HOLGER CZUKAY

I have the album he did with The Edge and Jah Wobble which is quite good but seems a bit clever, like My Life In The Bush of Ghosts vut not as good tune-wise.

like the others said - 'movies', 'canaxis' and 'rome remains rome' (feat. blessed easter) are all worth checking. as is just about all his work with can of course :) more recently 'good morning story' had it's moments. top bloke - in his sixties now i believe and still doin' it.

Yeah, I like that. Nice one, thankyou.

Search: the Movies LP

only donut bitch can save us now

Rome Remains Rome is so fucking great esp the aforementioned Pope song thing and the frist tracks on both sides: Hey Baba Reebop, Hit Hit Flop Flop

I sometimes wish he was a little less enamoured with spoken vocal samples though. The rest of the second side does drag a bit.

I love the vocal samples, though they're the best on Movies.

(well czukay's oftentimes great. i have and love rome remains rome & canaxis, too:)

first post (haiku)

"ode to perfume" is
perfect for four o'clock
in the morning-time, christ

hello ilx/m

Oh man, I caught my breath there, thought he might have died!

haha sorry for that...

yeah - had the same reaction
better not revive any threads on old german rockers these days

true that. rip klaus.

Phew!

hahahah @ my last post

Let's Get Cool in the Pool!

He was in London, or maybe he isn't here yet? Anyway, Time Out described him as being 61 years old... err, try adding another on 10 years, guys.

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/music/reviews/holger-czukay-the-roundhouse-london-1687693.html

it was a good gig apart from the posh teenagers doing coke and acting like twats.

but that's late noughties Camden for you....

<looks at camera with a shrug>

but that's late noughties Camden for you....

Can we also get hot in the dancing spot?

Donkey's mouth, full of hay...

Holger Czukay - He was there, at the first Can show in Cologne

No he wasn't, Bobby Gillespie was

boat woman song is kicking my ass today my friends

recently garnered copies of Rome Remains Rome and On the Way to the Peak of Normal, which still kick, too.

I know I've said this on noise threads before but

Canaxis / Movies / On The Way To The Peak of Normal / (most of) Der Osten Ist Rot / Rome Remains Rome = absolutely amazing and I come back to them all the time

collaborations Les Vampyrettes, Full Circle, Plight & Premonition = also too good

some good moments on Moving Pictures & Good Morning Story and I love Berlin Techno (the more anonymous the better) so I love the SF section from Clash. you'd better be a pretty big fan if you're curious about the three albums he's put out with U-She / Ursa Major. but he's in the category where his good ones are so good, I can't sell any of it back

Is Canaxis the only thing he's done that's like Canaxis?

Also is that David Sylvian thing up to much?

if you love Canaxis you will love Plight & Premonition (the first one with Sylvian). it's a little more traditionally tonal / ambient, less alien abstract, but it just sets an incredible mood. apart from Canaxis, this is the only thing that's like that record that's as good (side 2 of Good Morning Story has a 22 minute ambient shortwave piece I remember not working as well)

the second one with Sylvian is ok but it's more two seperate pieces, worked better as an LP, one drifty ethno-percussion piece & one weepy guitar-wall piece, heavier on the Sylvian polish than the Czukay strangeness. good though.

If you like Canaxis I recommend Tod Dockstader's 'Aerial 1' & you probably saw this thread

also if you're into 'Boat Woman Song' for the longform world-collage aspect -

John Oswald - WX
Carl Stone - Nyala (4th movement), Attari, 'Cooking Papa' from Kamiya Bar, Al-Noor
Jon Hassell - Vernal Equinox
Stockhausen - Hymnen / Telemusik
Richard Maxfield - Bacchanale (1963)

you really are a god among men I look forward to checking out as many of these as I can get my grubby mitts on

'Movies' is rocking my world...it's all over the place but got a lovely springtime vibe...'Hollywood Symphony' rules...

Thanks for bumping this...did any other ex-Canners have a solo career of note?

I kind of liked Karoli's album (that he did with some supermodel, I think?), but it's plastic as hell and has like, no guitar playing on it.

I have the album by Irmin Schmidt and Kumo called Masters of Confusion that was mostly Schmidt banging on the piano while drum n' bass beats played in the background...the first two tracks were really cool but it gets really boring afterwards.

Never heard anything by Jaki...are those any good??

the Can DVD came with a sort of sampler CD of solo stuff. Pretty good but I didn't really feel the need to go further.
I do like Jaki's stuff with Burnt Friedman though.

Irmin's stuff is pretty good. Not played them in a while but I've got a lot of his albums and I like at least a few things on every one of them. "Toy Planet" I like a lot. "Musk at Dusk" and "Impossible Holidays" have good things on them, very idiosyncratic stuff tho, maybe a bit smooth for some people. Tons of film music, a lot of which is like, uh, film music, but with some very Irminlike songs here and there. I've got the first of Jaki's Phantomband albums, which is dominated by Rosko Gee, which I don't mind because i like Rosko Gee's contributions to Can, not exactly startling however. Never heard the other Phantomband stuff, it's supposed to be a bit edgier.

revive!!

I was just thinking about Holger Czukay. How is he doing, I wonder? I'd like to interview him sometime soon.

Let's get hot. On the dancing...

spot

for the last two years he's been putting out very subtle remixes of track from his solo records as singles. they're all so similar to the originals they almost beg the question 'why', but anything's legal

but this sounds interesting

And the upcoming project will be "Music is a miracle", a 12" promo record from 1971 which only was made for the EMI sales people but became much more than it was initially made for...

http://www.czukay.de/news/index.htm

hi milton!

i watched the can DVD last night for the 5000th time (on a big screen at the MIT media lab...a bunch of us go there at night to play music DVDs on their giant system) and it reminded me that czukay is 73 now, and that michael karoli died almost exactly ten years ago.

