OFF: More on Amon Düül II

[K Henderson]

Hi Folks...

Because I've been thinking about ADII so much lately, and going back over
their entire catalog piece by piece, which is causing me to seriously
"Jones-out" (if that's even a word) over the potential for seeing them
sometime soon, I thought I'd ask this question to whomever has the
Repertoire CD reissue of Phallus Dei.

The bonus tracks are...
"Freak Out Requiem I"
"Freak Out Requiem II"
"Freak Out Requiem III"
"Cymbals In The End"

So how are these things?  I gather the first three are rather
non-structured?  Is this all with Dave Anderson - I'm presuming?

Might some of this material be the source of certain snippets of music that
I heard (but didn't recognize) on those Japanese retro-pastische things that
I have (Kobe and Eternal Flashback)???
Or is this all-different stuff from anything I've heard elsewhere?

Now, I did also give another listen to both live albums from the '73 period
(was it?)...Live in London and BBC Live.

No doubt Live in London is the better album.  From my distant memories of
first hearing the vinyl, it had always stuck in my head that the two-drummer
thing wasn't working well here, as they weren't all that closely together.
But then in those days (c. 1984), I wasn't that used to hearing music that
wasn't so completely refined and molded to perfection (in a manner of
speaking) in a studio environment.  So today it seems as the little bit of
roughness in the performance is nothing unusual (it's a hell of a lot better
than the 1996? Live in Tokyo show), and Leopold and Fichelscher seem to be
pretty much in synch most of the time.  [And anyway, ADII was always more
ambitious in writing tunes than was their ability (or anybody else's I
imagine) to actually play them perfectly in one take.]  Nice selection of
tunes also.  The mix overall though seems a bit murky, but then what do you
expect?

On the BBC album, the best thing is that the tracks are all completely
different, and not songs you'd expect to hear live commonly (it's kinda like
1999 Party live in that respect).  Now there it does seem like the band get
into a 'clusterf*ck' or two, as in the ending of "Manana".  But then perhaps
they were still learning to play those Vive la Trance songs live?  Not even
sure if that album had been released at the time of the recording.  Anyway,
the one thing I was struck by when listening to this one was how
stupendously brilliant the Dem Guten, Schonen, Wahren track sounded live
here!  This one alone is worth the price of admission.  "GBR Man" being
perhaps my favorite ADII song is of course also a high moment.  The bonus
tracks don't really add much, but nothing wrong with putting them there
either. It would be short without them.

And I played my Made in Germany copy again last night...why is this album so
disrespected?!  I'm not sure that many people have ever heard it in the 70
minute format that it was intended to be...that single-LP crap that the US
label pulled was criminal!  Side One (Tracks 1-6 in the 20-track version I'm
presuming) is I think the best side of the 2LPs, and only Metropolis made it
into the US version.  OK, Side Three is pretty weak (Wide Angle, Three-eyed
Overdrive, Emigrant Song, Loosey Girls, Top of the Mud) but then even here
there are some instances of great guitar work.  (The US omission of Wide
Angle was the only good decision made about 'editing' the album...if they
wanted to record a song that sounded like Abba, they succeeded!)  In fact,
MiG I think is Amon Duul II's best 'rock guitar' album.  Now, Alan Davey
felt he just had to learn to play bass when hearing 'Time We Left'...for me,
if I was ever to be inspired to pick up a guitar and try to learn to play it
(hopeless!), it would be almost entirely to try to reproduce Karrer's sound
on La Kraut(Pal)oma - that's just goosebump material.  And Heibl too...I
would take Meid's contribution to ADII over his any day, but on this album,
I dunno, I think his peculiar bass sound/style on this album just works
wonders!  The linking run at the end of the bridge in Metropolis to join
back up to the main 'riff' is just too cool for words.  Oh, and 5.5.55* is
another guitar masterpiece...don't know who plays that
stream-of-consciousness soloing there (I always imagined it was Weinzierl
(he co-wrote it with Tischer), but I never know who's who!) but it too is
stunning work and again comes in for a landing just as the chorus is set to
go...I love that stuff.

[*For years I wondered what this title meant...now I know it is the 10th
anniversary of V.E. day and not coincidentally the day when West Germany was
considered autonomous again, as opposed to occupied.  Makes perfect sense,
and if I'd seen it as 5/5/55 I would have figured that out a lot sooner.]

So...I think people just have the opinion that MiG was a overly pretentious
mess (a valid personal criticism)...but if anyone thinks it lacks the
original stylish madness of earlier works, or is somehow too poppy, they
just ain't listening!  Save the Abba track, the vocal tracks on there are
hardly standard compositions!  And there's heaps of crazy electronics and
synthesizers all over the place.  It's a damn *weird* album, and nothing
like what was shortly to come with Zauner's influence.  So I hope people
don't pass on it simply because this is what they've been told.

Well, that's enough ridiculous campaigning for just one album from me...I
suppose part of my love for this work is that this was the first ADII album
that really got me going on them (even though it was the second one I got,
following Phallus Dei oddly enough - it being the first of the classic
period and MiG being the last)...and that was the crappy version!

Anyway, before I wasn't really putting down Yeti that much (it is a great
album after all), I'm just wondering why everybody focusses on just two or
three albums of theirs and totally ignore all the others.  Carnival in
Babylon ain't too shabby either.  It's HiJack that really suffered...and
even there, there are some nice moments.

My rankings would go...

0. Lemmingmania (the four single tracks are great, but this is a comp. and
doesn't fully count - but taken at face value, it wins)
1. Wolf City (no second guessing here)
2. Made in Germany (70min rock opera version)
3. Dance of the Lemmings
3. Yeti (tie)
   (Disc one of DotL paired with Disc one of Yeti would move to No. 1)
4. Carnival in Babylon
   Made in Germany (single LP) would go here
   Live in London would go about here
5. Utopia (virtually ADII)
6. Phallus Dei
   BBC Live would go about here
7. Vive la Trance
8. Pyragony X
9. Vortex
9. HiJack (tie)
   Nada Moonshine # belongs here to, but won't officially include it
11. Only Human
12. Almost Alive
    Julie Waring material here (is she Dave Anderson's wife?  I saw the name
Julie Anderson in some Japanese liner notes, so I figured....), although
"One moments anger..." and "Olaf, Where's My $20,000?" are both long jams
that belong up around No. 6 or 7 (since Waring doesn't really sing here!).
Dead last.  Fool Moon (rubbish)

Die Losung I didn't even consider, with Calvert and all, but I guess I'd put
it in with the other '9's.'  I like it ok.

Grakkl (FAA)

ObCD: Kraan - Andy Nogger (EMI reissue) Just in the mail today! Great!

P.S.  I got it from Ken Golden (www.lasercd.com) - $12, who has a clearance
sale on now of some pretty darn good stuff, like a bunch of Man live CDs for
$5 apiece (everyone who doesn't have the "1999 Party" Man CD should get one
now so you can play the two back-to-back and timewarp back to 1974 Chicago),
and Calvert's Hype (ugly blue cover) for $6, Tubilah Dog for $5 (I think),
and a whole slew of other things.  And of course, he still has some of the
jewel box EMI Remasters of the Universe for damn cheap.