[engl] The first part of Hans-Joachim Roedelius' Selbstportrait (Self-Portrait) series was originally released under the title 'Sanfte Musik' on Sky Records in 1979. Now, some forty years later, a new instalment has arrived in the form of an album entitled 'Wahre Liebe'

[engl] During the legendary Forst years Roedelius had a private workspace with a Farfisa organ, a Revox-A77 tape machine, an echo device and a synthesizer which he borrowed from the Cluster studio next door now and again. Here he experimented, practised, allowed his imagination to flow, at any hour of the day or night, whenever he was not in the studio with Dieter Moebius and/or Michael Rother at work on new Cluster or Harmonia material. Roedelius always let the tape run, in order to analyze the ideas thus captured more effectively on repeated listening. The recordings offer us a deep insight into the creative process of his music. Fleeting notes, slivers of ideas, so to speak, moments of inspiration. Finger exercises, experiments in harmony, studies in rhythm are also preserved on these magnetic tapes.

[engl] 'Morphing Polaroids' is the debut album by Japanese born Saeko Okuchi alias Saeko Killy for Hamburg- based Bureau B. After moving to Berlin in 2018 Saeko Killy found herself in the orb of Club Sameheads, where she made herself known as a DJ and live performer. After releasing her first EP " ???????? ?? – Dancing Pikapika" with the label Chill Mountain from Osaka in 2021, followed a fruitful Jam session during the pandemic lockdown, resulting in the eleven titles collected together here for the album 'Morphing Polaroids' produced by Brussels DJ and selector soFa elsewhere. The LP is a contemporary Leftfield Clubsound, effortlessly combining elements of Dub, Post-Punk and Kraut with electronic Beats.

[engl] Compiled by Ralf Köster, DJ and curator of Hamburg’s Golden Pudel Club, "Where The Rabbit Sleeps" is an extensive collection of tracks by Sensorama, a project comprising Jörn Elling Wuttke and Roman Flügel. Working as a production team since the late 1980s in various guises such as Acid Jesus, Alter Ego and Primitive Painter, the pair also founded several labels with DJ Ata and Heiko MSO (Ongaku, Klang Elektronik, Playhouse). They released their debut album as Sensorama in 1995. The Darmstadt duo blazed completely new trails in those days, as Andreas Dorau noted: «Sensorama is artful techno, what one used to call intelligent techno. All in the best of taste, not so far removed from the realms of fine art.» Their music draws on a wide range of influences which reach far beyond the generic borders of techno. «Inspired by the the Krautrock of the 1970s, they were less interested in making Frankfurt Techno than they were in the electronic music of NEU!, Cluster and Kraftwerk. A Darmstadt-Düsseldorf axis, so to speak,» Christoph Dallach explains. «They kept records in the studio by the likes of La Düsseldorf or Pyrolator, playing them from time to time to refresh their auditory nerves, to clean out their ears.». Sensorama released the last of their three albums in 2001, leaving us with an extraordinary body of work which still resonates today. Charlotte Goltermann, founder of the Ladomat 2000 label and A&R manager for the third LP, recalls: «I’ve rarely come across artists who had such a clear idea of what they wanted – or did not want and consequently would not do. They were artists without fear, who would not shut out anyone who loved music, yet remained strictly underground themselves.» The new compilation "Where The Rabbit Sleeps" offers a deep insight into the musical world of Sensorama. It is available on CD or as a double LP with a gatefold cover, remastered by Andreas [Lupo] Lubich, with new artwork by Rike Weigert and liner notes by Charlotte Goltermann, Christoph Dallach and Andreas Dorau.

[engl] The Berlin project Sprung Aus Den Wolken was part of the "Geniale Dilletanten" movement in the early 1980s, along with Einstürzende Neubauten and Mechanik Destrüktiw Komandöh. The band first released an EP on ZickZack in 1981, followed by further releases on the band's own record label Faux Pas in 1982 and 1983, then on the French outlet Les Disques Du Soleil Et De L'Acier until 1991. The track Pas Attendre was part of the soundtrack of Wim Wender's movie Der Himmel Über Berlin and thus became an underground hit. Bureau B is thrilled to now re-release the debut EP under the title "1981 West Berlin" including additional songs from the band's early days, which have been carefully remastered from the original cassettes.

