― jack cole (jackcole), Sunday, 16 November 2003 23:52 (twenty years ago) link
― F. Anthony O'Reilly (Ferg), Sunday, 16 November 2003 23:53 (twenty years ago) link
― Julio Desouza (jdesouza), Sunday, 16 November 2003 23:57 (twenty years ago) link
― scott seward, Monday, 17 November 2003 00:04 (twenty years ago) link
― hstencil, Monday, 17 November 2003 00:22 (twenty years ago) link
― Broheems (diamond), Monday, 17 November 2003 00:23 (twenty years ago) link
― hstencil, Monday, 17 November 2003 00:23 (twenty years ago) link
― Orbit (Orbit), Monday, 17 November 2003 01:17 (twenty years ago) link
― nickn (nickn), Monday, 17 November 2003 01:55 (twenty years ago) link
― hstencil, Monday, 17 November 2003 01:58 (twenty years ago) link
(although there is a posthomous comp called "Manana" which has various live and peel sessions between Tanz Der Lemminge and Wolf City eras.. which is alright, but not worth killing to get)
― donut bitch (donut), Monday, 17 November 2003 02:03 (twenty years ago) link
I saw them playing at the Astoria a few years ago though and it was horrendous, they sounded like Starship without the choruses. Apparently they played some older (i.e. good) stuff in the second half but I was long gone by then, as were Steven Stapleton and David Tibet who were standing in front of me but left after about 15 minutes.
― udu wudu (udu wudu), Monday, 17 November 2003 02:03 (twenty years ago) link
It still drives me nuts to this day that I don't know what that song was!
― peepee (peepee), Monday, 17 November 2003 02:15 (twenty years ago) link
And peepee, it's conceivable to me that someone could love Phallus Dei but think every other AD II album crap, so maybe investigate that one.
― nickn (nickn), Monday, 17 November 2003 02:31 (twenty years ago) link
― hstencil, Monday, 17 November 2003 02:32 (twenty years ago) link
Yeti is beyond fucking awesome. It kills. Then 70% through, it abruptly loses focus for me, so overall, it slips just below Tanz. But as for single most amazing moments and songs, Yeti wins.
I really should listen to Phallus Dei more often, though.
― donut bitch (donut), Monday, 17 November 2003 02:44 (twenty years ago) link
get Yeti as intro, and then with the others, it'll just get better and better
one single lp then two 2lps !! in 2 years ! well prepared for the studio, well-gigged into shape, using the then quite quite new 2lp format properly ..
and then more a few years laterViva .. it's quite different -- there are amazing tracks and awful filler. The point though, they still had very good ideas for one of their pop albums that still lived up to the early use of that word in its title
am still having trouble getting into Carnival in Babylon myself, but the one track i've heard off Wolf City was maybe the right track to hear, so i'm hoping for more from that
Hijack was one of the most dissapointing mail-unwrap-listen experiences in my life though -- nothing to redeem it, but i'm still wondering about the possibilities of their being one or two classic tracks amoungst the later supposed dross
the i-duuno?/ frame-up /false alarm/ whatever re: Baader-Meinhof intrigues me -- i presume both Amon Düüls completely peacefully innocent obv., but i like the subversion of the blues and american culture there throughout the group's work, even whilst they were a big-selling american "head" band
― george gosset (gegoss), Monday, 17 November 2003 05:25 (twenty years ago) link
― hstencil, Monday, 17 November 2003 05:29 (twenty years ago) link
instead, try this : play one side of dance of the lemmings then play, say, plague of lighthouse keepers. ie go back to favourite songs and especially playing the lps the way they were designed to be played, one side at an instance.
