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Can
Can
When CAN (then known as The Can) debuted with Monster Movie, they seemed like a particularly strange psychedelic band: four hard-jamming Germans (with backgrounds in avant-garde, classical music, and jazz), fronted by a sandpaper-voiced African-American, Malcolm Mooney. Nobody knew yet that they'd become the godfathers of the German experimental rock movement. CAN didn't write songs in the usual sense; instead, they'd improvise for hours on end, rooted by drummer Jaki Liebezeit's crisp, inventive patterns. Then bassist Holger Czukay would edit the results down to their good parts. Michael Karoli's wailing, atonal guitar parts are wilder then almost any other psych band dared to be at the time. Their specialist is hitting a groove and staying there, as on the 20-minute lust letter, "Yoo Doo Right." Delay 1968, recorded around the same time, is so good it's hard to believe it stayed in the, er, can for another 13 years. It's CAN's most raucous and insistent record, with Karoli riffing harder than he ever would again, and Mooney's hoarse, off-key cries suiting its avant-garage vibe. (Radiohead has been known to cover "Thief" in concert.) Mooney left in 1970 and was replaced by an itinerant freak from Japan who integrated his voice into the band's improvisations more than Mooney had. Most of Soundtracks sounds like the transitional album it is- gentle psych in the vein of some of the things Pink Floyd was doing around the same time- but the band shines on the one-chord freakout "Mother Sky" and Mooney gets in a quiet, jazzy one, "She Brings the Rain." Tago Mago is CAN's masterpiece, a double album with seven long, trippy pieces that were years ahead of their time. The vicious, stealthy crack of "Mushroom" became a standard at post-punk era clubs. "Aumgn" is an echo-crazed-bad-trip of a showcase for Karoli and keyboardist Irmin Schmidt, sounds right at home on any chill-out compilation today, three decades later. A terser, somewhat calmer variation on the sound and style of Tago Mago, Ege Bamyasi consolidated CAN's fan following with the singalong "Spoon" which became a hit in Germany. Future Days sets its sights a little lower. Other than one attempt at a pop-song ("Moonshake") the rest of the album is three long, dreamy pieces that suggest CAN was listening to a lot of electric-era Miles Davis and came the closest they were ever going to get to the "krautrock" scene as their scene-mates Kraftwerk and Neu! Suzuki departed before Soon Over Babaluma, and CAN found themselves without a singer for the first time. From then on, Karoli handled most of their relatively rare vocals. Soon Over Babaluma is mellow and timid, except for "Chain Reaction" whose with its swift, slamming pulse anticipates what techno records would sound like 20 years later. Landed starts strongly with the proto-new wave "Full Moon on the Highway"; maybe the most conventional pop song the band recorded. Flow Motion spawn an actual hit single in the U.K. with "I Want More." Saw Delight saw a few more curious disco experiments, but it was like the band wanted to make a slick commercial record but to do so would sabotage themselves all together as the true experimenters that they were. Out of Reach is dismissed by the band as a ghastly mistake. They somehow pulled it together for 1979's self-titled album. Johnny Rotten was a fan and wanted to be their new singer but the band had decided to quit while they were ahead. In 1986, the original lineup of CAN- including Malcolm Mooney- reunited for the sessions that became Rite Time. Since then, the members of CAN have continued to make occasional appearances on each other's records. 2012 gave us the excellent The Lost Tapes, curated by Irmin Schmidt himself. It was so great, but apparently, and unfortunately, that release cleared the vaults, so the promise of a release of any new jams seems bleak. Oh well, we have a ton of music from this wonderful band to listen to. The high-water-mark for them was their run from Tago Mago to Future Days, but I have found, sorta' like the Beatles, that fans of CAN have a specific era they like the most. This is true experimental rock. Luckily, it sounds fuckin' awesome. C'mon and become a fan... It'...
CAN
Can
Can
When CAN (then known as The Can) debuted with Monster Movie, they seemed like a particularly strange psychedelic band: four hard-jamming Germans (with backgrounds in avant-garde, classical music, and jazz), fronted by a sandpaper-voiced African-American, Malcolm Mooney. Nobody knew yet that they'd become the godfathers of the German experimental rock movement. CAN didn't write songs in the usual sense; instead, they'd improvise for hours on end, rooted by drummer Jaki Liebezeit's crisp, inventive patterns. Then bassist Holger Czukay would edit the results down to their good parts. Michael Karoli's wailing, atonal guitar parts are wilder then almost any other psych band dared to be at the time. Their specialist is hitting a groove and staying there, as on the 20-minute lust letter, "Yoo Doo Right." Delay 1968, recorded around the same time, is so good it's hard to believe it stayed in the, er, can for another 13 years. It's CAN's most raucous and insistent record, with Karoli riffing harder than he ever would again, and Mooney's hoarse, off-key cries suiting its avant-garage vibe. (Radiohead has been known to cover "Thief" in concert.) Mooney left in 1970 and was replaced by an itinerant freak from Japan who integrated his voice into the band's improvisations more than Mooney had. Most of Soundtracks sounds like the transitional album it is- gentle psych in the vein of some of the things Pink Floyd was doing around the same time- but the band shines on the one-chord freakout "Mother Sky" and Mooney gets in a quiet, jazzy one, "She Brings the Rain." Tago Mago is CAN's masterpiece, a double album with seven long, trippy pieces that were years ahead of their time. The vicious, stealthy crack of "Mushroom" became a standard at post-punk era clubs. "Aumgn" is an echo-crazed-bad-trip of a showcase for Karoli and keyboardist Irmin Schmidt, sounds right at home on any chill-out compilation today, three decades later. A terser, somewhat calmer variation on the sound and style of Tago Mago, Ege Bamyasi consolidated CAN's fan following with the singalong "Spoon" which became a hit in Germany. Future Days sets its sights a little lower. Other than one attempt at a pop-song ("Moonshake") the rest of the album is three long, dreamy pieces that suggest CAN was listening to a lot of electric-era Miles Davis and came the closest they were ever going to get to the "krautrock" scene as their scene-mates Kraftwerk and Neu! Suzuki departed before Soon Over Babaluma, and CAN found themselves without a singer for the first time. From then on, Karoli handled most of their relatively rare vocals. Soon Over Babaluma is mellow and timid, except for "Chain Reaction" whose with its swift, slamming pulse anticipates what techno records would sound like 20 years later. Landed starts strongly with the proto-new wave "Full Moon on the Highway"; maybe the most conventional pop song the band recorded. Flow Motion spawn an actual hit single in the U.K. with "I Want More." Saw Delight saw a few more curious disco experiments, but it was like the band wanted to make a slick commercial record but to do so would sabotage themselves all together as the true experimenters that they were. Out of Reach is dismissed by the band as a ghastly mistake. They somehow pulled it together for 1979's self-titled album. Johnny Rotten was a fan and wanted to be their new singer but the band had decided to quit while they were ahead. In 1986, the original lineup of CAN- including Malcolm Mooney- reunited for the sessions that became Rite Time. Since then, the members of CAN have continued to make occasional appearances on each other's records. 2012 gave us the excellent The Lost Tapes, curated by Irmin Schmidt himself. It was so great, but apparently, and unfortunately, that release cleared the vaults, so the promise of a release of any new jams seems bleak. Oh well, we have a ton of music from this wonderful band to listen to. The high-water-mark for them was their run from Tago Mago to Future Days, but I have found, sorta' like the Beatles, that fans of CAN have a specific era they like the most. This is true experimental rock. Luckily, it sounds fuckin' awesome. C'mon and become a fan... It'...
CAN
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