[engl] The Berlin project Sprung Aus Den Wolken was part of the "Geniale Dilletanten" movement in the early 1980s, along with Einstürzende Neubauten and Mechanik Destrüktiw Komandöh. The band first re- leased an EP on ZickZack in 1981, followed by further releases on the band's own record label Faux Pas in 1982 and 1983, then on the French outlet Les Disques Du Soleil Et De L'Acier until 1991. The track Pas Attendre was part of the soundtrack of Wim Wender’s movie Der Himmel über Berlin and thus became an underground hit. Founder of the band Kiddy Citny is also a painter. His paintings of the Berlin Wall have been exhibited around the world and are now in private collections in the US, France and Japan. Bureau B is pleased to finally make the long out-of-print, self-titled album from 1982 available again. Carefully remastered, with reconstructed original artwork, numerous photos and liner notes by Alexander Hacke.

[engl] After a period of distance Station 17 just wanted to stand in a room together again and make some music, so they drove out of Hamburg to a remote site in the hills of the Hohe Geest in Schleswig-Holstein and played some new song sketches together – all day and late into the night. Afterwards they wanted to play the results live at a concert in Fabrik, a venue in Hamburg. No one in the band expected that the sessions would result in an entire album, but the music told them once again: what had been created here in the radiance of the moment could not be reproduced. A moment of happiness for the band collective. "Oui Bitte", Station 17’s 11th album had been born – quite unexpectedly, between pool and trout pond. It shows again and par excellence that Station 17's is a pleasure to listen to. Why is that? You can either follow the intuitive reference play, the traces of genres (so to speak: listening with knowledge), or you can be geared to the dense interplay between driving, elegiac rhythms and a flowing, aesthetic stream of consciousness, either lying down or dancing with a liberated mind and body. Everything seems possible in the boundlessness of their music. The seven songs are irrigating these candid invitations into a flowing aesthetical stream bundling them into a pleasure which lets you forget your own disposition. “Oui Bitte” shows Station 17 as a band of experts in a kind of acoustic transcendence. Their music tenderly forces you to engage in all of this at the same time. Already in the field recordings of the Elbe shore with which “20.000 Meilen unter dem Mond” begins you are being offered a pact: Hand over all control to the music, swim out to the open sea and be thrown back to yourself – just so you can indulge in the sonic waves. That prelude seems programmatic: In the following 40 minutes you are being carried along, you are being amused, catapulted, earthed, moved. “Oui Bitte” manages to douse the resonance body, to drift away, to wash ashore, to take off. The landing: always soft! The biggest continuity is the positive vibe, a reliable air host, pleasant, more shell than irritation. Station 17 do not produce cracks in the dam, they are smoothing out riverbeds. “Bewegung” then appears as the highlight of the album, a manifestation of the idea Station 17. Move your mind and move your body, as Birgit Hohnen says here, a deceased companion of the group who is being projected into the present of the song through a sample. With your eyes closed this track allows you to take off meditatively. And then there’s the latent melancholy which finds its way in. This futuristic music of the past stays warm, stays cordial, stays inviting: to the sonic utopia of a more beautiful world which has already been established by this album at this point and by this band in any case. In the end the record takes its time, a wide room is designed, meters are being covered. In the calmness of the last song a contradiction pops up: “Das Rasen” (“The rushing”). But the contradiction dissolves: If you listen closely, you are gliding through the high grass (“Rasen”) on which to lie down and listen to “Oui Bitte” invites. Yes, please: Repeat!