Yeah, it's unbelievable really, thinking Czukay is 73 now. Everything about him and his music still gives you this idea that he's 50-something. Equally unbelievable is that Karoli's death was 10 years ago already.

Cool in the pool - one of my all time favourite songs in the universe.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xa8RdpYMycs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-D-QgbSUslo

^ this insane thing just got reissued

it's like world of echo in hell

strewth, that's wicked, not heard it before

holger + conny from 1980

not sure whose dulcet singing voice that is though

interviewing him this week, anyone have any interesting questions they'd like answered?

that's very kind of you! I don't know if that would be considered an interesting question, but off the top of my head, I'd like to know if the Sylvian/Czukay remasters are planned to come out in the short term. apparently they've been ready for years along with the rest of his '80s catalogue, when SPV, his previous label, abruptly folded.
oh, and if he has some interesting anecdotes about working with Sylvian on those two albums.
thanks!

Is On The Way to the Peak of Normal coming out on cd at all? LOved that lp when I had it. But think I'm only seeing a vinyl & d/ld being advertised

ooh what i wouldn't give for outtakes from that lp; my favorite Czukay. doesn't seem to get much love.

Are there unreleased tracks in the Czukay solo vaults, a la the Can Lost Tapes?

Hard to jam with yourself tbh

Having said that I read something where he said he did a session with Jah Wobble and ended only using Wobble tuning his bass at the start of the session

Les Vampyrettes = fucking wicked, man.

Great questions so far - dunno how many I'll be able to ask but I'll try! Keep 'em coming!

finally bought the Groenland reissue of On The Way To The Peak Of Normal (as a download, from eMusic). Kept having to turn the volume down further and further. Felt like a loudness thing. Luckily, was able to find a blog just now with a rip of the Can Solo Edition CD from ages ago (the one with the two bonus tracks). Like this mastering much more. Sounds much richer when turned up loud but without hurting my ears. Sigh.

Those reissues bug me to no end. Those two tracks aren't bonus tracks -- the new version isn't a complete reissue, it dropped half of side two!

Then there's things like this, compiling two of his albums and replacing half the tracks with alternate mixes that are pretty much objectively less interesting than the originals - http://www.discogs.com/Holger-Czukay-Der-Osten-Ist-Rot-Rome-Remains-Rome/release/5943736

Someone stop him

lol wtf?!? That is nuts

have you heard the groenlands Milton? Do you think they're mastered too hot?

have only listened to 'Osten/Rome' online. I'm curious to hear the new 'Normal' to see if he touched it much.

I should walk it back a bit, the new mixes are not exactly less interesting, they just lack most of the disorienting jump-cut edits that really make the original mixes. I'm guessing as to how the original albums were made, but it sounds like he did several radically different stereo mixes of pieces, and then started splicing between them at perfect moments, sometimes between the same moment on the master, sometimes completely different moments. Pretty common practice even then, though he really emphasized the jump cuts instead of hiding them. These new mixes push up the live instruments, but they also mostly sound splice-free -- it's interesting to hear more of what I assume is the original tapes but if what you loved about the original records was the baffling mixing and sample density, those are not as present on the 'Osten/Rome' reissues

I am (obviously) a pretty big fan of most everything he did from 1979-1986 but you have to track down the original versions

/what I assume are the original tapes

the SPV-Revisited CD of 'Movies' is also a very different mastering job than the original Spoon CD, though it's still the same edit. But I ripped them both to iTunes and I can tell which is which within about 15 seconds just by listening, it's pretty extreme. In that case I find the new master interesting but I would start with the original

Czukay's Spotify catalog right now are the reissues of 'Normal', 'Osten/Rome', a weird remix album misattributed to him that he did a single remix for, and 'La Luna' - yikes

I checked out the Groenland 'Normal' reissue and the second half of the title track is a completely different edit removing Czukay's original vocals in favor of someone whispering 'I like you' over and over for three minutes. It is not as good. The other tracks sound like the original edits to me but definitely got a modern remastering.

I do like the vivid tone colors of that remaster but on headphones it's just too loud

Great Holger cameo at the end of this Eurythmics performance from the OGWT:

https://youtu.be/w2rRLc1Dmv4?t=306

Ha, I was thinking about this clip last week and very nearly went on to Youtube to post it on here.

I've a feeling it didn't sell as well as it could have but the last double 10" thing for "RSD" (Eleven Years Innerspace) is worth checking out. It's a bit of a weird package with more recycled (remixed / edited) stuff but totally worthwhile I reckon. You may think you don't need a six minute edit of Boat Woman Song but actually you do. There's also some bonkers cut-up Can rhythms with odd wailing over the top that sounds like Holger aping Damo.

I need a 6 minute edit of boat woman song!

Those reissues bug me to no end. Those two tracks aren't bonus tracks -- the new version isn't a complete reissue, it dropped half of side two!