there's a lot of material there, so sifting through gradually, getting to know the band mixing "chill/ drone/ trance" with "rock" quite cruisely is my advice. They're almost chris&cosey "subliminal", they creep up
but if i hadn't heard yeti first (thanks to duane playing them to me while we were arguing the virtues of "rock"), they would have seemed both too "rock" and too "trance" (even "trance" or "drone" as those words meant in 1973), and i wouldn't have bothered follow-up
(oh, i found the original viva vinyl in a well-maintained thrift shop some time later. The inter-layered drones on "mozambique", once the truncated b-side of that weird "pigman" single then splayed out to full length on the lp (with secret message at end), that may be my favourite "trance" song, and i like the way that that lp itself from 1973 was possibly the first to use that word "trance" with justification and admission, and "mozambique" one of few pieces to justify that label, imo)
― george gosset (gegoss), Monday, 17 November 2003 06:34 (twenty years ago) link
― el sabor de gene (yournullfame), Monday, 17 November 2003 07:54 (twenty years ago) link
― ddrake, Monday, 17 November 2003 09:14 (twenty years ago) link
― el sabor de gene (yournullfame), Monday, 17 November 2003 10:56 (twenty years ago) link
― Dadaismus (Dada), Monday, 17 November 2003 11:09 (twenty years ago) link
― carol brady, Monday, 17 November 2003 13:08 (twenty years ago) link
Generally, I would recommend avoiding Amon Düül, unless you are one of those saddoes who think the more unlistenable something is the higher the hipness quotient. The exception is "Paradieswarts Düül", which is good and even better with the addition of the Eternal Flow/Paramechanical World single.
― Dadaismus (Dada), Monday, 17 November 2003 13:24 (twenty years ago) link
NB that the recent round of repertoire remasters of ad2 albums have all been sonic maximised, somewhat to the detriment of the music.
― Pashmina (Pashmina), Monday, 17 November 2003 13:28 (twenty years ago) link
― Dadaismus (Dada), Monday, 17 November 2003 13:31 (twenty years ago) link
if they're in little cardboard fold-out sleeves, that's probably them. "Yeti" has the paramechanical world 7" as a bonus which would have been neat, if they hadn't maximised the whole fucking thing. It really pisses me off.
― Pashmina (Pashmina), Monday, 17 November 2003 13:41 (twenty years ago) link
― Dadaismus (Dada), Monday, 17 November 2003 13:44 (twenty years ago) link
― Pashmina (Pashmina), Monday, 17 November 2003 13:47 (twenty years ago) link
― Dadaismus (Dada), Monday, 17 November 2003 13:50 (twenty years ago) link
listening to albums one, two and three will be a chore -- maybe i think of a golden period for that band -- Dadamais, Can had a golden period and are forgiven for their mid '70s burn out crap -- i think both bands are the same in lot of ways -- maybe communal bands have a cell structure that means some cells are self defeating, lots of little marching cans from nonwarholia, but that's as good at or better than the marching music of some Kraftwerk and some Can (who sometimes sound too uptight or too mellow)
― george gosset (gegoss), Monday, 17 November 2003 15:20 (twenty years ago) link
― francesco, Monday, 17 November 2003 17:38 (twenty years ago) link
oh, hush.
― el sabor de gene (yournullfame), Monday, 17 November 2003 23:38 (twenty years ago) link
― Phil Freeman (Phil Freeman), Tuesday, 18 November 2003 00:51 (twenty years ago) link
so, avoid the first three jam lps (well the ten jam sides, like the greatful dead, no synths, a waste of time)(and avoid all jam lps obv.)
― george gosset (gegoss), Tuesday, 18 November 2003 02:03 (twenty years ago) link
The only crap Can album is "Out Of Reach", certainly Can never plumbed similar depths to ADII. ADII were always really just a rock band, Can weren't.
― Dadaismus (Dada), Wednesday, 19 November 2003 14:39 (twenty years ago) link
― donut bitch (donut), Wednesday, 19 November 2003 18:34 (twenty years ago) link
― hstencil, Wednesday, 19 November 2003 19:53 (twenty years ago) link
Mr Gossett, I like Wolf City shitloads, esp the last track (title eludes me) & I'll have to get it again soon I suppose. IIRC as well as the synth, they had an optigan, or its high-end spinoff (I forget the name, I'm very tired) as well. "Vive la Trance" I've never got around to buying, b/c a lot of the later stuff is so lame, and I always lumped it in w/that for some reason. Poss I shd pick a copy of that up as well.
― Pashmina (Pashmina), Wednesday, 19 November 2003 20:07 (twenty years ago) link
― Broheems (diamond), Wednesday, 19 November 2003 20:17 (twenty years ago) link
― Pashmina (Pashmina), Thursday, 20 November 2003 00:20 (twenty years ago) link
Once again I agree with Pashmina, a worrying development for both of us I feel - title of the last track: "Sleepwalkers Timeless Bridge", written, sung and mostly played by everyone's favourite drummer/guitarist, Daniel Secundus Fichelscher. As for the objections to "Lemmings" being based on a "knee-jerk reaction to the more superficially "prog-rock" sound" - well, if we leave the knees out of it, the fact that it's more prog rocky than the earlier albums is indeed one of the main problems with it except that "Wolf City" is much more proggy and is much better.