[engl] Remix albums have already become a tradition in the 30-year history of the collective: In 2001, the legendary label Mute Records released the album "Mikroprofessor" with remixes by DJ Koze, Thomas Fehlmann, Justus Köhncke and To Rococo Rot. In 2011, the "Goldstein Variations Remixes" followed, including versions by Erobique, Tobias Thomas, but also by Ada and Mense Reents, who we will meet again here. Timidly, the band began to ask their favourite producers most of whom agreed without hesitation. Soon, a top-class remix album with a Who’s Who of the local electronic music landscape was ready and even if only the bases of the pieces are recognisable, a completely new listening experience has been created here. It's grown into an independent work through the versatility of the participants and their expertise and can be enjoyed detached from the original material. As if by magic, a simultaneously stringent and diverse vibe has emerged that makes "Oui Mixe" more than just an addition to "Oui Bitte". We start with Berghain regular Efdemin, who takes on the instrumental song '20.000 Meilen unter dem Mond'. Efdemin, real name Phillip Sollmann, belonged to the core of Dial Records and now releases on Ostgut Ton. He is considered one of the most important protagonists in contemporary techno, because in his work he understands like no other how to care for the dancefloor as well as the loudspeakers at home. In addition to his records as Efdemin, he also regularly presents and produces other experimental, avant-garde projects. ‘Hausmann', the origin of the remix idea, in the hands of Paul Frick is transformed into a Hi-NRG house number. Paul Frick is not only one third of Brandt-Brauer-Frick, but currently also a member of the legendary Tangerine Dream - a favourite band in the house of Station 17. Paul's version is a floorfiller for people who think they are tired and are proven wrong by the penetrating sound. Pantha du Prince picks up the energy of the whole album rebuilding "Pusch" on a pressing bass drum. Pantha du Prince, who has released modern classics of electronic music with 'This Bliss' and 'Black Noise', was in Thailand during the production. While he was producing the remix in the studio on the island of Ko Pha- ngan, a gang of monkeys stole his nuts: "Pantha du Prince Sharing Lunch with Apes RMX" - a poetry that only life can write. The Andreas Dorau number "Der Monat" is handled here by Toto Belmont from Helsinki. His association with the Hardwax Spectrum are clearly audible, but Kimmo Saastamoinen, as he is actually known, has long since found his own sound: Subtly driving, always slightly melancholic and peppered with billowing delays that you want to immerse yourself in. The number of projects in which Mense Reents has already participated is enormous. Let's limit ourselves here to his electronic projects Egoexpress and Die Vögel - and of course Die Goldenen Zitronen, among whose incredibly accomplished musicianship he is a big part of. The song "Bewegung" is given a subtle dancehall riddim and so many amazing details are flying around in the sound so that close-listening is recommended here without doubt. The biggest surprise is probably delivered by Ada: instead of moving the track "Aufgehoben", recorded again with Dorau, to the club, she simply wrote new music around the vocals, singing over them herself while picking up the trace elements of the original. In a club, this song could take on the role of the last track after a wild night: The lights come back on, but the body is still in the middle of it - and so the soul lifts itself with the music into a sphere reserved only for it: bliss. Michaela Dippel has ventured furthest away from the foundation and yet remains true to it: she picked up the melody that was lying there (according to the text) on the floor, sang it - and it sounded beautiful. Content and form combine and result in a new form, from which one can recognise the creative freedom that Station 17 generate. Finally, we drive slowly with Lawrence from the Forellenhof back to more urban realms. At night, through the province, until more and more lights appear and we finally find ourselves in the middle of a city that doesn't seem to sleep: With a lot of dub, "Das Rasen" thus becomes a deep house track in the hands of Dial Records founder Pete Kersten. A pleasantly soft stomping bass drum drives the melancholic arpeggiator synth. Station 17 are alive and kickin' - in their own and in other people's clothes.