Then there's things like this, compiling two of his albums and replacing half the tracks with alternate mixes that are pretty much objectively less interesting than the originals - http://www.discogs.com/Holger-Czukay-Der-Osten-Ist-Rot-Rome-Remains-Rome/release/5943736🔗

Someone stop him

I'm so confused. Is this comp from Virgin in 1987 of Rome/Der Ostenremixes as well? Or is it the original mixes (minus a few tunes)?

http://www.discogs.com/Holger-Czukay-Rome-Remains-Rome-And-Excerpts-From-Der-Osten-Ist-Rot/master/23194

the one you link is the Virgin 1987 CD, the original mixes with a few tracks axed from Der Osten ist Rot (even though both albums would have fit on one disc without a problem)

the one I linked is the bizarro recent Groenland one with radically different mixes.

Ok, right -- the Virgin CD is the one I have. And yes, I had always wondered why we were being denied the other Der Osten ist Rot tracks (pretty sure all of Rome Remains Rome is on there).

Re. the Groenland issue, that's really bizarre. Sometimes these guys can't just leave well enough alone.

some of the new mixes are interesting and would make fun bonus tracks, like the new alt versions of 'Boat Woman Song' and 'Plight & Premonition' on that new ep Eleven Years Innerspace; it's just frustrating when they're featured on 'reissues' where the originals aren't available

Listening to this now. It would seek there is a lot less material here than on the Virgin CD – including no Photo Song!!

I actually always preferred the Der Osten ist Rot material a bit – in part because I can only take so much Sheldon Ancel. And yes, the edits on that are much more dramatic – the title track is particularly memorable in that respect, oscillating between the brass playing the anthem and the ambient synth drone, while Jaki patters away in the background over both. Assuming that's one of the re-edited cuts on the new one based on what I'm hearing on Spotify.

thank you spotify discover playlist for introducing me to "cool in the pool"

:)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PyqkIr-1Vk8

just the time of year for it too!

Lol, I sing that song pretty much every time we go to a pool.

Letz get cool in ze pool, letz get hot in ze dancing spot

OH IS IT HOT?

phew, wow, then letz get cool in ze pool

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xa8RdpYMycs

... there's a strange video out there for that track that Holger shot himself.

this?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5EH5GFP2Otk

... yes, and I've just discovered there's one for 'Cool in the Pool' too.

Lol, I sing that song pretty much every time we go to a pool.

― socka flocka-jones (man alive), Tuesday, July 5, 2016 5:56 PM (4 hours ago)

I sing it pretty much every time a pool is mentioned, or the weather, or dancing. I love it so.

(btw that was not meant to be a competitive statement, though on re-reading it does kind of come off that way)

ON THE DANCING...
...
...
...
SPOT

xp I sing Cool in the Pool five times a day facing Mecca

http://r-ec.bstatic.com/images/hotel/max300/348/34832490.jpg

We are so
NORMAL

ty for reminding me to listen to this important artwork

hollywood symphony also superb from that album, got that breezy germanic cheerfulness I find irresistible

thrilled that this was not an rip revive, long may his moustache reign

movies (home of 'cool in the pool') has just been reissued as movie!.

"Reworked" LOLger.

LP version has an instrumental CITP, buy otherwise the same?

*but"

Instrumental mix of "Cool in the Pool" is objectively awesome. It's like a miniature of everything I like about Holger. Weird varispeed dictaphone edits, jittery French horn and synth blasts, chunky little guitar rhythms, and his very underrated liquid guitar leads.

Have to say: I've always struggled a bit with the two longer tracks on Movies (née Movie). They feel a lot like Can's mid-period stuff but leave me a bit cold.

Dammit.

http://www.ksta.de/koeln/deutsche-rock-ikone--can--bassist-holger-czukay-tot-aufgefunden-28364470

Oh come on

Oh no

Holger Czukay is dead. The great Cologne musician and co-founder of the band "Can", died at the age of 79 years in the legendary "Can" studio - an old cinema in Weilerswist - which he had converted into the apartment in recent years.
When and exactly what the musician with the black hair and the conspicuous mustache has died, is currently determined by the Kripo.

Because construction workers had not seen him on the site for a few days, they informed a neighbor who was looking-and found Czukay lifeless in his apartment. An emergency surgeon could only determine his death.
Holger Czukay, who revolutionized the musical world from 1968 to 1978, died only a few days after his wife Ursula, who died on July 28th on her 55th birthday.

damn ... RIP. one of the best.

:-(

Oh man, I caught my breath there, thought he might have died!

― Tom D., Friday, 4 April 2008 09:09 (nine years ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

... and now he has ;_; One of the most important and talented musicians of the last 50 years, RIP Holger. Sad times. ;_;

Rotten news

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mjZHN1CX77Q

RIP big guy

Will be throwing on Ege Bamyasi as loud as possible tonight. RIP, a legend.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eBSLVtg083U

Thank you, Holger Czukay.

I am becoming less sure that we're not in the hands of some horrible cosmic jokers at this moment in world history.

With Stockhausen, pre-moustache...

http://www.czukay.com/news/122/images/stockh.jpg

JUst had to ask myself if he was still with us. I knew he was getting on. I think he was already oldish for a new band member when Can started. Sad tohear he's gone though.
Hope his passing wasn't overly painful or slow.

He's left behind some awesome music anyway.
THink I need to pick up another couple of titles by him. I iknow On The Way to the Peak of Normal is great. NOt sure what else fo his solo stuff is as necessary.

Is Irmin Schmidt still with us?

Yes, Schmidt is still here, along with Malcolm Mooney and Damo Suzuki.

Irmin is still with us. He was the oldest too.

One More Night one of my top 5 favorite bass lines of anyone ever

RIP my dude. ;_;

grateful for such a true original musical adventurer and brilliant mind.

One More Night one of my top 5 favorite bass lines of anyone ever

Undoubtedly played more of my favourite basslines than any other bass player... even Bootsy!

