HW: Anybody know these bands

[Chris Bates]

Sometime ago Keith A Henderson wrote:

> I was just searching through a mail order catalogue, looking for interesting
> things I didn't know about previously.  There were descriptions of the style
> next to each disc title, and here are some that seemed reasonably interesting.
> Anyone familiar with them??
>
> Afterglow
> Andwellas Dream
> Ghostly Medley
> Guru Guru     -- I know that this is a "Krautrock" band, right??
> Mynd Music
> Omina Opera   -- these two I have
> Nick Riff     -- heard of before
> Shiva Burlesque
> Tear Gas

There have probably been replies to this already - it seems to have been
stuck on an information back country lane on its way to me. The only
one of these acts that I'm familiar with is Guru Guru. Now when you say
*Krautrock* what do you mean? I take it to mean prog bands from Germany
but Guru Guru are nothing like Tangerine Dream or Amon Duul II or
Kraftwerk (yuck!). I've got a couple of albums and a tape of a
compilation album which seem to cover most of their career. The early
stuff is pretty standard spacey blues-rock a la HW without the synths.
In fact in many ways they remind me of Iron Butterfly (altogether now...
In a gadda da vida... :-). Later on they got influenced by samba
sounds and the pieces became shorter, totally different.

Like many German bands they had a great rhythm section, driving but
not afraid of getting away from a straight four to the floor. And
(also like a lot of their countrymen) the lyrics make f**k all sense.
Don't know who wrote 'em but I bet it wasn't the singer - he seems to
have learnt the songs phonetically! - I heard that Klaus Meine did that
on the early Scorpions stuff too.

Worth checking out though, and if you like 'em give a listen to Can. Now
there's some exciting and different music :-)


Chris