MAGMA - rfi

good lord.

what is that, anyway? new album?

also, lol:
http://us.fotolia.com/id/5774703

goddamnit

It's a new Christian Vander & friends record, a tribute to Coltrane as is probably obvious. There's supposedly a new Magma album being recorded too, but it'll be this new piece they've been doing called Felicite Thosz, which is pretty awful tbh so I'm not really bothered about it.

yeah, i wouldn't say awful, but from what I remember, not as driving as some of their other epics (maybe more similar to Offering than Magma?)

However, if new record has "Slag Tanz" on it, I'd buy it for that alone

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=elYKaEGlTCk

yea, was going to say exactly that. 'slag tanz' is incredible.

when this gets released, really think it's going to join the ranks of classic magma tracks

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ShPyiQEPGYM

and when did they start playing w/an orchestra???

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BmJZxdt1hAs

agreed about the 1st track you posted. a serious highlight when I saw them last year. so heavy!

I still can't get past the first album (not to say it's incomprehensible or anything - I'm just fascinated with it to the point where I don't want to hear their later stuff yet)

oh man, you're in for a treat.

if you ever get the chance to see them live, jump on it. one of the best shows I've been to. the '75 live album is prob my favorite magma release too.

would love to regardless of how little I know of their music, but somehow I don't think Green Bay is on their list of U.S. cities to visit..

If you say they're good I'll d/l a few more discs off eMusic or something - I didn't like Autechre until you mentioned how brilliant you thought they were, then they suddenly clicked, so I'll take your word for it here

hah, nice.

definitely get live from 1975 (sometimes confusingly titled live kohntark or live hhai). the versions of 'hhai' and 'mekanik zain' on there are definite but the whole recording is fantastic.

I'm a big, big fan of their last studio release Ëmëhntëhtt-Ré too. essential.

if you're into the first lp, try 1001 degres centigrades. it's the closest in feel to that one though not as scattershot and already trending towards the hypnotic sound they would eventually land on and become obsessed with. unfortunately, not much else in their catalog sounds much like these early records aside from various rarities from that era.

obviously, these will not be on emusic, but the live dvds they released a few years ago are killer. check out this incredible version of 'de futura':

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kzlMw8jqv4k

if you use spotify, an impressive amount of their material is on there as well.

or, if you decide to go that another route, I imagine it would fun to just dig through release by release. fascinating catalog imo.

so that's how they ended up sounding, eh?

I'll probably wind up just going in order, partially b/c I'm OCD about this (it's been awesome to do that for Ae and there are a lot of artists where I *wish* I had gone that way), partially because I really want to see how they arrived at the sound everyone talks about. Kobaia sounds like a neat little jazz-rock oddity, in fact outside of some of the more "out there" vocal parts, it's fairly straight, but totally addictive

yeah, kobaia is a weird one but mostly in the context of the rest of their stuff. I like it a lot as well.

New album out May 30th!

http://www.seventhrecords.com/indexuk.html

:) (but wtf, no slag tanz)

yeah thats too bad. esp since it looks like it will only run just over half an hr :-/

I got Udu Wudu on mp3 and it is great, very fresh for you alternative types! But there is something too ahistoric, un-seventies about owning it on mp3. I suspect it is worth the $30-40 the LP is going for on ebay...

Haven't seen mention of the remastered box set that came out like 3-4 years ago in the messages i've read on this thread, Sound seriously improved over the previous version of the cds.
I'm assuming that edition is currently available individually.
Was surprised that the end tone on MDK & Kohntarkhosz that I thought might be a glitch on the previous version was retained. i haven't heard the original vinyl so can't tell if it's on there too.

http://www.therocktologist.com/interview-with-christian-vander.html
Fear not, Slag Tanz will be on disc eventually

I'm really digging the Univeria Zekt disc, but was this really meant to be a Magma album? Anyway that 11 minute piece at the end "Africa Anteria" is such a crazy earworm, I just can't get enough of these guys.

huh. the way he phrases it makes it sounds like "slag tanz" will BE the next album. could just be a second language thing but I am kind of salivating thinking of that track stretched out emehntett-re style.

So, this new one... First listen and the piano on it is real pretty so far.

alright, I just heard MDK for the first time and, uh...yeah, that's got to be one of the most intense first listens to any album I can remember. like, if I was in an altered state of mind, I might have shed a tear or two

reason #lostcount I love this band: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mRol2CJYwAM

longest and best version of "Slag Tanz" yet -- a track that has yet to be released, and has already evolved into a classic mini-epic. Magma pieces never remain static, even some of their most famous pieces from the 70s feature new twists when they play live. Inspiring.

thank you. love when this thread gets revived!

finally heard Felicite Thosz this weekend on a road trip to LA. it's short. we played it twice.

yeah, I usually play it twice too

John Quijada, creator of a hyper-precise invented language, was inspired as a kid by Magma's created language-

http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2012/12/24/121224fa_fact_foer

yeah, and now certain Russians are very inspired by him...excellent piece.

I've been pretty obsessed with Wurdah Itah lately. What an incredible piece of work that is. One of those albums that I just immediately have to play again whenever I listen to it. I don't even have the words for it, everything after about 4 minutes in is just stunning. I can definitely see why so many people have a religious connection with this music.

Holy cow, Live/Hhai is just amazing. This is like the music that Zappa should've made had he not, y'know, been Frank Zappa. What are the other live albums to check out??

What's Kobaian for goalkeeper?