[engl] The avant-garde Kraut ensemble Supersempfft laid the foundation for their techno-tropical pop music in 1979 with their debut album "Roboterwerke." In 1981, they followed up with the album "Metaluna," which is now being honored through a re-release on Bureau B. The group, consisting of Dieter Kolb, Franz Knüttel, and Franz Aumüller, fused global in?uences, experimental sonic landscapes, and surreal lyrics into a unique sonic cosmos. "Metaluna" stands out with its meandering sequences, unconventional rhythms, and psychedelic songwriting that remains groundbreaking even decades later. We live in the data rich days of the Internet age, when globalisation and mass communication have trivialised time and space, and fusion as follows, is now commonplace. While the entire world’s art and in?uences stream through your digital consciousness, any odd assemblage of creative diaspora makes just as much sense as the next – another eddy in the grand churn of genre-?uidity. As such, this Bureau B reissue of Supersempfft’s superb ‘Metaluna’ is particularly pertinent for a couple of key reasons. Firstly, that this collaborative AV ensemble laid down the template for techno-tropical pop way back in ‘81, an astonishing achievement which broke ground musically, culturally and technologically; and secondly, that the rest of us have ?nally found them in the future, and can at last move in time to their animated groove. Supersempfft is at once a star-sailing frog enjoying cartoon chaos around a cosmic Caribbean, and also the multi-disciplinary miscellany of a trio of school friends who never lost that youthful penchant for play. The postmodern project comprised of musical genius, Dieter Kolb, computer whiz Franz Knüttel and the boundlessly creative Franz Aumüller, whose vibrant visuals and surreal lyrics situated their sound in a universe all of its own. Operating out of the basement of Dieter’s parents’ instrument shop, the band began to explore their interests and share their talents with no consideration of a commercial goal. Rejecting rock from the off, Kolb dove into his love of global styles, surfacing only to borrow display models from upstairs which were swiftly modi?ed by Knüttel to reveal bold electronic possibilities beyond their intended use. Recognising his own shortcomings behind the kit, Knüttel built his own drum machine, Roboterwerke, which piqued the interest of Kraftwerk, Herbie Hancock and Tangerine Dream, and piece-by-piece their kaleidoscopic pop began to coalesce. The industry soon took notice, and a debut album emerged on CBS in ’79, though didn’t score the sales it deserved. After the ?rst album, Kolb and Aumüller’s love of reggae and dub took them on a transatlantic trip to Trinidad and Tobago under the false assumption that all the islands stepped to the Jamaican style. Any momentary disappointment was soon dispelled by the liveliness and optimism of calypso and soca, and a life af?rming experience at carnival left them awestruck and inspired. Back home, they began work on ‘Metaluna’, a wild combination of roving sequences, tropical rhythms, squashed brass and yearning vocals which sprints, skanks and soars through ten triumphant tracks. Amid the metallic beats and interplanetary idents lurk sublime melodies and soulful motifs, psychedelic songwriting reminiscent of Barrett, Beefheart or Brian Wilson at their best. In their dubbier moments, Supersempfft sound like Lee Perry jamming on an alien console, with wild panning and delirious FX suggesting a sound clash on a distant planet. Meanwhile the arcade exuberance, vocoder gospel and space age ballads predate the sweltering synth-pop of The Knife, Hot Chip and Ariel Pink by a full two decades, setting a bar that their successors still fail to meet. Even if you expect the unexpected, there’s still room for one looney tune to take you by surprise as the jazzy “Farewell Goodbye” sinks the Cole Porter songbook in the nearest wormhole. Innovative, experimental yet still heavy on the hooks, ‘Metaluna’ is both a jubilant expression of its creators’ tastes and a masterclass in mercurial pop - a success of self-expression which proves once again that the best bands play for themselves.

[engl] Renowned acid cosmologist Johannes Auvinen, best known by his alias Tin Man, leaves the club floor behind for a full-length kosmische excursion on Bureau B. Since his first Tin Man records nearly 20 years ago, Auvinen has impelled acid—in the grand tradition of Phuture and co.—into shapes and forms heretofore uncharted. He does it again on his latest, "Arles," exploring a new realm of impressionistic beauty where pristine, heartfelt melodies dance delicately atop austere motorik rhythms. It's a trip you'll want to take again and again. "Cosmic," as defined by the Merriam-Webster dictionary, means "of or relating to the cosmos, the extraterrestrial vastness," or "relating to abstract spiritual or metaphysical ideas." In that light, the first record by Tin Man, aka Johannes Auvinen, on Bureau B is cosmic indeed— kosmische, if you will. Auvinen is best known for his manifold expressions of acid, in the house and techno sense, that pull your heartstrings as they move your feet. But on "Arles," he leaves his dance floor bonafides behind for an album-length journey through inner and outer space. Although "Arles" isn't built for the club, it's unmistakably a Tin Man record, through and through. (Fret not: adventurous DJs will find much to work with here, naturally.) Auvinen's tender melodies, coaxed from an array of gear including his signature Roland TB-303, dance delicately atop minimal, propulsive rhythms. The form is different, but the fundament remains the same. In the manner of its namesake city, "Arles" is a portrait of impressionistic beauty. One might call it a turning point for Auvinen, a new direction, but like Auvinen's best work elsewhere, "Arles" is disarming in its unveiled simplicity. There is no artifice here; this album has nothing to prove, no need to convince the listener of anything. Its elegance is accessible immediately, its grace given freely. And after the record's done, chances are you'll find yourself dropping the needle right back at the beginning. Each listen reveals a new tenor—each track becomes a new favorite. It's a trip you'll want to take again and again.

