Holderlin - Holderlin's Traum (1972)

This entry isn't so much to delve into a specific group as to just talk about a specific group's album. Also, there's no youtube clip for this post, so if you only really come here for the clips I guess you should just move along and wait a few days cause there will be plenty of those coming.

Ahh, but to the point or the subject...or....the topic of this humble little entry. I didn't know anything about Holderlin when I decided to pick up their first album Holderlin's Traum. A quick google search yielded very little information and what information I could find was in Japanese or some other language I couldn't even pretend to understand. The information I could gather was the following;

Holderlin started out primarily playing cover tunes of German folk songs during much of the 1960's. Hailing from Germany, the band was founded by two brothers, Christian and Joachim Grumbkow. In the early 1970's they received a record contract and the album, Holderlin's Traum was their first release. They went on to continue releasing music well into the 1980's, but I've not had a chance to hear anything but Holderlin's Traum and frankly, I'm afraid that if I did pick up any of their later efforts, I'd probably be disappointed.

This album is great stuff. Most songs are peppered with strong, ethereal female vocals, but the third song "Strohhalm" is pulled along by some great male vocals. The stand out tracks are their shorter songs, like the second track "Peter", which showcases some beautiful acoustic guitar work at the beginning right before jumping into a jaunty folk groove. This song consistently gets stuck in my head. I wish I knew German so I wouldn't have to just go "na na na na" to the parts I don't understand!

The album shifts effortlessly between folk and krautrock stylings. The song "Requiem Fur Einen Wicht" is the most indicative of this fusion of techniques. Actually, there's a wide melding of styles; eastern influences, jazz, prog, folk, kraut. Each song handles the union of these musical approaches creatively and beautifully.

In short, I'm pretty bummed that I can't supply you people with some media of the band. But I highly suggest you try tracking it down, or if you know me, eventually I'll probably play it for you....because that's just what I do, isn't it?

Did you know that Faust means Fist?

I figured with the passing of Uwe Nettelbeck on Jan. 17th, it was only appropriate to begin my series of krautrock-based entries with the band he created; Faust.

The first song I ever heard from the band was the absurdly jaunty "Picnic on a Frozen River" from Faust So Far and I will readily admit to heavily using the song on many mixtapes. Another one of my favorites, from their self-titled album, was "I've Got My Car and My TV." which I was able to find a live performance clip of from 2005.



Faust formed in 1971. According to what I could dig up on wikipedia, they were also one of the first bands to sign to Richard Branson's Virgin Records (for those of you unfamiliar with Richard Branson, maybe you will remember his reality show called The Rebel Billionaire?). Although they are often noted as being one of the preeminent influences in the genre known as krautrock, they weren't commercial successes like Can or Kraftwerk. The band broke up after Virgin refused to release their fifth album and for some time after that, no one knew where the band was, or what they were doing. There are some documented instances of members performing together in the 80's, but it wasn't until 1990 that some of the members began touring and performing together recurrently. As you can see from the above clip, the band is still performing at various festivals in Europe.

I would kill to get my hands on some of Faust's original releases. Yes, having the music on pure, pressed vinyl, even with it's hissing and popping from age, would be amazing, but mostly, I would love to see the artwork in it's original state. The first album (Faust) was pressed on clear vinyl, inserted in a clear sleeve that had a silk-screened x-ray of a human fist. The second album (Faust So Far) had illustrations for each song included within the sleeve (I think Pearl Jam did something like this for one of their albums. Ha.)

Obviously, I don't know as much about Faust as I would like to know. Thank god, for wikipedia helping me fill in the gaps where my knowledge failed. Still, over the years, I have had more and more time to fall in love with their music and in time I'll learn more.

Here's one last clip of the band in concert during the 70's. Unfortunately, it's in German and I am not fluent in the language, but you take what you can get on youtube, sometimes;