BBC 1974 is very well recorded, with a pretty brooding version of Kohntarkosz.
Theater du Taur 1975 and Opera de Reims 1976 sound like they were recorded from the toilets, but capture the full crazed intensity they were cooking up back then.
Bobino 1981 is best avoided if you're not into their funky fusion phase, a lot of it's good though but sounds a bit more like their subsequent band Offering.
Theusz Hamtaahk Trilogie and the Mythes et Legendes DVDs feature the newer line-up, it's good but not as insane as they used to be.

The Retrospektiw discs are great -- you just have to put up with some (actually pretty classic) 80s synths. However, the version of "Theusz Hamtaahk" on it is definitive, and I love the extended version of "Hhai".

Oh yeah, those are on my list to get (Retrospektiw). Was wondering about the newer live albums since there seem to be a lot lately and I'll bet they're a lot better recorded than some of the earlier stuff. Are they all very different?

The newer records by Magma are pretty much all good (live or not) if you like the band. Matt#2 has a point in that they aren't quite the same ball of fire they were in the 70s, but on the other hand, they add new wrinkles to all the pieces, and the performances/recordings are ace. I saw Magma in New York a few years ago, and it's probably the best concert I've ever seen.

I may have been at the same show, and yeah, co-signed! one of the live sets I've ever caught.

For me the Retrospektiw discs are the best of all. I love the synths, always felt they should've have gone farther down that road!

Aside from that, my favs are the AKT Live at BBC and also the newer 1979 live thing which is beyond killer with energy levels going straight through the roof. I also have a bootleg called live in Bremen featuring Jannick Top which gets played a hell of a lot. It's the most apocalyptic of all their stuff! They play KMX twice and both takes are staggering. Top especially sounds like some ferocious Lovecraftian monster or something. Worth tracking down!!!

Another really underrated one is the AKT Les voix de Magma which has Wurdah Itah and Zess extracts performed with choir and pianos and nothing else... maybe their most beautiful album of all. But I also am a huge fan of everything Vander did in the 80s!

xp - Well I can hardly imagine anything with the same amount of fire as the last track on Hhai. I was kind of stunned by how stupidly fast it was - were there 2 drummers or was that all Vander?

I have seen some recent videos and felt like all the newer (younger) guys did a really good job. Like King Crimson I think the constant swapping in and out of band members makes for a lot of interesting live recordings.

liam - thanks for the suggestions. I'll certainly check those out. That Bremen gig sounds amazing. Haven't heard any of Vander's work in the 80's yet or beyond...he kinda went silent for a while didn't he?

if les voix is your bag definitely check out the very limited "live in tokyo" release... this one has them doing a reduction of the whole theusz hamtaahk trilogy in the same style as "les voix"

magma is a band where you can really get into the bootlegs... even though there are a lot of hoarders, there's still hundreds of hours of classic stuff out there- one needs well-seasoned ears, of course, but they tend to be on fire. sowiloi for instance was just an epic jam in '73, going on for like half an hour, and you can hear how k.a. literally turned into kohntarkosz from '73-'74. there's also the original version of "theusz hamtaahk" from dec '73 and jan '74 where they just kill it for eight minutes straight on the ending. there's also stuff like magma's first american concert, with the brecker brothers guesting on horns- shambolic but top is fabulous- the "great zombie" from '77, where the last half of emehntehtt-re was taken from- an amazing 38 minute kohntarkosz from beynes 1975- magma doing the most ear-curdling "otis" ever in a 1981 radio broadcast- the short-lived lineup with the late pierre moerlen on second drums- a '72 concert where they encore with "klaus kombalad"- some tremendously stoned takes on "om zanka" from '75 and '77- it's a major rabbit-hole.

offically some of the stuff on the "vandertop" cds (magma by another name) is worth hearing- stuff like "la musique des spheres" and a ten-minute version of "mekanik machine"... a lot of fans don't know of these

in the '80s vander transitioned magma into "offering" which was more of a jazzy thing, to some people's tastes but not as overtly apocalyptic. in '96 magma reformed and has been going strong ever since.

from ProgressiveEars:

anyone know when "Slag Tanz" is coming to the studio?

Slag Tanz, now called Axium, is being mastered as I write. Should be out in a few months, unless Offering live is released sooner.

so...new Magma this year???

nice

Slag Tanz sung by child

frogbs, who is that user? I forgot my progressiveears login, wondering what his source is. Trying to be a good obsessive Magma fan, but can't recall passwords in my old age

it was Dana5140, who writes for Sea of Tranquility. also posted this:

Originally Posted by Dana5140
I think the plan is to include a new version of MKD with Axium on the new CD.

that's a little disappointing. I love MDK as much as anyone but how many versions of it do we need?

from "unclemeat":

They did re-record "Riah Sahiltaahk", and, along with a couple of new pieces and "Axium", this is (apparently) going to be the next CD. Also in the pipeline : the Offering DVD (and - possibly - a Vander solo DVD and a tribute to Michel Graillier, all filmed at le Triton).

I see -- well, I guess it makes sense, because I don't know any other new Magma songs that are unreleased.

just noticed a recent update to the magma discography at wikipedia:

2014: Rïah Sahïltaahk

http://www.rythmes-croises.org/traversesmag/modules/news/article.php?storyid=540

As previously announced, several album releases MAGMA (new and reissues) will be spread in the fall.

Here is what would be the program:
September 23 will see the official release of the new version of Riah Sahïltaahk on CD and LP; and November 4 will that Axiom (ie Slag Tanz) 'd.

In between, Oct. 7, will be published in LP size the three volumes of the trilogy Ëmëhntett-Re, namely Könhtarkösz, Köhntarkösz Anteria and Ëmëhntett-Re. Incidentally, this is the first time that the last two albums cited benefit of vinyl media.