I put up a new blog post over on Mostly-Retro where I talk about walking around Tokyo at 6:00 am and listening to Yes (two of my favorite things). It’s a bit different, but if you read it and like it let me know, I plan on writing more things like it in the future.
Also a quick request. Anyone out there have any experience with app development for the Android? I recently upgraded to the new Samsung Galaxy. I love it, but Samsung removed a few key features from their photo editor that I really like, mostly just some simple filters/effects. If anyone out there would know how to put new filters into the Samsung Photo Editor, I would make it worth their while (i.e. I would pay actual money). Let me know.
Now three very long songs.
Adelbert Von Deyen
Iceland
There are a lot of holes in my musical knowledge. For example, I still have never listened to a My Bloody Valentine album (I know I know, leave me alone). Another big gap, especially for someone with musical tastes like mine, is that I’ve never taken a deep dive in the more well-known krautrock acts. I love Harmonia and have most of their albums, and I’ve spoken in length about Tangerine Dream in the past, but I still don’t own much Amon Duul (I or II), Neu!, Cluster, Moebius, and so on.
That’s probably why I had never heard of Sky Records until recently. Sky was one of the major labels of the Krautrock/Berlin School movement, most notably putting out the Cluster/Eno collaborations of the late-70s. I’m becoming a fan of the label now, having realized that a lot of the old Germn prog/electronic music I’ve been buying lately (mainly reissues by Harald Grosskopf and Tyndall) was originally put out by them back in the 70s and 80s.
Even among Sky Records artists, I think that Adelbert Von Deyen is relatively obscure, if prolific. He pumped out nine albums between 1978 and 1987, but most of those remain unreleased digitally or on CD.
I’ve only managed to stumble upon Nordborg, his 1978 sophomore effort. Very much in the Klaus Schulze style, it is just two longform pieces, one on each side. The first track, “Moonrise,” is super avant-garde and ambient, with nary a melody, rhythm or motif to be found. It’s purely soundscapes and sonic experimentation. It’s not for everyone. This track, however, is a tad more digestible, complete with a steady beat and beautiful piano sections. I love this stuff.
Mick Clarke
Spectro
Mick Clarke strikes me as a guy who rolls with the punches. A Brit, Games, his first album was recorded in Germany in the krautrock style on the minor German label Blubber Lips. Since then, he’s seemingly dipped his hands in nearly every electronic music style I can think of, from new wave and synthpop to hardcore techno and house music, releasing music with various groups and under a number of aliases. I’m not familiar with his work at all, but it does appear that his new wave group Naked Lunch, has some degree of notoriety among the more die-hard synth enthusiasts out there.
This is the first track from Games, clocking in at over 17 minutes and taking up the entirety of the album’s first side. It’s split into two distinct parts. The first half is very ambient, with an emphasis on textures and effects instead of strong melodies. The second part shifts focus to sequencer patterns, with a slightly dark edge to them. It’s like Tangerine Dream but a little menacing.
Of these three songs I’m sharing today, this is the most noisy. The LP had some dust and other damage I couldn’t remove physically or digitally. It gets better after the first minute or so though. Sorry about that.
Sangiuliano
Take Off
I don’t know if it’s accurate to call Sangiuliano the “weirdest” of this bunch. All three of these guys are quite out there, but I feel it’s safe to say that, of these three artists, his music is the least typical. Instead of following in the Berlin School/krautrock styles of Amon Duul, Tangerine Dream or Cluster, Sangiuliano seemed far more content to combine his electronic musical leanings with classical influences. His pieces sounds like concertos from space. Everything about his music seems to be intent on copying classical orchestrations entirely with synthetic instrumentation. A symphony with a choir could perform this piece and it wouldn’t sound that out of the ordinary from other classical pieces, until it goes full synth at the end with an explosion of sequencers.
Sangiuliano never released another album, although he allegedly recorded one that ended up shelved by his record company. According to his Discogs page, he’s now a radio personality in his native Italy. Wonder if he kept the hair.