― Dadaismus (Dada), Thursday, 20 November 2003 10:42 (twenty years ago) link
― george gosset (gegoss), Friday, 21 November 2003 04:31 (twenty years ago) link
― Paul (scifisoul), Tuesday, 5 October 2004 18:22 (nineteen years ago) link
― hstencil (hstencil), Tuesday, 5 October 2004 18:23 (nineteen years ago) link
― Paul (scifisoul), Tuesday, 5 October 2004 18:29 (nineteen years ago) link
― nickn (nickn), Wednesday, 6 October 2004 03:53 (nineteen years ago) link
― Professor Challenger (ex machina), Wednesday, 6 October 2004 04:02 (nineteen years ago) link
― nickn (nickn), Wednesday, 6 October 2004 04:06 (nineteen years ago) link
For some reason I've never liked these guys... and I'm a sucker for most any krautrock out there. They are probably the only "important" krautrock band that I just don't get.
― ilxor, Thursday, 25 September 2008 02:25 (fifteen years ago) link
whoah that is some major dissing of the Amon Duul records in that Weinzerl interview.
― sleeve, Thursday, 25 September 2008 02:26 (fifteen years ago) link
"Very important: we are NOT a Krautrock band."
Oops!
― Nate Carson, Thursday, 25 September 2008 07:17 (fifteen years ago) link
"Eye-shaking king" is still one of the heaviest/ more fucked-up/ plainly weird songs ever.Yeti = the real soundtrack to Jodorowsky's Holy Mountain (unintentionally funny bits included).
― Marco Damiani, Thursday, 25 September 2008 08:01 (fifteen years ago) link
Has any 'Krautrock' band ever said, "We're a Krautrock band"?
― Tom D is a rattly old puffin, who remembers ILX in the days when... (Tom D.), Thursday, 25 September 2008 08:53 (fifteen years ago) link
Just Faust.
― Trip Maker, Thursday, 25 September 2008 14:18 (fifteen years ago) link
I put on Carnival in Babylon in hopes of liking it, and I'll admit I liked it more than I did last time I tried it, but it was still eh to me. What do I need to hear instead?
― the HOOS from the hilarious internet connection (BIG HOOS aka the steendriver), Wednesday, 17 December 2008 22:00 (fifteen years ago) link
I like everything up to and including Wolf City.― hstencil, domingo 16 de noviembre de 2003 03:39 PM (5 years ago)
i.e. YETI
― sleeve, Wednesday, 17 December 2008 23:25 (fifteen years ago) link
i <3 yeti...i need to give tanz der lemminge more time...
still, someone go nominate AD2 in Sven's best band ever thread RIGHT NOW!!!
― Janitor in the Valley of the Dolls (Drugs A. Money), Wednesday, 17 December 2008 23:58 (fifteen years ago) link
I like a lot of Yeti, but I don't like all of Yeti. The last two tracks (one of which is 18 minutes long) sort of lose the plot. At least, the plot I was following.
― scott pgwp (pgwp), Thursday, 18 December 2008 00:43 (fifteen years ago) link
I put on Carnival in Babylon in hopes of liking it, and I'll admit I liked it more than I did last time I tried it, but it was still eh to me.
yeti yeti yeti
CiB is pretty eh to everyone, i think, it's got a couple of good songs but it just feels flabby and unmemorable.
― Manclusion (GOTT PUNCH II HAWKWINDZ), Thursday, 18 December 2008 02:33 (fifteen years ago) link
OTM. Whereas "Wolf City" is sheer entertainment from start to finish.
― Vicious Cop Kills Gentle Fool (Tom D.), Thursday, 18 December 2008 10:15 (fifteen years ago) link
Wolf City is a masterpiece. Even if the band doesn't agree.
