I wish I could sit here in my lederhosen, wood clogs, and stein full of warm beer and say I’ve been hip to Krautrock since I was a stellar Midwest teen. I wish I could say I started a movement in my John Hughes years of forward-thinking teenagers filling their heads with komische music like Kraftwerk, NEU!, Cluster, and Popol Vuh. I wish I could say that. Truth is I didn’t even know what Krautrock was till I was well into adulthood. I’d heard the name now and then, though I thought it was something to do with sauerkraut that sat in the fridge too long. “Don’t use that sauerkraut! It’s got the krautrock!” Okay, maybe I didn’t think that(or didn’t I?)
Point is I had my “come to Komsiche” moment and I’ve never looked back. It started with Kraftwerk’s Trans Europe Express ten years ago and since then Krautrock has become one of my favorite musical genres(right behind ukulele doom metal and Mediterranean throat singing.) I think the album that really did it for me was NEU!s first album NEU!. When I first heard the motorik beat of “Hallogallo” I knew I’d found my people. With Klaus Dinger’s drums and experimentation and Michael Rother’s enigmatic guitar playing I felt like this was true blending of rock and art. Of course those two got along infamously. Dinger was the experimental chap that wanted to make everything they did a political statement. Michael Rother was more interested in making good music and the creative process. In between NEU! records Rother formed another musical alliance with two other Krautrock OGs, Cluster’s Hans-Joachim Roedelius and Dieter Moebius. That band was called Harmonia.
The first time I’d heard of Harmonia was over at my pal 1537’s place. After reading his great piece on the record I knew I needed to get it in my head. Of course I’d only listened to snippets here and there. I did check out a live album of there’s that was excellent, but I never found a copy of that debut for myself. Until now.
On a college trip to Bloomington a couple weeks ago I happened across a copy of Harmonia’s Musik von Harmonia at Landlocked Records for a quite nice price and proceeded to happily give my money to the young lady at the counter. When she looked at me funny I realized I didn’t hand her the record. Record bought, we left looking for sustenance.
Musik von Harmonia is quite the aural feast. It loops, blips, and bleeps all over the place like a drunk android giddy on high octane motor oil. The album opens with the bouncy “Watussi”. It seems to unfold over the course of its nearly 6 minutes like an endless red carpet that elevates to spatial levels. They’re not songs more than they’re moments of exquisite discovery. “Sehr Komische” floats and expands over the course of nearly 11 minutes. It pushes the boundaries of ambient music to new heights, really. Out of the ether you can make out a motorik beat attempting to come to the service, the gauzy tones raising as the beat does. “Sonnenschein” has somewhat of a tribal beat to it. Synths glide in and out as the rhythm gains momentum.
I can almost picture Rother, Roedelius, and Moebius inside the old house pictured on the inside gatefold sleeve, maybe under the influence of mind-altering substances, just throwing these ideas out and seeing where they’d land. Moving from instrument to instrument and seeing what would happen. By the sound of it they came across some pretty amazing ideas. “Dino”, for example, is classic krautrock goodness complete with the classic motorik beat. It has that NEU! airiness to it without sounding just like NEU! or Cluster. These three seem to have really loved the creative process. Then you get to something like “Ohrwurm” and all bets are off. Buzzing tones and wobbly guitar seem to illustrate musically a mental breakdown. “Veterano” sounds like sounds the Mothersbaugh brothers would attempt to create with Devo. “Hausmusik” starts out as a melody line but quickly descends into electronic noise, like low tide washing away drawings in the sand. Soon enough our melody reappears to help finish the song out.
With a lot of komische music there seems to be a regimented code that is followed. Everything feels free-flowing and spontaneous, but it’s very much a controlled chaos. Harmonia seem to leave regimented improvisation at the studio door and let artistic expression flow freely. There’s a lightness to the tracks on Musik von Harmonia that is infectious. I have yet to hear their other records, so I can’t comment on future Harmonia endeavors. Rother, Roedelius, and Moebius would all head back to their previous projects and continue to make boundary-pushing art in their respective “name” bands, but none would ever capture the airy magic that Harmonia created. At least to my ears.
I don’t know of this one, or those folks, at all. I’m still new to the whole Krautrock thing (wee bits of Faust, Tangerine Dream and Neu! And big bits of Kraftwerk), but this sounds good. Very good, in fact.
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… also some outstanding artwork.
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I’d recommend it. Some of the best krautrock I’ve heard. Their second album’s pretty good, too(listened to it this morning.)
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Dang. I might need to spend some cashpennies…
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If you can spare a couple it’d be worth your time.
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Don’t trust that Welsh fella, he’s bad news.
I got hipped to Harmonia mostly by a magazine cover CD that was curated by the Red Hot Chili Peppers – they chose ‘Dino’.
I haven’t played this for a long, long time – Sehr Kosmisch was my fave. I bought the first Cluster LP and wasn’t very impressed by it by the way.
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RHCP chose ‘Dino’? That puts the Chili Peppers up a notch for me. Though Flea always gets high marks from me. He’s a hell of a musician. And he was great in ‘Dudes’.
I’ve had a hard time getting into Cluster. I’ve got one that I liked, but I can’t remember which one it was. Rother was on the Beaches album a few years ago. He still sounds pretty stellar.
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I have the first Cluster LP and it just sort of sits there and doesn’t do much for me.
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Terrific write up. ‘Deluxe’ is essential too. Brilliant.
Cluster are more difficult, for sure. Try ‘II’ (the blue one with the yellow stars) or ‘Zuckerzeit’ (as the title says, ‘sugar time’).
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I’ve got ‘Curiosum’. It wasn’t bad, but I just don’t revisit very often.
I’ve since listened to ‘Deluxe’ and I concur. I also quite liked Harmonia ’76 with Eno.
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I was playing this the other day and loving it. I enjoy Cluster’s USA live not titles just the city the tracks were recorded in, whenever I listen to it in the car I get to places and have no idea how.
I now need to search the records out.
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“…and proceeded to happily give my money to the young lady at the counter. When she looked at me funny I realized I didn’t hand her the record.”
Hahaha what? She couldn’t read your mind?
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Apparently Record stores have stopped hiring mutants and mind readers these days. Bummer.
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Once again you highlight something I need to hear because I have not yet.
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Spotify has them. You can check em out on the cheap.
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