Time flies, and once again a year has gone by far too quickly. Looking back, I have to say that the past year has given me far more wonderful moments than I could ever have hoped for. At 67, I continue to look forward to the years ahead with confidence and am eager to see what lies in store for me.
Charles Aznavour would have turned 102 today. He was an Armenian-French chansonnier, lyricist, composer and film actor, and I’ve always had a soft spot for his songs, which often featured poignant lyrics and made a real impact thanks to his distinctive voice.
On their third album, the Hamburg punk band Abwärts took a more laid-back approach and delivered a superb cover of Aznavour’s song.
In the early 80's Oz, a new discotheque (later it was called as a club) opened the doors in Stuttgart. The specific at this place was the basement where the owners realized a small venue for live concerts. I remember one evening when me and a couple of friends owned tickets for a new band from West Sussex. The Cure came to promote their second album Seventeen Seconds and we expected nothing more than a good gig. What we became was one of the best concerts I ever had the luck to be part of it. The venue was very small and constructed for maybe 300 visitors but at this evening there were more than 500 persons in this venue. You could imagine how it was standing in a crowd close rank to your neighbor, the air was filled with a full load of cigarette smoke in the air for a couple of hours. I remember also that lots of people standing on the stairs and watching the show. The concert started with the supporting act, Abwärts a punk band from Hamburg and they were full of the energy punk gave them in these days. I really enjoyed their fast and amateurish songs. The perfect support for the main band. I saw The Cure several times during the last decades but they couldn't beat this gig. Robert Smith and Lol Tolhurst had so much fun playing their songs and made their gloomy songs brighter. After almost two hours playing most of the songs from their first two albums they finished their gig and giving the audience a session of four songs together with Abwärts playing a few standards by associated bands like Siouxsie and the Banshees. All in all a venue were we came back often in these days.
Abwärts were one of the first punk bands formed in the late years of German punk revolution. Their first album AmokKoma is one of the classic records that stamped German punk and was on heavy rotation on my turntable in the late 70's. After their masterpiece they released several albums that wasn't that successful at all. Their self-titled third album is less punk-influenced and Gothic than the ones before and they tried to sing sometimes in English. For me it is an album that is very underrated because it is manifold to the ones before. One of the reasons was that they covered Hotlegs' (10 CC's) first chart appearance as well as a chanson by Charles Aznavour. Great stuff from my very younger days - even for you all.
The will be the last post in this series. As said, I couldn't imagine that this series continued until now. I offered you a big bunch of music that was made by German musicians - in a lot of different styles all over the last 40 years. How to finish this series? That was the question I asked myself a lot of times. Should I feature my favorite artist, album, song or what ever? Finally I decided to none of them. Let me show you some artists/songs that came out the last years or maybe long time ago. All of them mean a lot to me in any way. So thank you for following me during the last year in this series. And I'm sure the foreign correspondent will return again if there is something new that is worth listening to.
Arrived last night back in Germany after a long travel but with enough power to go back to office next week again. I had a relaxed time and now it will be business as usual. This means that I will post regular and my series will continue. Today I will feature a band from the glory days of post punk. Abwärts was formed in the late 70s in Hamburg by Frank Z. and FM Einheit (later member of Einstürzende Neubauten). Their first record Amok-Koma is still a milestone in German punk music. Their songs are dominated by a leading guitar in the tradition of Wire. Short songs with many influences (even Turkish elements) made them great. I saw them in a small club in Stuttgart in 1980 as a support act from The Cure. Their physical presence on stage was very impressive and Robert Smith had to give it's best to beat them. The concert ended with a session by members of both bands playing standards from the early punk era. Never will forget this fantastic concert. Listening to this songs again inspire me to grab out more of this old stuff and listen again. Maybe it's sentimental but anyway - it is still worth to look back at this time and the music we listened to.
Yesterday I was thinking about the Montonie in Germany. Origin was a post of Swiss Adam and a comment from Dirk. Finally Dirk offered a tune from Ideal, who was gods at their time in Germany as he said. I still remember their first record and it was a highlight in that so called Neue Deutsche Welle (New German New Wave). Most of it was terrible and not worth to be listened to. But there was another side of it. It was the time, when everything in music was allowed - without frontiers and new horizons.
In this time everything could be possible. New groups with new sounds are shot like mushrooms.It was the time I spent a lot of nights in Stuttgart in a small club, where in the early 80s played all the bands of the NDW and also bands from from the British island. I can remember listening to the Cure who jammed with their support (a German punk band called Abwärts) after their gig. At one of these evenings I went to a concert featuring Trio, a small band from northern Germany.
I knew them from a single, which was very soft. Only spoken words from a guy talking to his former girlfriend on the telephone, trying to get her to an engagement once again. Of course it was not successful but was a good step into the music of Trio. I went there with no more expectations than having a good evening with some live music. So I went on a warm spring evening to the place where they played. It was a very small club in the red light district in Stuttgart. It was on the first floor on the left side - the right side was a well known fun house. So we waited, that they would let us in and while we stood in the row all the customers of the fun house passed us with their heads kept down to the floor.
It was a very small club where they played their gig. If there where more than one hundred people it would be more that can beard to. As I finally got inside the club I hit for a bottle of beer and I got it. While having my first beer I talked to the guy next to me. We talked about this and that and finally about music. It was very interesting to listen his view of how new music might look like. After another beer he apologizes that he has to go, as he makes an appearance. I did not recognized that I was talking to the guitar player of Trio.
I listened to a lot of concerts in this time but none of them impressed me more than them. It was nearly anarchy to play in a band with only a simple drum, no bass, just a few accords an a singer who sung German and English in one song. It is still amazing and burned in my heart.
