Tír Na HiFi

Johnny,

Consider it done, the K list, I mean.....after the football :-)



Here's one for starters :-) The cheapest seems to be Amazon....


This is a beautiful boxset representing excellent value for money, when you think how much it would cost to buy the CDs individually. The music of Popol Vuh is timeless, refreshing and deceptively simple: simple it may be, but once it sinks into your mind, it's unforgettable. The albums included in the set are amongst the best works of Popol Vuh and span a number of styles (the spooky electronics of Aguirre, the African songs of Cobra Verde, the poignant melancholy of Nosferatu), which are, at the same time, different and yet typically Popol Vuh.

The packaging is of a satisfyingly good finish and quality, whilst the design is suitably restrained and simple (that word again!). Of course, it won't fit in a CD rack, but it will look well on your bookshelf! There are many great photos in the book; the text is not especially informative (and some of it is repeated in each CD booklet) but why not let the music speak for itself? In any case, part of the appeal of Popol Vuh (and of Florian Fricke, its genius loci) is that air of ancient, inscrutable mystery that says "You don't need to understand every detail here - just enjoy it acceptingly, without questioning".

For fans wanting to complete their Popol Vuh collection, or for those just discovering this wonderful music, this boxset is an absolute must.

Found something I did earlier :-)


Johnny,

Here's a few essentials for your KG (Krautrock Guitar) list:

Can : Soundtracks - specifically for Side 2
Cannibalism 1 - Terrific primer/compilation
Tago Mago

Amon Duul 2 - Yeti - A stonewall classic with plenty of juicy guitar and other weird things :)
Tanz Der Lemmings - gets weirder by the day....

Popol Vuh - Einjaeger & Siebenjaegar - for Danny Fischelcher's sterling Telecaster work.
Seligpreissung
Hosianna Mantra - Featuring Conny Veit's beautifully liquid guitar sound

Faust - So Far - their most accessible album :)

Tangerine Dream - Richochet - First and best Live album - featuring Froese's guitar interjections.

Encore - Another Live one, this time from their American tour and featuring
all aspects of their slightly more easy listening style but still
compelling listening especially Side 3 - again Froese's guitar in
abundance - and Side 4 being the more experimental side.

Sorcerer - Their first and best soundtrack.

Footnote: Nobody has done more damage to the Tangs reputation than Froese himself with increasingly banal and pointless remixing of his group's back catalogue as well as releasing consistently poor albums over the past 30 years or so...

Agitation Free - Malesch

That'll do for time being...if you need more recommendations on the electronics side let me
know. I'm talking about the likes of Cluster,Roedelius et al.....

Edit: Here's a link from the top 100 in Ultima Thule's list (See worthwhile links thread)...

http://home.btconnect.com/ultimathule/krautrock.html - note: the list is in alphabetical order....



Here they are in all their pictorial glory and in no particular order:


















[/quote]

Wow! Thanks for that Dermot, Tower and Play.com are going to be seeing a lot of me! :-)

JAW wrote:Wow! Thanks for that Dermot, Tower and Play.com are going to be seeing a lot of me! :-)

You're welcome Johnny :-) Please don't hesitate to ask me about anything in the K canon you're not sure of, ok.... I'm currently investigating the weird and crazy world of the Jap scene with Julian's Japrocksampler as my guide. His number one choice from the Flower Travellin' Band is a sonic and musical delight that doesn't come across as weird at all. See my earlier post on the listening thread....

Motion Sickness Of Time Travel - Seeping Through The Veil Of The Unconscious





Seeping Through the Veil of the Unconscious" came to us out of nowhere as a demo and I think I can say with some certainty that it's the best demo we've ever received. Motion Sickness of Time Travel is the solo moniker of La Grange, Georgia's Rachel Evans. She also plays in the duo, Quiet Evenings, with her husband and runs the Hooker Vision label with him as well. And while she's done some really great stuff, this album takes all of it, everything, to incredible new heights.

Evans concocts five whirlwind romances all in the space of less than an hour. Beauty, magic and bleeding effervescence come together in perfect harmony. Vague electro meanderings hide hints of early Grouper as Evans' compositions sing like an ecstatic choir. While the songs are built around vaguely-catchy, repetitive synth backbones, she laces an incredible array of instrumental layers between those bones creating music that is as dense and complex as it is continous. Yet, the real star here is her voice. sometimes its at the fore, other times its buried underneath the plodding keys but it never gets lost and always shines.

As the opening chords and rising whispers of "Clairvoyance" begin, you are immediately immersed into the well. Evans' voice sings haunted, wordless lullabies that sound distant and strange yet oddly comforting. The entire aural world of "Seeping" is populated with ghosts, haunting the crevices between notes and adding a beguiling sense of complexity. With heavy kraut influences, "Mental Projection" is a midnight gem while the dark, rhythmic sequences of "Telepathy" would perfectly fill the halls of a spectral ballroom. These kraut and electronic leanings are part of what give Motion Sickness of Time Travel such a distinct sound. This is stunning music and an album that further unfolds with each and every listen.

Cleared - 'Cleared' with Steven Hess and Michael Valler on Immune

K. Leimer - Statistical Truth (2004)

Anyone remember this one? Mostly jazzy piano solos with a fabulous electronic piece on Side 2.

Followed by...

On Lp...





A Boomkat review and something to read :

*Amazing album of what are allegedly important 'lost' recordings spanning back a century and packaged in a sublime gatefold sleeve with die cut panelling - strictly limited copies* Eccentric avant-garde composer Felix Kubin has spent the last five years sifting and selecting this incredible volume of ancient sonic curios from archives and personal collections spanning back a century. Together with attached essay and extensive sleevenotes, this is an often surreal portal into the "foreign country" of the past, preserving for posterity sounds which may otherwise be resigned to the scrap heap of history without the world recognising their idiosyncratic charms. However, in similar fashion to Faitiche's Ursula Bogner recordings, we should say we've reserved a modicum of doubt as to their provenance, but when he's crediting them to heavyweight figures such as David Tudor, Oskar Sala and even Joseph Goebbels, replete with extensive backstories, the situation only becomes more muddied. The most divisive, and fantastical of these "recordings" is a 1min 10secs piece of "...atypical electrical activity on line" captured by a telephone engineer/voyeur at the residence of Finnish composer Jean Sibelius, apparently dated to the same time he held a séance attempting to contact deceased folk music specialist, Elias Lönnrot. It's either spine chilling or preposterous... we've love to go with the former. Elsewhere, there's the personal recording of Joseph Goebbels, Reich Minister of Public Enlightenment and Propaganda, dated to 1935, playing Oskar Sala's Volkstrautonium prototype, plus one of the very earliest recordings of John Cage collaborator David Tudor, a 1948 recording of Norwegian Whaling festival music, the sounds of a Pgymy hunting ritual in 1934 and just to test your faith, the sounds of a 7" reel found in a package post-marked 1918, with contents dated to 1951 and most likely produced in the early 1960s - go figure. Whether it's a beautiful work of sonic fiction or genuine documentation remains to be seen, but either way this is hugely fascinating and beautifully presented album worthy of your immediate and long term attention. Highly recommended!