Tiers Mix

Another Bagging Area mix for you, an hour of old and new and fairly ambient/ drone/ instrumental based but with Mark E. Smith turning at the end to add his inimitable voice to proceedings. In fact the only other voice is Andrew Weatherall's, heard briefly at the end of Prana Crafter's Starlight, Sing Us A Lullaby, a moment that got to me the first time I heard it. You can find Tiers In December on Mixcloud. 

• Kams: Hopfen (Richard Norris Remix)
• Stray Harmonix: Mountain Of One
• Harold Budd: The Pearl
• A Winged Victory For The Sullen: Keep It Dark, Deutschland
• Lol Hammond and Duncan Forbes: Angel Hill
• Dreems: Shark Attack (Abyss Mix)
• Daniel Avery: A Story In E5
• Daniel Avery: Petrol Blue
• Prana Crafter: Starlight, Sing Us A Lullaby
• Radioactive Man: Goodnight Morton
• Harmonia and Brian Eno: Atmosphere
• Neotantra: Ataxy- Hills
• Woodleigh Research Facility: The Fallen
• The Fall: Bill Is Dead

Atmospheres

This ambient/ kraut hybrid was recorded by Brian Eno and Harmonia in 1976. Eno heard Harmonia in the early 1970s and said they were 'the most important band in the world'. A trio made up of Neu!'s Michael Rother and Cluster's Roedelius and Moebius has as good a claim to that title as anyone I guess. Eno eventually hooked up with them in Forst, in rural Lower Saxony, West Germany. They worked on some sessions for nearly two weeks before Eno headed onto Berlin to meet Bowie and begin work on what would become Bowie's Berlin Trilogy. Puzzlingly Harmonia '76 (as the Harmonia- Eno collaboration called themselves) then left the master tapes unreleased until 1997 when Roedelius rescued them and put them out as Tracks And Traces. A 2009 re- issue expanded the album with some digital clean up of the cassette recordings. Atmosphere was one of the additional 2009 tracks, three and  a half minutes of arpeggio, synth textures and a rhythm track that is made up of hiss and echo. 

Atmosphere

Harmonia's debut was the self- explanatory Musik von Harmonia, a record they put together in 1973 using a very basic mixer and three tape machines, a Farfisa organ, a piano, a rhythm machine and some guitars and a very open-ended approach to making music. 

Hausmusik

I finish work for two weeks today. I could add lots to that but for the moment I'll just say it's been a long time coming and a rest is very much needed. 

Watussi

In 1974 Neu! guitarist Michael Rother visited the duo Cluster (Hans- Joachim Roedelius and Dieter Mobius) in Forst, the West German village the pair lived in. He wanted them to join Neu! but when they started playing together it became clear this was something new. Rother brought his gear with him, a Farfisa organ, a drum machine and a mixer, and they became Harmonia. Recording onto three Revox multi- track recorders Harmonia created an album that shifts between the mechanical sounds of Krautrock and the background presence of ambient. Shimmering keyboards, repetitive rhythm tracks, swirling melodies, simplicity and texture at the fore. This track, the opening one on their debut album Musik von Harmonia, is six minutes of off- kilter, weird bliss.

Watussi

We're back into work today and it'll be the first time I've inside a building with more than a handful of people since 20th March. It all feels very weird. I was working full days at home from the Monday schools 'closed' through until the 19th July, teaching online lessons daily (plus plenty of Zoom meetings), and I've been into the building a few times in the last two weeks as we make it Covid secure, set up bubble areas, hand sanitising stations, new food arrangements, one way corridors and no entry signs, paint markings on the floor for staggered entries and exits and socially distanced classrooms. It really is another world we have entered and we won't know if we're getting it right until it happens, live and in real time with over a thousand teenagers. The New Normal is a phrase that's already become a cliche and at the moment none of this feels particularly 'normal'.

Very Cosmic

How about some krautrock? Oh don't groan you lot.

In 1974 Michael Rother (from Neu!) joined with Moebius and Roedelius (both from Cluster) to make the Musik Von Harmonia album. This track (song isn't really the right word) is Dino, lovely swathes of sound and melody with rhythm driving it on. The album also contains tracks called Sehr Kosmisch and Hausmusik- both of it's time and ahead of time. I've got a feeling the last time I played this in full the even numbered tracks were good and odd numbered tracks less interesting, but I could be imagining it.

There's something about all this snow and ice which seems quite teutonic. If you're interested BBC 4's excellent krautrock documentary is repeated tonight at 10.30. Worth staying up for.

04 Dino.wma