[engl] Without a doubt, To Rococo Rot are an exception within the German music landscape. From 1995 until they broke up in 2014, the group around Robert Lippok, Ronald Lippok and Stefan Schneider researched a unique sound between electronic music, ambient, post-melancholy and the further development of a new, free music like krautrock. Pitchfork described their sound as "unmistakably digital, yet 100% human". With releases on labels such as Kitty-Yo, City Slang and Mute Records as well as concerts worldwide, the band has built a remarkable reputation. The trio was invited three times by John Peel to record radio sessions in the BBC studios. Bureau B is pleased to make the recordings from these three sessions from the years 1997 and 1999 available on record for the first time, which, in addition to the live versions of selected album tracks, also contains exclusive, unreleased songs.

[engl] With "Leave Me Alone", Detlef Weinrich presents his fifth album under the moniker Tolouse Low Trax. Weinrich, who has meanwhile turned his back on Düsseldorf and lives in Paris, has long since ceased to be an insider tip and is a guest in renowned clubs and festivals all over Europe. With his new album, he succeeds in an exciting, unforeseen new direction. The velvety heaviness and rawness of earlier records seems to have given way to a new playfulness. A playfulness perhaps in the sense of an electronica reminiscent of the late 1990s, which in its idea of deconstruction and reduction is currently enjoying a new appreciation in the clubs. But also in the sense of an urban vibe of hip hop and dub references, which are woven into a very unique mix in Weinrich's tracks.

[engl] Christoph Dallach, Andreas Dorau and Daniel Jahn present Echo Neuklang, a compilation which explores the question of how Krautrock has influenced generation after generation of musicians since its inception. A contentious genre at the best of times, the music within its spectrum is essentially intangible. The common thread running through it is a compulsion to seek out the new. Beginning in the year 1981 and extending as far as 2023, the music in this collection demonstrates how the idea of what passed for Krautrock in the 1970s has been interpreted or reinterpreted by a diverse array of artists with distinct approaches in the decades which followed, without recourse to any generic conventions.

[engl] Do not adjust your sets. Take a step back from the tracking. This is the sound of Germany's musical youth let loose on cheap synths and pawnshop guitars. A record of a disparate scene of squat pop-stars, art-school upstarts and committed non-musicians who redefined German music in the first half of the 1980s.