― Nate Carson, Thursday, 18 December 2008 13:00 (fifteen years ago) link
since when has a band's opinion mattered
― Manclusion (GOTT PUNCH II HAWKWINDZ), Thursday, 18 December 2008 14:04 (fifteen years ago) link
Yeti >> Wolf City >> Carnival In Babylon > Phallus Dei
― I KNOW WHAT YOU'RE UP TO (Colonel Poo), Thursday, 18 December 2008 14:26 (fifteen years ago) link
And Dance of the Lemmings?
― Vicious Cop Kills Gentle Fool (Tom D.), Thursday, 18 December 2008 14:27 (fifteen years ago) link
Haven't heard it
― I KNOW WHAT YOU'RE UP TO (Colonel Poo), Thursday, 18 December 2008 14:28 (fifteen years ago) link
get on that, colonel.
also it's
YETI>>>>WOLF CITY>>>TANZ DER>>>>PHALLUS>>>>>VIVE LE TRANCE>>>>CARNIVAL
not to imply that any of them are terrible, though, they're all worth listening to.
― Manclusion (GOTT PUNCH II HAWKWINDZ), Friday, 19 December 2008 04:04 (fifteen years ago) link
I think Carnival is certainly better than Viva Le Trance. The first few songs on Viva are really good, but then it falls off...
Anybody want to buy my Hi-Jack LP?
― Nate Carson, Friday, 19 December 2008 04:11 (fifteen years ago) link
i was actually going to put them as tied
but you're probably right, now that i think about it.
― Manclusion (GOTT PUNCH II HAWKWINDZ), Friday, 19 December 2008 04:14 (fifteen years ago) link
I can't really argue with the rest of your hierarchy. Yeti is spectacular and Wolf City purrs along like a dream.
― Nate Carson, Friday, 19 December 2008 04:32 (fifteen years ago) link
I find this band perplexing. I like various chunks of their catalog but sometimes I am baffled that the term krautrock is used to encompass acts as disparate as Amon Duul II, Cluster, and Neu!, all of which seem wildly different for the most part. have had Wolf City and Yeti (never heard any of the Amon Duul stuff) and they're okay - not as goofy/fun/random as Faust. Kinda of a piece with Hawkwind but not as conceptually together.
― I, Mr. Sneer Joy (Shakey Mo Collier), Tuesday, 15 February 2011 22:36 (thirteen years ago) link
AD2 had more range than Hawkwind. Tanz der Lemminge, one of my favorite albums of all time, zigzags thru a panoply of psychedelic flavours. Restless Skylight Transistor Child goes from awkward Teutonic boogie to sitar-addled psychedelic folk idyll to distorted overdriven acid rawk to impending doom. The next track, Marilyn Monroe Memorial Church is a stagnating pool of echoey Goth bleakness.
I love Hawkwind and can see the comparison but I think it sells the Duuls short and ignores just how much they could do well.
― kingkongvsbasedgodzilla (Drugs A. Money), Tuesday, 15 February 2011 23:20 (thirteen years ago) link
Amon Duul II is def more all over the place than Hawkwind (who pretty much just cycled between one or two modes for the bulk of their early career). whether or not that's a virtue... eh, I'm undecided. I find the sprawl of Amon Duul II's stuff a bit off-putting.
― I, Mr. Sneer Joy (Shakey Mo Collier), Tuesday, 15 February 2011 23:25 (thirteen years ago) link
Yeah well that sprawl is the essence of the band. No other band combining Jefferson Airplane, Incredible String Band, Velvet Underground and Night on Bald Mountain
― kingkongvsbasedgodzilla (Drugs A. Money), Tuesday, 15 February 2011 23:34 (thirteen years ago) link
So I guessing Stefan Zauner, singer of Freiheit, is the only former member of Amon Duul II to have appeared on Top of the Pops? (This could have gone on The Rolling "Top of the Pops" BBC4 Revival thread, er thread).
― Frozen Mug (Tom D.), Friday, 10 January 2020 21:26 (four years ago) link
Amon Düül II--C, because
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BqxH2aU9z-Q
― reggie (qualmsley), Tuesday, 11 February 2020 18:05 (four years ago) link
"Hijack" is rubbish.
Me otm. I listened to this today, along with a lot of other shitty so-called Krautrock, and... well, put it this way, Renate sings two songs on this album and Lothar Meid sings THREE, I mean, wtaf?!?!? He's the worst singer in a band that contains Chris Karrer and John Weinzierl, need I say more? And what's with that song where he just lifts entire lines of lyrics, unchanged, from Mott the Hoople?
