TO WHERE I AM NOW

I wonder if the day before your birthday is more important than the actual day? The day before is ripe with anticipation, the upcoming party, the presents, the birthday cake, all the cards (Thanks Steve and Lynne, got yours today). Then there’s the imminent relief from responsibilities, no chores, no diet, no cooking, no washing the dishes, no getting out of bed at all if you choose not to. But then when the day actually comes and apart from the presents, the surprises, all the lovely messages, the realization that people are thinking about you, that they care about you and that they would like to make you feel good on your birthday…apart from all that. Wait a minute, birthdays are amazing before and during!! Ha ha. I won’t talk about it anymore until the day arrives, I’ll try to quell the excitement and tell you all about it tomorrow on MY BIRTHDAY!

On a more serious note Florian Schneider, co-founder of Kraftwerk with Ralf Hütter, died today. Although he hadn’t been involved in the band for many years he was there through all their records and into the 21st century. The influence that this band had on the music world is immeasurable. I managed to see them live once in Australia with that unique show where they all stood there in front of ‘terminals’, looking futuristic. It was at a festival indoors, perhaps The Big Day Out and the audience didn’t seem that interested when they did anything more interesting and less accessible, but as soon as that sequencer and the childlike melodies came out they were engaged. I suppose the appeal of The Model and Autobahn, Computer World and Tour de France is what made them known to bigger audiences, but if you go back and listen to their earlier albums as I have been doing tonight, experimental doesn’t really cover it. Most people don’t realize that Schneider was a flautist (he also played guitar and violin) and that on their first album on one song at least they had real drums (Vom Himmel Hoch / From Heaven Above) played by the future member of Neu! and La Düsseldorf, Klaus Dinger. We were recently in Düsseldorf and we visited their Kling Klang studios, where we recorded a small video that will see the light of day at some point. Outside the door where the studio was stands a traffic cone so you know you are in the right place. RIP Florian Schneider, condolences to friends and family.

We were in the studio again today, I was playing nylon string guitar and fixing some bass. New strings on the nylon string means that it can take days before the strings settle down and stop stretching out of tune. When I picked it up today it was beyond a semitone flat (that’s another note if you don’t know what a semitone is, A becomes A flat). But it’s a unique sound, just listen to Leonard Cohen, that was part of the trick. So it takes constant checking to make sure you are in tune. This is allegedly the last Space Summit track we will be working on although Jed and I might have a go at writing an acoustic song to add another flavour to the album.

Yesterday I was looking at the free CD that came with PROG magazine. I rarely know any of the bands, especially if its from this magazine, with Mojo’s free CD it’s more likely to have more well-known artists (to me), but then again I suppose mega Prog fans dig deeper into their favoured genre. I noticed something about the CD, something beyond the music. It had two recycling symbols, one on the cover telling me the cardboard that the CD came in was recyclable and the other on the actual CD telling me that CD wasn’t recyclable. So, let me get this straight, this information is given to me for when I throw the CD and its cover away? First of all why would I do that? Secondly is this CD meant to be thrown away? Do most people throw these CDs away? And then I thought rather than directing people on how to dispose of the cover in the cardboard recycling bin and making sure that the CD itself goes in the general garbage, how about direction on the cover to help people value music and value the medium?

I intend to finish today’s blog before the clock strikes 12 so I’m not tempted to believe it is actually my birthday whilst writing. There’s also this whole thing about what time you were born so in actual fact your birthday only lasts from when you were born till the end of the day. So if you were born at one minute to midnight, I’m very sorry to have to inform you that your birthday is only one minute long. Luckily for me and as I remember my Mum telling me, I was born at 6 in the morning, so long pampering guaranteed.

Music today will obviously be Kraftwerk which translates directly to power plant. The two crazy traffic cone albums came out in 1970 and 1972, the first with a red cone, the second with a green cone. At this point they couldn’t have imagined the commercial heights they would reach. Obscure music, obscure cover art, there weren’t many clues on the third album Ralf und Florian (1973), but things were developing, for example they included a picture of themselves on the cover. By 1974 and their fourth album Autobahn the music world was changed – there was a new ingredient. Those sequencers would eventually find their way into very commercial music, remember Donna Summer’s I Feel Love? Eno was listening, Bowie was listening, German Electronic music would have huge influence on your favourite arty Rock stars and when you listen to phase two of Ultravox with Midge Ure, the album and worldwide hit Vienna was produced by Conny Plank (who had worked with Kraftwerk from the beginning), you realize that the German scene that also included Tangerine Dream and Kluster had made their mark. Earlier pioneers such as Conrad Schnitzler (who played with early Tangerine Dream and Kluster) didn’t break through to the mainstream but Klaus Schulze who was the drummer in Tangerine Dream made a number of visible electronic albums from the seventies onwards. Other early artists in love with German Electronic music would be Gary Numan, John Foxx from phase one of Ultravox, Orchestral Maneuvers In The Dark and a million more. The list of German Electronic pioneers and who they influenced is too long for here, but it’s a fascinating journey should you care to take a trip. You Spin Me Round.

Song Of The Day is Lover’s Head from Noctorum’s Offer The Light for obvious reasons.

 

Lover’s Head

On a hill there was a King
He threw a banquet for the Queen
She asked him what’s the party for
To celebrate my love for you
She smiled her secret hid the truth
She didn’t know he knew her thoughts
But he was a patient man
He was a patient man
He was a patient man
He was a patient man

On the day the guests arrived
Many came from many lands
People said he loves his Queen
See this lavish spectacle
Jugglers and roasted boar
Musicians Poets Acrobats
And then there was the silent man
There was the silent man
There was the silent man
There was the silent man

In the tent the perfumed Queen
Danced her way towards the box
She wondered what could be inside
The King he beckoned ‘Lift the lid’
She couldn’t wait to look inside
She slipped the bow, removed the top
To stare down at her lover’s head
To stare down at her lover’s head (head)
At her lover’s head
Stare down at her lover’s head

(Willson-Piper / Mason)
Noctorum – Offer The Light (2006)