FLOW MOTION @ 45

 

Released in October of 1976, CAN’s seventh studio album, Flow Motion, is celebrating its 45th anniversary this month. It’s an album that continued the major shift in the way CAN created in the studio, something started with their previous LP, Landed, and was rather divisive among the group’s fans at the time of its release.

CAN always recorded in their own studios, Inner Space, but their equipment drove them to compose in a mostly “live” improvised manner for their early albums as they lacked the ability to do extensive multi-tracking. The arrival of a 16 channel recording system in 1975 meant that they could work in an entirely different manner than they had before and this was part of what drove them to pursue what some would consider more accessible music as the ability to consider and arrange songs usurped the improvisational approach of earlier works. As they came to grips with the possibilities of their new tools, they became interested in working with structures like reggae and disco inspired rhythms, a move that would prove somewhat unpopular with some.

The opening cut from the album, I Want More, and it’s reprisal on the side A closing track, And More, build on a shuffling disco beat with the opening track becoming something of a hit single in the UK, one of CAN's biggest ever. It even scored them a slot on Top Of the Pops, which was great for exposure, but hardcore fans of the band weren’t into seeing them lip-syncing and dancing on the BBC and a lot of them started to write the band off as sell-outs. But in retrospect, the fact is that it’s simply a damn good little song that deserved the popularity it garnered and, once people got off their “high horses” and gave it a chance, they came to recognize its charms.

Much of the rest of the album plays around with variations on reggae rhythms, with Cascade Waltz coming up with the ingenious idea of fusing a reggae shuffle into a 3/4 time signature. While there’s a lot of accessible, compact music on the album, it’s not without its darker turns as is the case with the thundering percussion, like rolling storm clouds, on Smoke (E.F.S. No. 59), or the sprawling strangeness of the album’s ten minute plus closing title track. All in, the balance between so-called “mainstream” dalliances and CAN’s usual weirdness, something that is never truly absent from any of their albums, add up to a pretty great listen. Of their late ‘70s releases, it’s one of my favorites and one of the most thoroughly listenable from this era.

INFLUENTIAL ALBUM - THE STOOGES, FUN HOUSE

Recorded 50 years ago (May, 1970), The Stooges sophomore LP was not my introduction to Iggy Pop, but it was the album that got me to turn my gaze to the past for challenging music and not just look forward. I'd read about Iggy and his antics in various music magazines like CREEM and Hit Parader a couple of years before I bought any of his records, but it was his 1979 appearance on The Midnight Special that got me ready to pull out my wallet in a record store. I think it was the episode hosted and curated by The Cars where they played two of his latest promo videos for his recently released New Values LP. Both Five Foot One and I'm Bored were aired that night and that was all I needed to become a fan of Mr. Pop.

At the time I bought New Values, my attention and interests were firmly forward facing in terms of looking for new music. I wasn't at all interested in what had come before. The zeitgeist of the times, with "punk" and "new wave", was to blast away the past and focus on the future. That said, when I kept reading references to The Stooges and how they were the "first punk band", my obsessive collector nature kicked in and I decided to roll back the clock 9 years and dip my toe in with The Stooges second album, Fun House. I decided to start there because I wasn't quite ready to abandon the current decade and step into the 1960s with their debut, though that would come to my collection soon enough.

Fun House appealed to me, at least superficially, thanks to the insane looking album cover. Iggy looked like he was on a slide, heading into the bowels of hell. The fiery color pallet and posterized graphic style gave the album a look of intensity and the contents didn't disappoint. Within its grooves was a kind of raw rock & roll which was nastier than any heavy metal, and sleazier than what I'd found to that point within the punk/new wave sphere. This was pretty scary music made by disreputable people who probably did questionable things in seedy places. Definitely not the kind of fellows the parents would invite over for dinner. It was stripped down and bare and edgy and way ahead of its time. It also took chances, like the manic finale freak-out of LA Blues, a song that felt like it left your turntable in ruins.