Love him. RIP.

RIP to one of the greats, sad I never got to see him play live

RIP, great guy

rip :(

RIP :( <3

Another one down ...

A great loss. :(

This makes me sad. I knew he wasn't in good health but still. In addition to being a genius, Czukay was such a titanic influence on so many geniuses.

Gonna spin Persian Love for my man this evening.

Back in my graduate school years, I was hosting a show on the local college radio station. I never, never got calls from people listening saying anything in regards to what I was playing. One night, I got a call from a listener asking about a song I had played. He was a music teacher he told me that he really liked the bassline of a song he'd heard because he thought it would be a great introductory song to his students learning the bass guitar. I told him it was "She Brings the Rain" by Can and thanked him.

From an album Holger & Jaki go full tilt on, something they often did live but less so in the studio...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zKl3S-Ousw

the dum-dum, the dsda, the daddy. rip hc

just the absolute greatest spirit behind what he did, so loveable as well as everything else, he had a fkn awesome life

Oh man, his wife had died in July. :(

RIP

I don't like any of Can dying, because they were gods in my formative years.

and she was only 55 apparently

Xp obv

That's from the Guardian obit which also mentions that 'Irwin Schmidt and Malcolm Moody' recently played in London, don't know who those guys are though.

RIP Holger. I was sad he didn't play at the show the Guardian made a hash of reporting on earlier this year.

Strange days as Holger wanders out at the end of "Never Going to Cry Again" to play his trademark elephant-in-distress French horn...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w2rRLc1Dmv4

This track is from a recording session with Jah Wobble where the only bit he used from the entire session was Wobble tuning up...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3cXshWlOkc4

oh wow first Walter Becker, now Holger - damn. Really feels like the closing of an era.

Can was my gateway drug out of a fairly claustrophobic indie rock environment in the early 90s. Holger was the linchpin and I'd expect that my musical tastes would be so much more narrow if it weren't for the massive appeal that his work had (and continues to have) for me. RIP.

What's his best solo album?

Movies, I'm guessing.

I've been looking for a copy of "On the way to the peak of normal" off and on the past year. Just bit one and got it off ebay just now.

i feel sad for irmin :(
can't even get his name spelled right in the paper!

Maybe about 12 years ago, Holger Czukay's name was stuck in my head for several days during a period of extreme stress, just cycling through every time i had an idle moment. Over and over and over, Holger Czukay. Persistent like a bassline, RIP

RIP

What's his best solo album?

Movies is his most impressive, seems like a real technical and musical achievement, does that make it his best? I don't know. I like all of his albums, there's only a couple I haven't heard, they're inconsistent but they're always interesting - I don't think he could be boring if he tried.

Movies is definitely his Can - iest solo record right? Most of the band is on it anyway ... Was listening to "Persian Love" on repeat this morning, so gorgeous.

On the Way to the Peak of Normal is the one I come back to the most.

just saw this news, this really sucks - rip big man, hope he, jaki and michael are jamming in heaven

ON the Way To The Peak of Normal is pretty sublime.
It got reissued on cd a few years ago so I picked it up cheaply in HMV.
Movies seems to have been reissued as Movie with a bonus disc, not sure what.

from the obituary thread:

Jesus, losing the CAN rhythm section is like one of the laws of physics being rescinded.

Movies is definitely his Can - iest solo record right? Most of the band is on it anyway ... Was listening to "Persian Love" on repeat this morning, so gorgeous

"Oh Lord, Give Us More Money" uses Can backing tracks - sounds like the base material for "Hunters and Collectors" - but apart from Jaki, he plays everything else, which is pretty mindblowing."Radio Wave Surfer", an album I admittedly haven't heard in years, always seemed pretty Can-like: live(ish), improvised. Everyone is on it but Irmin, Sheldon Ancel is doing his sub-Mooney thing and Holger is back to playing old style Can bass, like he hadn't done since "Future Days" or thereabouts.

... plays everything else on "Movies" that is. Reebop is on "Cool in the Pool" playing organ!

Geeta's memorial piece is up.

http://www.vulture.com/2017/09/remembering-cans-holger-czukay.html

that's great.
anyone know when Rob Young's Can bio is scheduled to come out? Looking forward to it.

curses -- not out til next summer: https://www.amazon.com/Untitled-Can-Biography-Irmin-Schmidt/dp/0571311490

Also a good piece from Sid Smith: http://teamrock.com/feature/2017-09-06/remebering-holger-czukay

there isn't a SINGLE Steely Can mashup on Youtube. surprising.

there is some mercy in the universe

RIP.

:(
When I saw the thread had been bumped earlier, I immediately thought 'Oh shit, please say this isn't an RIP revive'.
RIP for real.

aw, RIP

Great interview with Paul Murphy from Bison who worked with him and recorded at Inner Space, some fab photos of his studio. http://testpressing.org/feature/paul-murphy-bison-at-innerspace/

oh, nice photos!

Excellent.