― The Corbynite Maneuver (Tom D.), Wednesday, 22 April 2020 17:58 (four years ago) link
HISI (had it, sold it) - long gone from my collection, never to be heard again
― zoomer death circus (sleeve), Wednesday, 22 April 2020 17:59 (four years ago) link
Chris Karrer sings three songs too! But then Renate did say the guys in the band were a bunch of sexist hippie assholes.
― The Corbynite Maneuver (Tom D.), Wednesday, 22 April 2020 18:05 (four years ago) link
Touring next year… could be exciting or maybe not?
― mmmm, Saturday, 4 September 2021 20:14 (two years ago) link
I hear they're pretty good! I mean it's an oldies act, but most of the original lineup iirc
― sleeve, Saturday, 4 September 2021 20:38 (two years ago) link
Okay thanks! Going to buy the tickets. Will give me a nice run up to spend the time with their music.
― mmmm, Saturday, 4 September 2021 20:44 (two years ago) link
please report back! very cool.
― sleeve, Saturday, 4 September 2021 20:46 (two years ago) link
And what's with that song where he just lifts entire lines of lyrics, unchanged, from Mott the Hoople?
It's worse than that, there's actually TWO songs on this album ("Hijack") that lift entire lines of lyrics, unchanged, from the same Mott the Hoople song!
― My God's got no nose... (Tom D.), Tuesday, 16 April 2024 07:10 (one week ago) link
Maybe the clue is in the album title; a détournement.
― ringworm, Tuesday, 16 April 2024 09:50 (one week ago) link
For the record, the Mott song is "Hymn for the Dudes" which is quoted in both "I Can't Wait" and "You're Not Alone"; the former also contains a line lifted from Leonard Cohen's "Stranger Song", which maybe does suggest this is a conscious repurposing.
I only heard this album this year but I found it a lot easier to digest than Vive La Trance; the band just seems a lot more confident about their efforts even as they scatter their energies. They're not "trying too hard" but the creative decisions seem less contrived; I was touched to hear Chris Karrer contribute a long sax solo to "You're Not Alone", or to hear elephants trumpeting over a "Shaft" funk groove. For what it's worth, this is probably the best of their "non-classic" records (though I haven't heard Made in Germany because only the single-disc version is streaming).
― Halfway there but for you, Tuesday, 16 April 2024 17:59 (one week ago) link
I quite enjoy Made In Germany
― Toshirō Nofune (The Seventh ILXorai), Tuesday, 16 April 2024 18:02 (one week ago) link
"Hijack" is terrible.
― My God's got no nose... (Tom D.), Tuesday, 16 April 2024 18:07 (one week ago) link
What you call a "conscious repurposing", I call lazily stealing some lines to fill out a lyric - and it's not like it's they're referencing some lines from a classic song, it's from a contemporary song!
― My God's got no nose... (Tom D.), Tuesday, 16 April 2024 18:15 (one week ago) link
idk i like "hijack"
― budo jeru, Tuesday, 16 April 2024 18:29 (one week ago) link
What you call a "conscious repurposing", I call lazily stealing some lines to fill out a lyric
It just makes it more interesting for me, more than if Lothar Meid had scrambled his brains to come up with two or three more lines of English lyric.
― Halfway there but for you, Tuesday, 16 April 2024 19:09 (one week ago) link
made in germany is interesting because it's one of those records where a completely different guy takes over and then vanishes, in this case a guy named nando tischer
i guess it's kind of the end of "classic era" adii tho... lothar, falk-u, and renate's last '70s outing with them, right?
― Kate (rushomancy), Tuesday, 16 April 2024 19:11 (one week ago) link
Lothar's not on it I think? It's the bass player from "Vive La Trance", Robby Heibl, but Danny Fichelscher is on at least one track!
― My God's got no nose... (Tom D.), Tuesday, 16 April 2024 20:28 (one week ago) link
The comings and goings in this band make Hawkwind seem steady and sedate.
― My God's got no nose... (Tom D.), Tuesday, 16 April 2024 20:29 (one week ago) link
can't believe they stole some lyrics on uh Hijack
― made entirely of styrofoam (GOTT PUNCH II HAWKWINDZ), Tuesday, 23 April 2024 08:06 (thirty minutes ago) link