einstuerzende neubauten: classic or dud?

Can understand why 12-15 year-olds would say "classic", but it's harder to comprehend the notion of adults (17 and up) giving this codswollop the time of day (at least not without extreme embarrassment).

Then again, arrested development is the coin of the realm, ain't it?

The music of, say, "Vanadium I-Ching" is the product of a quite focused and disciplined attention to objects and sounds, and the structure of the piece is pretty far removed from any kind of childish tantrum. The entrance of musical lines was determined by a temporal map of cracks in a piece of metal; this kind of conceptual compositional strategy seems pretty coolly analytic and controlled to me.

On February 20th, the ICA will stage a Re-enactment of the now-legendary ICA performance, Einstürzende Neubauten’s ‘Concerto for voice and machine.’ The original event took place in 1984 when it was seen as a reaction against music as an easily and readily commodifiable package and industry in post-punk conservative Britain. The event comprised of cacophonous but orchestrated noise and destruction with industrial machinery and tools being used to drill holes in the stage of the ICA and was called to a halt after 21 minutes when ICA technicians turned off the power! On February 20th, emerging young artist Jo Mitchell will direct the re-enactment of this seminal event in an attempt to highlight the gap between the real and the represented and to question notions of expectation, consensus and the conventions of (the different) times.

Okay, seriously the last minute or so of Yu Gung: Classickerist or Classicumilingus?

What's their new album like? I sorta tuned out after 'Perpetuum Mobile'

I like the new album. Posted this on another thread in September:

Most (okay, probably only) country song on the new Einsturzende Neubuaten album Alles Weideroffen is "Nagorny Karabach, which has a very recognizable Lee Hazelwood (R.I.P.) clippity-clop to it. Lots of repetitive electronic factory clang to the rest of the album, often building gradually into something tangibly if Teutonically identifiable as a groove, with repeatedly chanted harangues on top, which slow-building sometimes makes me more impatient than other times. Faves are opener "Die Wellen" (reminds me of Faust), humorlessly titled and minimally starting "Let's Do It Dada," nine-minute "Unvollstandigkeit," and "Ich Warte" (maybe their most danceable track since Adrian Sherwood produced "Yu Gung" for them 22 years ago.) Part that sounds like "bacon bacon bacon bacon" in "Von Wegen" is also neat. Didn't know they still had it in 'em.

Classic, but more for the quiet drony bits than the shrieking clanging bits.

Eyethengyew.

wow, is that available through normal channels or is this another website/supporter release?

I also have not heard anything past Perpetuum. Somebody on another thread was extolling their supporter's club deal, it seemed interesting.

http://www.juno.co.uk/ppps/products/281460-02.htm&highlight=neubauten

Lol "Genre: downtempo"

I've never heard these guys but they sound like something I like. How are they, compared to like, early Cabaret Voltaire or Throbbing Gristle?

more visceral, you need this stuff.

Apropos of sod-all, Dingsaller is bloody fantastic.

Please tell me you posted that to a rolling country thread, xhuxk.

Turns out this album hasn't reconciled me with them. Impressive but ultimately a bit boring.

okay this is pretty cool and then at 4:30 AW YEAH

stick around for blixa's covergirl moment

US leg of 30th anniversary tour cancelled

It is with great regret that Einstürzende Neubauten announce the cancellation of their planned thirtieth anniversary appearances in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago, Toronto and New York. While the U.S. Department of Homeland Security did issue approvals for the band’s visas, it was not done in time to secure the appointments at the overseas embassies and consulates that represent the necessary final step in the process.

The band members are tremendously disappointed by this turn of events and wish to thank all those fans who purchased tickets for these performances for their support. The band would have loved to do the tour and meet their overseas fans. Because this tour was a time-sensitive production, it will not be rescheduled. Ticket holders can obtain refunds from their point of purchase.

poop! i was really looking forward to seeing them. i'm especially miffed that it won't even be rescheduled.

may as well mention how great the ANBB album Blixa has done with Alva Noto is, its probably my favourite album at the moment

I've been listening to the recordings of the latest tour (they are doing the Grateful Dead recording every show and selling soundboard USBs at the end of the night) and they are so so so so tight and the setlists are so so so so amazing right now. The world's best live band. Whoever said Blixa needs to stop the inhale scream and wearing suits upthread 15 years ago is a fucking idiot.

jesus christ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mxyWStLB0z0

<3 <3 <3 bookmarking for later

Ende Neu tour I saw in 1998 remains one of my top ten concert experiences

I saw them four times over the years: in 1989 in a tiny club in L.A., in 1990 at the (new) Ritz on 54th Street, in 1993 at Roseland, and in 2000 (I think) at Irving Plaza. Always fantastic, but the 1989 and 1993 shows were the life-changing ones.

And thanks to this thread's revival reminding me of their existence, I just bought a very rare (so rare it's not even listed on Discogs) Japanese 3CD set that contains Strategies Against Architecture Vols. I and II on eBay.

Saw them for the first time on the Ende Neu tour in London, it was incredible and have tried to see them every time they've rolled around since, that YouTube concert is fantastic but man, the illuminated perimeter of the stage is like some Trypohobic nightmare.