[engl] For their second foray into the fringes of German pop, Bureau B delve deeper than before, raiding cassette culture, 7" obscurities and overlooked album cuts to further frame this free-thinking strain of sonic expression. Starting the count from punk’s year zero, this set sees a newly liberated generation get weird and wild with anything they could lay their hands on, delivering demented, detuned and disorienting tracks brimming with DIY spirit. Where their kosmische predecessors preferred immersive, expansive compositions, these artists opted for immediacy, quickly capturing one idea before moving on to the next. Exploiting advances in home recording to say outside of industry confines, these art-school extroverts and commune drop outs often came together in unplanned collaborations and one off projects, capturing their whole creative lifespan on one side of a C45. As such, there’s a youthful charm to the sounds found on this compilation – an infectious combination of energy, expression and naivety running though each unlikely melody. This shift in approach and outlook even informed established acts, as evidenced by the perverse pop curiosities from Cluster and Moebius & Beerbohm lurking on the line up beside unreleased and unremembered gems from the likes of Maria Zerfall and E.M.P. Once again those expert selectors at Bureau B have done the hard work, digging deep to deliver a disparate, different and dissident side of German Pop Music. All you have to do is press play. The sparse drum machine of ALU’s »Aludome« opens proceedings, laying the foundation for wavy guitar chords and simple melodies on this tender 1980 composition, which only came to light in 2005. From there we sink into the watery electronics, free jazz bass and abstract guitars of Detlef Diederichsen charmingly abrupt »Pissnelke 2000«, before Maria Zerfall moves us into the shadows with the dark and punkish dirge »Der Mond«, a haunting track with double tracked and distorted spoken vocals. Butzmann / Kapielski’s avant-dance masterpiece »Do The VoPo« diverts us to the dance-floor, where the oddball synth sounds and skewed sampler vox of Rüdiger Lorenz’ »Francis & Friends« traps us in a strange slow motion groove. The tempo raises via E.M.P.’s dubbish sabotage of 80s smooth jazz, turns inside out on Vono’s charming interlude “Der Zauberer”, then finds its feet again via Reichmann’s ’78 composition »Wunderbar« taken from the Sky LP of the same name. This frazzled fusion of cosmic country and Asiatic melody shares a widescreen worldview with Deux Baleines Blanches’ »Draht 9«, on which post punk electronics and chiming guitars combine with bittersweet beauty. The time-travelling Rolf Trostel takes us to the midpoint with pulsating chords which predate Basic Channel by a decade, while Phantom Band’s »Dream Machine« stitches together two decades of the psychedelic continuum in a riot of tumbling toms, panning sequences and brain melting waveforms. »Glucose« sees Moebius & Beerbohm unleash their strange music at a delinquent tempo, before Jimmy, Jenny + Jonny offer a second subversion of smooth jazz with their skronking Mediterranean fantasy »Salome«. Thomas Dinger’s frosty music box romance »Alleewalzer« and The Wirtschaftswunder’s stomping ska-like »Television« follow in quick succession, leading us into Cluster’s narcotic fairground »Oh Odessa«, a queasy assemblage of detuned FM bells and percussive piston bursts. From there, the dubbed out post punk of Sprung Aus Den Wolken, experimental dance of Notorische Reflexe and unhinged disco of Günter Schickert capture different ends of the alternative dance floor, before the pastoral outsider pop of Lapre’s »Septer« signs off in a swell of yearning melody.

[engl] Over the last ten years a strange mycelium was sprouting from the ground of Germany’s sound topography, going widely unnoticed while creeping its way up through the copse of the ubiquitous “Neo-Kraut”, “Diskurs-Pop” and the like. We’re talking about a small underground network of artists and projects with poetic, mysterious names such as Brannten Schnüre, Baldruin, Kirschstein, Freundliche Kreisel and Balint Brösel. Operating in the margins and intersections of folklore, experimental electronics, dreams and nightmares, the “Gespensterland” LP archives and compiles their magic works for the very first time and already today it stands as a contemporary testament with an auratic presence comparable to that of Pordenone’s “Great Complotto”. “Deutschland – Gespensterland”: they’re lurking in each and every crack of a brittle reality, amongst the concrete of apartment blocks and motorway bridges, twixt and tween the shopping mall and the leisure park, they’re floating along gap sites and post-war facades, apricating in the ludicrous snobbery of Germany’s suburbia, whispering from behind crammed sheds in a labyrinth of allotments. Gossamer ghosts spun from daily rituals, spectres of a mundane here and now, that suffuse the land with an invisible veiling. Hardly ever have their frequencies been transmitted as unadulterated as on this record. Much like the fever dream imagery of gothic novels and early horror flicks has equipped our senses with a new perception of reality itself, Gespensterland’s surreal songs and oblique sound textures yield an array of microscopic reflections and deeper insights into the psychogeography of the land. Raised in Lower Franconia, both Baldruin and Brannten Schnüre already have a considerable discography under their belt. A string of vinyl and cassette releases issued in lovingly designed small runs contributed to their underground fame, securing them a distinguished but growing cult following, especially abroad. Due to their rather brief or latent existence, the legacy of Balint Brösel and Kirschstein, hailing from the Ruhr area, however is of a more obscure nature. Hence, it’s all the more important that their fascinating and idiosyncratic skein of ghost musick is being documented here as well, emerging like a seldom ore that slumbered too long inside the earth, having accumulated the collective dreams of generations of necromancers. Ghosts stories, both uncanny and hilarious, are likewise the main ingredient of Freundliche Kreisel’s songs, a joint project of Brannten Schnüre and Baldruin, and as with all material on this record these tracks have been unreleased to date. For as much as these bands differ in their respective sonic approach, “Gespensterland” can still be considered as a cipher for a shared cosmos and a mutually found aesthetic language. It is always a similar sentiment of a slightly disconnected, shifted and delayed reality that manifests itself in Brannten Schnüre’s wistful and whimsical ambient-folk loops, the evocative and rhythmic poltergeist interludes of Baldruin, the sweet and naïve C86- jangle of Balint Brösel, Kirschstein’s rhenish mutant-NDW and post-kraut-romanticism and the electro-acoustic séances of Freundliche Kreisel. Think of it as a rampant yearning, a manic laughter, but mostly as a feeling of some somnambulistic thirst for adventure and journeys into the unknown, a feeling that is grounded deep inside the heart of the continent. We imagine, this is the music of a few like-minded recluses, sitting alone at night in their chambers, immersing themselves in the darkest and innermost Tibet of their own work. It’s not too far-fetched either to read “Gespensterland” as a contribution to a specifically German response to Mark Fisher’s hauntologic theories. In every track, the fancy of an abandoned future uncoils a narrative thread that has long been discontinued, a dream vision that remained unredeemed forever, now haunting the dull grey corridors of the post- historic presence. These songs glimmer and shine with moods and stories that draw their tension from the same force fields that once gave rise to Alfred Kubin’s demonic visions, Hans Henny Jahnn’s nightmarish “Night of Lead” or the bizarre adventures of Baron Muenchhausen. And yet, it is not the spectres of the past that are being summoned or dealt with here, but instead the quotidian, perpetually recurring disintegration of reality that lies within the close encounter with one’s own unfamiliarity: “is this my hand, or is it someone else’s?”. Margot Benetti, Walpurgis 2023