I've listened to Movies, Peak Of Normal, Der Osten Ist Rot, Rome Remains Rome more than any Can

pretty much all of the side-projects during this time are also great, Full Circle, Vampyrettes, Phew, Plight and Premonition. Snake Charmer is just ok.

not to be redundant with all my fanboy posts upthread but you do have to be careful to hunt down original editions, his recent 'reissues' of the solo albums on Groenland are profoundly remixed and on all counts less adventurous than the originals

& this post definitely overlaps with upthread obsessing but this guy was Holger... wouldn't recommend starting with any of the later ones, but being a completist goes like this:

Radio Wave Surfer has moments, the old gang minus Irmin shows up to record. the results stay more jams than songs, not bad if not classic

Moving Pictures is lovely downtempo, the songs on side one in particular are polished & tranquil. side two 'rhythms of a secret life' is an epic in the mold of 'ode to perfume' but the main guitar line is slightly more diffuse and Sheldon Ancel is singing dramatic lyrics about cyberspace circa 1993

Crash - 2 CD live album with Dr Walker. some fellow Czukay fans find Dr Walker's beats too generic but if you've ever liked any Cologne/Berlin 90's techno, then there is that fine line between 'generic' and 'life-giving water'. some techno fans also might resist Czukay anarchically covering everything with loose shortwave sampling & dictophone noise bursts throughout -- you can't dance to this, but the subset of fans of techno and noise are much greater in 2017 than they were in 1997, so I keep thinking this one's a sleeper (though it's definitely a document of a wild improv more than a polished studio thing like 'movies'. I saw the concert in SF and it was live without a net

Linear City - a record that grew out of file submissions & internet collaborations, cut together by Czukay, has moments

Good Morning Story - he starts sampling old Can records on this one, and using drum machines & synths to produce the new songs -- his bizarre sense of rhythm, off-beat timing & reconstruction is in ways even more in evidence when he is using the ultra-familiar Can sources. side two one long piece, layered shortwave, canaxis-esque but also audibly the first time he used a keyboard with a sampler

La Luna - single track late night jam, drum machine metronomic pulse with lots of shortwave, forgot that I never actually bought this one

New Millenium, Time and Tide, 21st Century - the three records with U-She. the emphasis here is largely on her songwriting, and the studio production is on modern equipment. New Millenium has a few tracks with his trademark disruptive editing, Time and Tide has one particularly crazy love duet that makes me smile

Been listening to "Moving Pictures" today, great album. Sheldon Ancel is something of an acquired taste, which many don't feel like acquiring, but he's so eerie and effective on "Rhythms of a Secret Life".

alas, another of the great ones i never got to see/hear in person.

Listened to "Cutaway" this am ... what a great, completely incongruous track. The bits with Holger talking thru the ring modulator are LOL funny. "I must TOOO-OOON!"

Per Milton's post, Full Circle was one of my very big faves for a long time. The How Much Are They EP is unfuckwithable -- and the two radio sessions are really good as well (if a slight bit less essential). This is probably Wobble's best non-PIL recording, FWIW.

I have less patience for Sheldon Ancel but I still wish I hadn't sold Radio Wave Surfer. Dumb dumb dumb.

Also: while I enjoy their two ambient collaborations, don't sleep on Holger's contributions to David Sylvian's solo debut Brilliant Trees. Holger's shortwave (and vocals!) add an air of mystery to an already excellent, and smoothly eclectic, record.

Must..Put..This.Here..

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wo54P5Z6vhg

susan.

Just saw this in Biba Kopf's (really great) 1984 interview with Holger that's free on RBP right now:

The ancient bathchair that is a prop in 'The Photo Song' takes up a comer of Czukay's kitchen.

"I have just turned 46," volunteers Holger, while making tea. "Still too young to marry! Ha ha. When I'm 80 I will get married and this bathchair will be the present to my wife!"

https://www.rocksbackpages.com/Library/Article/holger-czukay-the-lunatic-has-taken-over-the-asylum

Alas, neither he nor his wife made it to his 80th birthday. 😢

holger box due in march:

https://pitchfork.com/news/holger-czukay-retrospective-box-set-announced/

It additionally includes a “vinyl video,” which is made from a system that makes it possible to store video footage on vinyl.

ha, so the shitty videodisc technology from the 80s makes a triumphant return. Why not go all in on Zoetrope footage of "Cool In The Pool"?

There are further details and a track listing here - just two unreleased tracks by the look of it, though one of which is a collab w/ Stockhausen:

https://thevinylfactory.com/news/can-co-founder-holger-czukay-box-set/

Considering that collab is from 2008 and Stockhausen died in 2007, the result should be interesting.

He was back on his home planet of Sirius when Holger got on the blower to ask if he fancied working with him.

I've been listening to this box. The opening track on disc 1 is a nice jazz piece, the two long pieces from "Canaxis 5" are ok but don't grab me. Discs 2-4 are almost all great, highlights include "Signal" by Phew, the Les Vampyrettes tracks and disc 4's closer "Hit Hit Flop Flop" (such goofy fun!). Anything Jaki plays on is instantly recognizable and at least good.

Disc 5 later today.

And how is the rest of that Phew album?

So, what exactly is that 7" video disc then, exactly?

And how is the rest of that Phew album?

most excellent.

Sylvian on his work with Czukay

http://thequietus.com/articles/24916-david-sylvian-holger-czukay-plight-premonition

thanks... that was a great read.

Came here to post that as well. Agreed, wonderful.

After listening again to the Sylvian collabs most of this week, I’m remembering back to what got me into Can: Musician Magazine’s review of the 1990 or so Spoon reissues. The way they described the band was so exciting and exotic to me – this real blend of prog, musique concrète, Stockhausen and free improv. The first record I ended up getting by them was ... Unlimited Edition, which hadn’t been reviewed and was a massive mindfuck of, well, prog, musique concrète and free improv. I loved it immediately – Holger’s splicing of two track jams into monster pieces like “Cutaway,” and brooding synth pieces like “Ibis.”. I was actually perhaps a bit underwhelmed when I finally got a record of theirs proper, Ege Bamyasi as it felt a bit tame on first listen, but was soon to be hypnotized again by Future Days.

