grauzone

grauzone - eisbaer

"ich moechte ein eisbaer sein... / eisbaere muessen nie weinen." (I'd like to be a polar bear..polar bears must never cry.")

grauzone is a swiss post-punk/electronic group from the early 80s, prime material from the Neue Deutsche Welle (New German Wave) scene, essentially the Deutsch incarnation of icey, metallic-inhuman electronic rock. "Eisbaer" was their most commercially successful effort, in which the singer longs for a Knutian transformation, not out of devotion to face-melting cuteness, but so that he can never cry again. It also sounds way better in German, natuerlich. "Ice Bear" being clearly more intimidating than "Polar Bear." The rest of grauzone's material is consistently shadowy, noisy and sonically inventive. For further research:

grauzone - collected releases

Tracklisting:
1. Moskau
2. Ein Tanz Mit Dem Tod
3. Ich Lieb Sie
4. Film 1
5. Film 2
6. Schlachtet!
7. Hinter Den Bergen
8. Maikäfer Flieg
9. Marmelade Und Himbeeries
10. Marmelade Und Himbeeries (Part Two)
11. Wütendes Glas (LP Version)
12. Kälte Kriecht
13. Kunstgewerbe
14. Der Weg Zu Zweit
15. In Der Nacht
16. Eisbär
17. Raum
18. Träume Mit Mir
19. Wütendes Glas (Single Version)

Tracks 1-4 taken from Moskau EP recorded November and December 1981
Tracks 5-15 taken from Grauzone LP recorded July & August 1981
Tracks 16-17 taken from Eisbär single recorded 1981
Tracks 18-19 taken from Träume Mit Mir single recorded 1982

special thanks to gute luft for the compilation efforts.

Bush & Beach: Axes to the Frozen Sea

Kate Bush - Hounds of Love

Beach House - You Came to Me

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There is a famous quote from Kafka, about what a book should be. It should be "an axe to the frozen sea inside us," he says. At times I wonder if this isn't also true for music, at least some music. There are some songs I find truly upsetting, that I avoid approaching carelessly, for fear of allowing them to needlessly provoke me.  Here are two of these songs. Each has a very specific moment that triggers a cold flurry of the nerves, a deep spinal rush, for a reason I can't explain. It's not that I'm reminded of a tender childhood idyll, or a bitter romantic letdown. It's that I feel as if a raw nerve inside me has been struck, one that I have to avoid thinking about too often if I want to be a person and live among others in this world.

1. I don't understand why I have to explain who Kate Bush is to my friends. 'Running Up the Hill' is obviously a classic, but no less spellbinding is the title track from her album 'Hounds of Love.' You know how you hate Tori Amos? Can you imagine if you took all of Tori Amos' characteristics but combined them into a version that you do like? I know, it takes a certain speculative stretch, but you can do it. This song is suffused with dreamy erotic energy and unnameable poetic passions. Also it has cool tom drums. It sounds like she's going to lose her shit while she's singing. The part that freaks me out is when she says "take my shoes off and throw them in the lake..and I'll be two steps on the water..."

2. I also don't understand why no one writes songs as heartfelt and mesmerizing as Beach House does. They make lots of other people's songs sound insincere and calculated by comparison. Also I have a natural disposition towards states of decadent, inonculated melancholy, which makes it quite easy to ride for these guys. This is my favorite song from Devotion, and the first one they played at Music Hall of Williamsburg last night, which forced me to abandon my drink order and rush to the mezzazine to watch. The raw-nerve jolt here is when the song switches into blissful outro mode and Victoria sings, in a tone that more often than not reduces me to tears, "you came to me...in my dreams..and spoke of everything.." The video matches the Beach House vibe quite well, it appears mildly slowed down, glittery, somnabulistic, a velvety opiate lullaby. 

Infinite Cosmic Lullaby / Suburban Balearic

Amon Duul - Love is Peace

American Analog Set - The Magnificent Seventies

Two acknowledged classics, very recommended. "Love is Peace" is the opener from the Duul's third album, where they trade in their lysergic drum-circle fever beats for some endless mellowed-out voyage through space and time - an infinite cosmic lullaby. When you hear "once I got a hang-up in the time machine"...."love is peace..freedom is harmony..." with disarming intensity, don't think barefoot live Dead twirling, but a shimmering excursion to a utopic counter-world. One of the top ten smoothest Krautrock jams maybe ever, the sonic drift on this one is pretty serious, make sure you keep an eye on the shoreline so you don't get swept to sea.

Decades later, American Analog Set takes the interlocking guitar lines and dreamy infinite groove and transposes it to master-planned communities and strip malls. No coincidence that the album's titled "From Our Living Room to Yours." Call it Suburban Balearic. The psychedelic long-player version of, as SY Lee says, "shouting the poetic truths of high school journal keepers." Here they sing "we left the house to see it shine...when we came back it was gone.." The long lysergic voyage has been transposed, now it's that journey to the end of the night in your parent's car with your closest friends, out on lonely highways awash in lunar glow.  

Addendum: Amon Duul was also a political bug-out art commune in Germany in the 60s. They ended up being two different bands, Amon Duul I and II. For a while Amon Duul I counted as a member Uschi Obermaier, a high-profile glamour girl / rock groupie in Germany at the time (she played maracas) - a bit like the Teutonic Marianne Faithful. 

Uschi Obermaier

There's a new documentary coming out of Obermaier's life, called "Eight Miles High (Das Wilde Leben)" and I wanted to post the clip but it literally has the most retarded "in a world..." voiceover ever, so screw it. Instead, here's Uschi and some other hot German Frauen making bombs in the 1969 pre-feminist cult classic Rote Sonne (Red Sun)