[engl] This compilation represents an initial – and long overdue – foray into the years 1980 - 82, when KLAR! 80 was a cassette label, paired with a shop of the same name in Düsseldorf. Founded by Rainer Rabowski, KLAR!80 released 18 cassettes of varying length and a box set containing three 12” vinyl Eps which fetch handsome prices among collectors nowadays. The KLAR!80 - Ein Kassettenlabel aus Düsseldorf 1980-1982 collection reaches even further back in time than the SAMMLUNG - Düsseldorfer Kassettenmusik 1982-1989 (BB236/2017) collection, similarly curated by Stefan Schneider, which focused on the mid-1980s Düsseldorf cassette scene. It captures the brief period between the end of punk and the looming capitalisation and digitalisation of so many aspects of life. A report for the future. Spontaneity and understatement characterised the brief creative period of KLAR! 80, which lasted from April 1980 until October 1982. Experimentation was the driving force behind the label’s output, released exclusively on home-made cassettes. Whatever happens to be accessible was swiftly transformed into artwork for flyers, posters and cassette inlays with the aid of scissors, a typewriter and felt pens, then photocopied. ? Art, perceived as such, is no longer created in the studio, but in the copy shop or local café. In 1981, the compact cassette was the medium of the moment. Cheap, readily accessible and quickly copied, a democratic means of production and an end product that was easy to distribute. Everyone’s a musician! Anyone can do it! Do it yourself! The DIY ethos of punk saw the emergence of a new type of producer: an instrumentalist, arranger, author, publisher, manufacturer and retailer all in one. Cassettes pre-empted the influence of personal computers to the extent that they enabled a single person to cover multiple steps in the production process which had hitherto been the remit of specialists. The musicians who release their works on KLAR! 80 are, at once, distinctly individual spirits and yet related, familiar and yet unfamiliar, like-minded and yet, and yet not... the personal is mixed with adjacent art. New forms of collaboration are explored, sometimes lasting only as long as a single recording session: from a band to a project. So it was that KLAR!80 introduced the early experiments of Christo Haas and Beate Bartel, performing here as CHBB, to the world. Before long, they would enter the international dance charts with their pulsating sequencer sounds as Liaisons Dangereuses. Eva Gössling imported no wave from New York to Düsseldorf, grafting electronic and motoric elements into the sound. Strafe für Rebellion, who opened the record with a sculptural sonic collage, would later release numerous albums on the prestigious Touch label in London. Today, the Aachener Strasse shop in the Bilk district of Düsseldorf survives in a few Polaroid pictures and video recordings made by Agi Yuzuru and Mamoru Shibuya, two journalists visiting from Osaka. The label shut down in October 1982 and, in the years that followed, the original cassettes, master tapes and artwork were either given away or misplaced. The recordings you can listen to here have been gleaned from private collections of well-preserved cassettes, painstakingly restored and digitalised. Rainer Rabowski: “At the very moment when the label and shop needed to reinvent themselves, I would have had to come up with a new business model, something I had never wanted to do.” The end came about quite innocuously, with no explanation. Rainer Rabowski and Stefan Schneider, Düsseldorf March 2023