Of course I adored Jaki, was impressed by Irmin, tolerated Michael and wanted to cuddle Damo. But for me, there was only one hero in that band and it was Holger – the mad professor and the visionary I wanted to be. I burned thru those solo records and chased them down in every store around – I still remember when I found Full Circle at Tower in Boston, it was like manna from heaven (and lived up to the hype). His use of the dictaphone seemed both unprecedented in popular music and wonderfully mad. And as Sylvian notes in this Quietus piece, he had a really odd, somewhat off-putting buffoon-ish side. But really his whole conception of music was just ... different.

I realize that this is really just a poorly phrased stream of consciousness rant that doesn’t actually say much, but he’s one of the few guys whose whole existence makes me feel this way.

God I miss the man.

Also, another good reflection from Sylvian on Holger:

Here’s the full transcript of my interview with ⁦@davidsylvian58⁩ from the current issue of ⁦@uncutmagazine⁩... https://t.co/M531wNQ4bU

— Michael Bonner (@MichaelBonner) July 13, 2018

I love all of them but I've always always thought Holger + Jaki were the geniuses of the band.

i am getting myself a copy of the CINEMA box set for my birthday
what should i expect? the personnel looks good and i love pretty much any soundtrack music.

What is it?

https://www.groenland.com/en/product/holger-czukay-cinema/

i am getting it used from my friend who owns a record store. discount!!

... oh it's some of his solo albums, it's not soundtrack music!

not sure if I'm misunderstanding these posts, but Cinema is not a collection of soundtrack work, it's a retrospective of Czukay's non-CAN career. So if you've got any of his solo albums, there will be redundancies. That said, it's a great set! Surprised myself by responding most warmly to the late 80s stuff

It's everything he released from 1969 to, errrr, 1991?

oh well i don't have any of them
are they good? i hope?

sorry i was mistaken

They are!

i figured with czukay and liebezeit involved the worst thing it would be is boring and i like them being boring more than i like most things
regardless, i am looking forward to receiving it as a gift from myself.

no need to apologize--I'm not sure why it's even called "Cinema"...
I feel confident in guaranteeing that you will love it. quite a bit of it sounds CAN-like, but it goes in some unexpected directions (sorry to be vague; there's a lot of music on it) and his impish spirit is all over it

i can't wait!!

love his impish spirit <3

also I have the CD version and even that's quite lovely, I imagine the vinyl box will be a very nice object to have!

There's certainly a lot of impishness - arguably too much at times.

well "Hit Hit Flop Flop" is my current favorite, so I think maybe we have different imp tolerance levels?

I was thinking more "The Photo Song" tbh.

aw I kind of dig the young marble giants host a children's show vibe of that one, though the whistling is maybe a step too far I'll grant you

As I think I've mentioned on ILM before I curse my brother for pointing out, on hearing "Cool in the Pool", that his singing voice sounded like *Kenny Everett with a German accent, I've never been able to get that out of my head since.

(*non-UK ILXors might have to resort to wiki here)

the only solo work of his that i know is "cool in the pool" and i'm not entirely sure why i ever had that on my hard drive. probably a blog around the same time i got super into CAN -- like 2004-5? IDK

i had a nightmare about "cool in the pool" once

When you get it let us know what the video vinyl item is. For the life of my I cannot find out from the internet what that is.

haha! my friend joked about that too, he said he hopes i have a vinyl video player
lol

Happily that bit of UK culture wasn't passed on to me, though now that I've imagined Czukay hosting a children's show my mental image of his face is blending with Captain Kangaroo's

"cool in the pool" is pretty representative of a chunk of the set, so hopefully that nightmare was more weird than horrified

I'm tempted to pick this up, I sampled it on Spotify and found much to love (but not all of it, his tastes and creative spirit was incredibly broad).

I don't think it's *everything* he did in his solo career, it's a large anthology.

No, it stops with "Radio Wave Surfer" - which I think was his last album for Virgin?

also I think it only samples most of the albums (all of Movies is on there though)

there's a lot of amazing music on that box. for me also wildly frustrating. it's the first 7 albums, each nearly complete, minus one or two tracks. czukay released remixed versions of the albums over the last ten years which are profoundly different (sometimes interesting but never improvements - a lot of the tight splices and edits are now gone, and there's more reverb); none of the people who reviewed this box knew the material well enough to mention which versions were included here and the website doesn't mention, but I'm guessing it's the later versions.

the groenland reissues of 'peak of normal' and 'osten ist rot / rome' also left off a bunch of the best tracks, and some of them, but not all of them, are back on this box, and are now the only places you can get them. it is sloppy.

that being said - I love all this music so much, I would still consider buying this if I found a (very) cheap copy so I could pick the box up and hug it while listening to the original versions

The only one I really couldn’t cope with back in the day was radio wave surfer. I wonder how I’d react to it now.

When you get it let us know what the video vinyl item is. For the life of my I cannot find out from the internet what that is.

It's one of these I think. It's a record with black and white video encoded in audio. It's been around since 1999 and there were initially 21 releases in the format before it was 'revived' recently. It uses a special decoder thing.

http://www.vinylvideo.com/
http://vinylvideo.supersense.com/

Movies is a really strange record. The two short pieces go down easy – witty, melodic, brilliantly edited, it’s hard not to flash a smile at these. But holy shit, the two long pieces are bizarre as shit.