Once I heard this music, my mind was opened up to the reality that challenging music wasn't only happening in the present, but that there were precedents for it in the past and that it was worthwhile for me to turn at least some of my attention in that direction and understand some of the roots of the music with which I was obsessed. From this vantage point, bands like The Velvet Underground, CAN, Silver Apples and many others became fair game for exploration and helped expand my understanding of the way the past influenced the present. It helped me understand that these new bands I was falling in love with were standing atop some pretty impressive shoulders and those needed to be appreciated as well.

40 YEARS LATER - THE LEGEND LIVES ON... JAH WOBBLE IN "BETRAYAL"

May 9th marks the 40th anniversary of the release of Jah Wobble's debut solo LP, The Legend Lives On - Jah Wobble In 'Betrayal', which was unleashed on this day in 1980.

Let's start by reminding people of the career of another bass player for Johnny Rotten and its tragic end. After the Sex Pistols, Sid Vicious went on to self destruct rather quickly and spectacularly within a very short time after the demise of the band that made him famous. As such, Jah Wobble stepping out from behind John Lydon to kick off a solo career, being not entirely dis-similarly reputed for his indulgences (though with booze instead of smack), cast this release with its own level of suspicion. One could not be blamed for expecting this career move to potentially be as short lived and disastrous.

Indeed, Wobble pushed out the boat with a good deal of levity and frivolity for his initial outing. Frankly, the whole endeavor came off as something of a joke and, in fact, proved to be a fatal coffin nail for his relationship with the band that made HIM famous, Public Image Ltd. Surreptitiously pilfering PiL backing tracks to recycle for his solo album didn't sit well with Mr. Lydon and, once the band had completed it's US tour, Wobble found himself out of the enterprise with little fanfare. The band would go on to prove that they didn't need his bass or anyone else's on the virtually bass-less Flowers of Romance.

However, Wobble's career would prove to be no "flash in the pan" as he soon found his feet, connecting with the likes of Holger Czukay (CAN) and The Edge (U2) and ultimately forging a solo career which has spanned decades and dozens of acclaimed releases and shows no signs of faltering to this day. Within that context, it is possible to look back on this album and discover that, while it was possessed of a certain irreverence and sense of mischief, it still managed to deliver some innovation and a jolly good time, once you twigged that it was meant for a "larf"!

Personally, as a devout, fanatical aficionado of all things PiL, the thought of a solo album by Wobble was a no-brain'r. This was to be acquired, forthwith. Fortunately, I was able to special order the album through one of my local record shops. Upon its arrival, I was pretty instantly swept up in its craziness. Though the ideas weren't without precedent, this was the first record I'd come across which utilized the concept of the "remix" as it featured alternate versions of two songs from the PiL canon; The Suit, reworked and augmented to become Blueberry Hill, and Graveyard/Another, dub mixed as an instrumental, Not Another. As silly as it all seems, the album explores a lot of dub production techniques, in some ways even more extremely than what PiL had done on Metal Box. The touches of reggae were also more apparent as some songs went directly into the genre rather than offering glancing blows like Metal Box.

I loved it and still love it, though it baffles my mind that Virgin Records were willing to give Wobble money and studio time to create what was very much an indulgence and a private joke at the expense of the label. This is one of the reasons it stands out as it's a rare example where a musician has been able to get backing to go into a studio and just piss about for the hell of it and actually have the results pressed on vinyl and sold to the world. As a musician, that willingness to throw caution to the wind and try something silly has been a guiding principal ever since hearing this album. I've done a lot of crazy experiments because I was emboldened by the brevity of this LP. Yes, it was a swindle in the best "punk" tradition, but a fun and delightful listen in the end, proving that you don't have to be so goddamned serious all the time in the studio! 

 

PLAYLIST - THE LEGEND LIVES ON... JAH WOBBLE IN "BETRAYAL"