[engl] Inspired by Punk and Post Punk, vibrant scenes dedicated to independent self-actualisation by means of sound circulated on self-distributed cassettes, in the 80s the cheapest and fastest medium, were developing not only in the FRG but also in the GDR (=DDR). The artefacts from that era tell of a stance of refusal in practice, and of the possibility to charge up on a high level, in spite of everything. "Magnetband" features 14 exciting experimental-electronic pieces from the GDR that originally have been released between 1984 and 1989 on cassettes only.

[engl] Fellow humans, Bureau B invite you on an expedition to Silberland, a singular span of spacetime created by Germany’s sonic futurists of the seventies and eighties. Embracing the early electronics and tape experiments of the sixties’ avant-garde, these artists aimed to boldly go, eschewing small steps for giant leaps into a nebulous and novel sound.

[engl] Welcome to Silberland – where the streets are paved with strobes. Home to neon lights, straight lines and open roads, this futurist fantasy was first founded in the mid-seventies, when Germany's creative class chose musical therapy in order to indulge their shared hallucination of a new Europe. Fuelled by the catalytic fusion of globalisation and new technology, the world was turning ever faster and the kosmische generation were ready to keep the pace. With synthesisers, rhythm computers and human metronomes turned to a gallop, these electronic innovators set modernity to a motorik beat, and Bureau B's second trip into Silberland cuts right to the thrust of the genre.

[engl] Two years have passed since the successful release of the first "Sows von egal" compilation. "Sowas von egal" is a collaboration between the Hamburg record label Bureau B and the Hamburg party series Damaged Goods where they present rare, obscure synth & wave discs from the early 1980s which absolutely deserve to heard. It was clear from the outset that “Sowas von egal 2” would need to scale similar heights of excellence as its predecessor, featuring carefully selected, sought-after, danceable tunes. In contrast to the first volume, most of the acts here were only active in the early 1980s and have not released any records since then. The tape artists were particularly invested in the DIY ethic – as is often apparent in their sound aesthetics and the unbridled energy which has lost none of its intensity today. Their art was seldom – if ever – tempered by commercial considerations or sales strategies. A year in the making: “Sowas von egal 2” is a worthy successor to part 1!

[engl] “Under Pressure” is Von Spar's fifth album, not counting their homage to Can (recorded live with Stephen Malkmus). 15 years have passed since their debut “Die uneingeschra?nkte Freiheit der privaten Initiative”, five since the “Streetlife” album. On closer examination, there is a somewhat chameleonesque quality to Von Spar’s discography. Their records are the result of continuous metamorphosis, opening wormholes to post punk, krautrock and 80s art pop. The constants: rhythmic refinement and harmonic quantum leaps, swirling synthesizer arpeggios, backwards guitars with no hint of retrogradation. The eight songs on “Under Pressure” were recorded in Von Spar’s Dumbo Studio in Cologne, with guests from Toronto, Tokyo, New York, London and Nashville adding noteworthy contributions. As on “Streetlife”, the formative voice belongs to Chris A. Cummings alias Marker Starling. His distinctive falsetto graces over half of the songs, asking: “Is there a cure for this / Unhappiness, happiness?” On the opening track, Cummings is joined by Eiko Ishibashi (Kafka's Ibiki, Jim O'Rourke, Merzbow) in a Japanese dream sequence exploring where they might get to if the shackles of the flesh are cast off. Punk and reggae professor Vivien Goldman (The Flying Lizards) picks up the thread and liberates herself from the ghosts of the past on “Boyfriends (Dead Or Alive)”. Lætitia Sadier (Stereolab) sings on the album’s kraut-pop hit “Extend The Song” which could run and run for ever, powered by motoric energy: “If someone would ask me / Could I go on?”