“Oh Lord Give Us More Money” is an epic remix of “Hunters and Collectors” from 1975’s Landed (a fact pointed out to me by Milton on some old Krautrock thread), with wandery varispeed guitar noodlings competing for space against Solina string synth noodlings. His almost amelodic vocal entrance on this (“Some arguments in the past have made gold/Out of STONES!!!”) is equally odd – later in the song Czukay even repeats the line and follows it by asking, “What the devil does that mean?” It’s even weirder when you realize how utterly different it is than Karoli’s singsongy lead on the original track. The editing is almost every four bars – building, slowing, and building again with periodic jump cuts to heroic resolutions or nothing other than Liebezeit’s hihat pedal. And then it ends almost arbitrarily after thirteen-and-a-half minutes The effect overall is as disorienting—and often as frustrating—as anything Teo Macero did with Miles in the 70s.

“Hollywood Symphony” starts off like it’s going to be an entry into the “Ethnological Forgery Series” before Czukay himself swoops in to croon about “endless nightmares” – again with no sense of actual melody or contour. Here again the guitar dukes it out with the string synth for long stretches at a time. But where at least “Oh Lord Give Us More Money” had its descending piano chords to pin it down, “Hollywood Symphony” has even fewer guardrails – supposedly edited for over two years, the piece feels through-composed, at one point transitioning from a bass rumble figure reminiscent of the introduction to “You’re So Vain” to a sublimely hyperactive synth, guitar and short wave radio jam before returning to the demi-melody (albeit vocaless) with which the piece began. What is Czukay trying to accomplish with this piece? I honestly have no idea.

the single edit of "halleluwah" is a good one. anybody heard the 2 minute single edit of "oh lord give us more money"?

"Some alchemists in the past have made gold/Out of STONES"

great post btw

(xp) Was about to say...

I love how "Oh Lord" fades out fades in again... about four times. I always feel like the two long tracks were partly about Czukay showing the rest of Can just how complex and musical he could get without them.

Alchemists? Ok my bad.

Barring maybe Cannaxis, Full Circle is probably my favorite non-Can Czukay release when all is said and done. The trio has incredible synergy and equal billing with Liebezeit keeps Wobble and Czukay’s most indulgent qualities in check.

On the full release (this was initially an EP), “How Much Are They?” is probably the closest thing the trio got to doing something club ready. The dubbed out piano parts are delightful. I do wonder what Jaki does on this however, given prominence of the drum box.

“Where’s the Money?” has a rhythm that could’ve been pulled directly off Metal Box, with Wobble holding down a great 4/4 riff but with some overdubbed echoey African percussion from Liebezeit. Czukay here spends most of his time adding dub accents on rhythm guitar and modulating the dynamics of things with timely edits and atmospheric short wave. But here he lets Wobble’s vocal and bass set the pace to great effect.

Then comes the title track and “Mystery” (neither of which were on the original EP), which were part of the “Radio Picture Series.” The latter features creeping footsteps and a drone and an insistent dub bass.

The title track is a brilliant high life/dub/radiophonic amalgam. Once upon a time I didn’t particularly rate this but as time passes, it feels increasingly like the strongest track here – with some of Czukay’s lithest guitar work, short wave/dictaphone punctuations and French horn blasts. The Jaki/Wobble groove rivals any Can track for its sheer relentlessness but showcases a level of interplay between Liebezeit and Czukay’s interjections that didn’t exist in that band. Credit here probably goes to Wobble who allows them that freedom by locking things down so completely. Even tho it goes on for 13 minutes and doesn’t really build to anything approaching a traditional crescendo, the track somehow never outstays its welcome.

Really, every track is great but “Trench Warfare” is probably the most unhinged piece here and the climax of the full release. Over a deceptively complex Liebezeit rhythm of rimshots, finger cymbals and various cowbells, Czukay again tears into his French horn, but instead of West African guitar wails like Pete Cosey thru a harmonizer during a traffic jam. The garish stereo separations worthy of There’s a Riot Goin’ On and jump cut splices of Jimmy Smith organ and dictaphone, combined with Wobble singing thru a harmonizer as well (it’s possibly feeding the whole mix), give things a particularly psychedelic touch.

“Twilight World” rounds things out with a spacey swinging groove, Wobble croon and chicken scratch organ. It’s probably the most conventional thing here and there’s very little editing from Czukay but it’s a perfect comedown from the insanity that just preceded it.

I love this record unconditionally.

it's totally peak era. what felt like a spontaneous casual jam side-release when I first heard it has become a high water mark

When did the full length version come out? I don’t have it.

1982 according to Discogs. The single came out in 1981.

There's quite a bit about the making of that record in Wobble's autobio IIRC. Just reished as a standalone CD by Groenland as well by the looks of it.

I always loved the ep, didn't know about the LP until about a month ago. Looking forward to its arrival

super enjoying these informative posts and this box set, thank you holger & ilm <3

posting for later

https://www.ardmediathek.de/tv/Rockpalast/Rockpalast-From-The-Archives-Holger-Czu/WDR-Fernsehen/Video?bcastId=8051040&documentId=46816188

Ta.

Awesome.

Danke!

Watched some of this last night. Two things:

1) I wish I spoke German or this had subtitles – Holger doing an interview while splicing tape of a Papal service would be amazing to understand!

2) Is that one of the shows they used for Radio Wave Surfer?

3) Michael Karoli. I had no idea that the wispy guitarist from Can was such a damned handsome man!

1) Ditto.

2) Looks like it.

3) But of course!

haha! Michael Karoli was definitely the prettiest Can man

3) Michael Karoli. I had no idea that the wispy guitarist from Can was such a damned handsome man!