So despite having invented crowdfunding 20 years ago, they're now doing the next Supporter's Project on Patreon:

https://supporter.neubauten.org/

Yes, yes, grumble moan about Patreon being terrible if you're outside the US, but there are some wonderful perks. The usual webcasts and online shenanigans (TIL that German guitarists use Vah-Vah pedals, which is what I will always call them from now on!) - a proper album in April 2020, but also downloads and 7"s of spontaneous 'Jewels' and Dave projects.

And this is the kicker - they're digitising Blixa's enormous collection of 80s cassettes, rarities, rough mixes, live soundboard recordings from the early days, source material tapes, field recordings - and they will be making downloads of that material available to supporters. Some of the tracklists they've teased are just o_0 amazing.

Anyway, I've seen almost nothing about this floating about online - so if you know anyone who would be salivating over this sort of thing, please pass it on? Cheers!

Weedy scream, why I oughta... saw them only last year, and at 60, Blixavoice is still powerful enough to shake building foundations. So there.

http://www.drinkswithtony.com/ep-16-hackedepicciotto-and-blixa-bargeld/
THis was interesting Alex hacke and partner talking for an hour about various things including her 2 books. Followed by a 2007 interview with Blixa.

there is a breathing, pulsing quality to silence is sexy that is deeply satisfying

i saw them in 1987 at the olof palme festival near munich. they were drilling and making other not so funny sounds. they were better than the awful toten hosen. i was pissed out of my head at that festival. but i must say that i never became a fan. later on i bought "das haus der lüge" which was less abrasive and i kind of loved it. blixa bargeld is a strange guy. my fave lyrics by him:"nagel mein herz ans fensterkreuz", ie "nail my heart at the crossbar of the window". it says a lot about him.

I wouldn't call Blixa strange particularly. Perhaps the strangest thing about him is his career trajectory from emaciated, hollow-cheeked metal-basher into portly, three-piece-suit-wearing respected literary figure about whose writing conference papers are now given. He's a highly intelligent, cultured and charming man but he doesn't suffer fools gladly.

xxp I once saw Blixa do an amazing solo set based entirely around his voice and a loop pedal, I am really feeling that description

also, Neubauten on the Tabula Rasa tour was one of the best shows I have ever seen in my life

I spent an hour with him for Alternative Press in 2002 or so and he was like a cross between Bryan Ferry and Hannibal Lecter. One of the most fun interviews I've ever done.

i put them on one time and was about to go in the dressing room but overheard him shouting at the other members about (i presume) how badly they had played (i hadn't noticed anything amiss and had thought they had been wonderful). he is very scary when angry.

Blixa can, in a good mood, be very sweet and thoughtful? He recently sat down and patiently explained all of his favourite Kraftwerk albums to me, which was really quite above and beyond. I'm vaguely terrified of him, but he's actually lovely?

One of the things I've noticed about him is that he is just naturally an incredibly LOUD human being, even in his default mode, he seems like he's shouting. So if he's irritated, the irritation seems much more magnified by the volume. But him refusing to suffer fools is often when he is at his wittiest. (So long as you're not the target.) There's no putdown quite like a Blixa putdown.

I'm quite sad that the current supporter's project isn't getting any attention at all. They're still doing some really wonderful and pleasing work - funnily enough, the almost-throwaway "Dave" experiments have been resulting in some of the most enjoyable and playful, freeform, almost surreal tracks.

That is very interest8nbg.

That is very interesting. Perhaps when I encoutered him then he wasn't actually angry at all.

No, I mean, he also can be scarily, incandescently angry - and the volume combined with the rapier-sharp wit makes that terrifying.

But he's also kind of weirdly (almost childishly) excitable. Which is unexpected in someone with a reputation for being so icy uber-cool. So I do think that sometimes "Blixa shouting loudly in German" is read as him being angry, when he's just begeistert and laut?

But he really, really does not suffer fools gladly. (Which is why I'm so terrified of him - I'm 110% fool.)

I don't know when I became such a Captain Save-A-Prussian. I just love him, OK?

Go on then, I'm curious – how come you sat down with Blixa for a chat?

I'm a massive EN fan but I don't care much for this supporter thing, I just want to buy the finished record. The earlier supporter projects weren't very interesting to me either as they seemed to include the possibility of creative input to the album from supporters, whereas I thought they should have been making the record free from that kind of influence. Interestingly, they seem to have dropped that aspect from the current supporter project.

It's interesting that you didn't consider, that perhaps the very thing you're disparaging as totally "not your thing" in the second paragraph, is the exact answer to your question in the first.

So what are his favorites Kraftwerk albums?

Well, I assumed that your conversation with him was face-to-face, and face-to-face meetings are not part of the supporter rewards, but maybe it was via video.

xp

He said he was a huge fan, growing up, loved them from the first 2 albums all the way through to Die Mensch Maschine (after that he said they lost him). But the two releases he particularly singled out were Ralf und Florian and the Kometenmelodie single (with a cute story about combing all of West Berlin to find it! Sign of a true Kraftwerk nerd, tracking down that one.)

Oh nice, what a journey!

This may be worth your time.

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

And if you can track down the Liebeslieder documentary also, it's some story.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5VsIW3M5p1o

hell fucking ya

please sir, can we have some more...

<3 N.U. Unruh

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

New single!