― Naive Teen Idol

dude that's his sister on the cover of roxy music's "country life"

True. But forgive me, I said two things and that was a third.

There's quite a bit about the making of that record in Wobble's autobio IIRC.

Karoli's girlfriend was the other woman on the cover of Country Life.

It's a bit daunting, but I got one, box dented and some LP sleeves a little creased, but apart from that all sound, for £40

Tempting to splurge, but probably best to just keep to one LP a week or some such.

https://www1.wdr.de/mediathek/video/sendungen/rockpalast/video-holger-czukay---der-privatsinfoniker-100.html

Available until 2099

Wish he'd talked a little more about his time in Berlin. When he was a student, Czukay lived in Steinstücken, a tiny exclave of West Berlin that was surrounded on all sides by East Germany. He had to show his pass every day at the GDR checkpoint in order to leave Steinstücken and travel along the transit route to get to West Berlin.

"The East German policemen weren't at all like you'd expect. In Steinstücken there was an elite unit of 300 men. A hundred of them were assholes. a hundred were in-between and a hundred were really OK. They marched up and down outside my window while I practised on my bass and told me what I was doing well and not well. [...] Three of the East German soldiers, I brought them with all of their weapons to the West Berlin check-point. The police there brought out some bottles of beer and we all drank. This was during this hot time (in the Cold War). Somehow I survived."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8bqtY2PtEyU

THis may have appeared before and also may have been seen from teh same link I got from David Stubbs today
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=klPlEJoHF1M
but pretty surreal. Surprised to see him on what appears to be a pretty mainstream show. & do wonder what response the competition question got.

I posted in some other thread, but it was a while ago now.

all the best avant-gardists did a solid stint on blankety blank or local equivalent: john cage with his mushroom lore, robert fripp and toyah, this whatever it is

"i thought i would get a kiss from you".

Didn't Frank Zappa appear on one of these? 🤔

Not with Anthea Turner though.

Thanks to this thread, I finally listened to Movie.

Oh I miss him.

Also, another good reflection from Sylvian on Holger:

🐦[Here’s the full transcript of my interview with ⁦@davidsylvian58🕸⁩ from the current issue of ⁦@uncutmagazine🕸⁩... https://t.co/M531wNQ4bU🕸
— Michael Bonner (@MichaelBonner) July 13, 2018🕸]🐦

Holger was evidently impressed with you; but what impressed you about him?
With Movies he’d created a genre defying classic album that continues to impress even when listened to today. It’s an incredibly innovative piece of work. We spent a good deal of time together in the ‘80s, prior to my moving to the States. He was an incredible raconteur with an endearing sense of humour. It’s virtually impossible to think of Holger without a smile on his face. In his earlier incarnation as a member of ‪the band Can, he tends to appear quite intense in group photographs, but he went through a radical change on leaving ‪the band. He claimed he suffered a minor nervous breakdown and the story of his recovery is a rather remarkable one in which it’s impossible to discriminate between fact and fiction, reality and altered states. When he emerged from this experience he claimed to have discovered his sense of humour, which is very much to the fore in albums such as ‘Movies’. One of the very few musicians who could incorporate humour into the fabric of an album without diminishing the powerfully groundbreaking quality of the work (Hassell claimed humour in music was comparable to the same in sex, which may possibly say more about Jon than anything else, but you can see what he was getting at). In his role as composer, producer, musician, and engineer he was a genuine innovator. To work with him, or to witness him at work, was to see an entirely different methodology utilized than the kind you’d likely find as standard in professional recording facilities of the time. Now that a good deal of recording takes place outside of such institutions it’s possible there’s more room for personal innovation than there once appeared. But judging by the limitations of the technology touted by the recording industry, harping on about authentic recreations of technology of the past, I can’t be certain. Holger’s was a uniquely inventive mindset, beyond replication.

thanks for sharing that video - both Holger and Anthea seem personable enough to make that interview fun instead of awkward like it ought to be. I never noticed how tall and imposing he was, but he seems so friendly. he reminds me of a few professors I had. Sylvian's story makes sense...Can had a sense of humor but were also serious and intense. by the time they were clearly goofing around Holger was out of the band.

Thanks for that interview excerpt!

This album is amazing, btw - gorgeous and silly and playful.

On The Way To The Peak of Normal is really slinky if you haven't heard it. Very recommended

so that led me down a rabbit hole of Holger interviews, including one where he's talking about electronic music. he says Can's music was out of fashion for a while because it wasn't "hi-fi", which to me is weird because the records sound amazing. but I suppose that's maybe not what he's talking about.

like Monster Movie *should* sound grungy but it's really crisp somehow. it was 1969 and they were broke, I dunno how they did it. Ege Bamyasi and Future Days sound like something that could have been recorded today.

I assume he means that, prior to 1975, they recorded everything on 4-track.

Having said that I don't really know what's he talking about. I don't know that the circumstances of the recording had anything to do with whether Can were "in fashion" or not - or whether they ever were particularly out of fashion. The post-74 (most hi-fi) version of Can seems like the version that was most out of fashion or favour or whatever.

does he say who they were out of fashion with?

it's at 2:00 here - I guess he says what Can was doing was "unprofessional" and "not accepted"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u_s1aMhoMH0

he says they do 'lo fi' recording, but again the actual albums sound really good to me

"Some alchemists in the past have made gold/Out of STONES"

― visiting, Thursday, 23 August 2018 06:05 (four years ago) bookmarkflaglink

"Sir, please, if you would have the goodness..."