As this blog was initially about how to turn musical Lead into musical Gold,or vice-versa, the 'electro-alchemy' of another very serious Hungarian seems out of place, when you compare it to anything on 'Fuck Off Records',but they do share the same determination to get their very unpopular works into the hearing appendages of a few hundred members of the public.Apart from that I've ran out of UK DIY stuff,so i gott write about something,no matter how tenuous the link.
This,one has to say, 'Fantastic' record melts haunting neo classical choirs with Kluster style narration in a foreign language....unless you're Hungarian of course.....and ......here's the electro bit....minimal electronic noise.
This would have made a great soundtrack for "Solaris 2" if anyone had the guts, or stupidity to try making such a bold attempt at the only good movie with a "2" at the end of the title.
Failing that, get a bunch of contemporary dancers and leave them to it.The results should be hilarious.
Tracklist:
1 Antifonák(1977) 9:30
2 Hivó Jelek(1977) 10:05
3 Ballade(1976) 5:00
4 Ludus Syntheticus(1977) 8:00
5 Kínai Templom Visszhanggal(1979) 8:12
6 Hommage À L'Électronique(1978) 9:24
John Coltrane's "Om", or anti-Om, as made on a Sinclair ZX Spectrum,by some cat called Zoltan!?....so that's either Zoltan, Cat of Dracula, or John Zoltrane?
Zoltrane, uses a french...yes French!!!?...synth called a 'Rsf Kobol',which if made to French manufacturing standards in 1986 would break down or fall apart as soon as you glanced in its general direction. I've never seen another artist use one of these who wasn't French....they like to buy French product do the French, no matter how crap it is. Then we have it hooked up to a computer designed by the idiot who produced the Sinclar C5 electric "I'm A Twat" sign on wheels.
I'm surprised the ZX Spectrum could handle the minimal repetetive sequence that plays continuously for fifty minutes.It must have used at least one whole kilobyte of the massive 128 Kilobyte memory that comfortably enabled kids to play Donkey Kong for hundreds of brain numbing hours.It obviously numbed the Brain of 'Sir' Clive Sinclair.....yes, this dick was knighted!?.....as he ruined his company with that ridculous plastic death chariot that he thought would revolutionise road transport.
The Commodore C64 was usually the home computer to go for concerning Electronic Mooozik production.Why' I've even used it myself,as my first sampler,and it had a built in synth called the 'SID Chip', which made unique lo-fi squelchy synth sounds. The ZX had nothing like that, so I'm at a loss as to why Zoltrane opted for this lo-tech device. Probably an importing beyond the Iron Cutain problem.Hungary only got Stockhausen LP's and ZX Spectrum's smuggled into it's musicians grasps.
They are likely all absolute whizzes at 'Donkey Kong' I wager.
Then came the Atari ST, with MIDI!?...just in time for the Acid House debacle.
Thanks to the Chernobyl disater,1986 was a good year for high background radiation levels,which made all Geiger Counters sing like a Nightingale on Crystal Meth. So ,maybe, that noise was Zoltrane's inspiration for this nursery rhyme from the reactor core of communist computer music.
I guess this could be referred to as a sequenced hypnotic drone,which it is,but I won't repeat it again; and it's certainly an easy way to fill up two sides of a vinyl LP.Kinda like an Avant-Garde Rock'n'Roll swindle,but,it being from a communist country,no money will have exchanged hands in the process.What is missing, is a robot chanting "Oooooommmmmmmmmmmmmm".....now that would have said something worthwhile?At least about the human tendancy to follow hive minded religions robotically.
Tracklist:
A-Om 1 (26:20)
B-Om 2 (26:12)
Oh Those Hungarians and their weird Iron curtain ways,and their kerazzzzy christian names like.....er.....Peter!!!?.....two Peters in fact.Theres a Peter Winkler on here,surely no relation to Fonz legend Henry I trust? Anything's possible in the world of avant garde Electronic music,even a 'Happy Days' connection.Despite the music summoning enough power through discomfort to rename this shit TV series as "Unhappy Days"
I'm relieved to say that the other names are far more in the malevolent dictator realm,like Ivan, and the previously discussed Zoltan......wasn't that the hound of Dracula's name?
The...er.....'music', is suitably castle dungeon in it's homeliness.
The odd appearance of The Soup Dragon from the Clangers,in Zoltan's work,place the evil one head and shoulders above his compatriots,although its all jolly sinister.Evoking empty space,lonliness and fear amongst the moist cloisters of a vampire's mountain top chateau.A Hungarian 'Trump Tower',but with taste.
Tracklist:
A1 –Zoltán Pongrácz - Mariphonia(1972) 8:07
A2 –Zoltán Pongrácz - Egy Cisz-Dur Akkord Története (1975) 5:48
A3 –Peter Eötvös - Mese: Rövidített Változat (1968) 12:18
B1 –Iván Patachich - Magánhangzók: Ta Fonaenta (1976) 8:06
B2 –Iván Patachich - Hangzó Függvények (1975) 10:37
B3 –Máté Victor & Péter Winkler - Viscositas (1975) 5:12
Most Hungarians have names that are later used for the character of an Evil God in cheapo kids fantasy cartoon series'. Zoltan , the bringer of pestilence,with a few of those weird Hungarian Dogs straining on the end of some chain heavy leash. One day Zoltan hopes to compete at 'Crufts',but for now he'll make do with just doing evil.Keep it simple Zolt.
This Zoltan makes evil sounding neo-classical electronics,complete with the barking hounds of Zoltan. Not the type of Electronics anyone can do mind....there's some craft to Mr. Pongrácz's electronic compositions. Sound effects as music, this most certainly is not! There's dark and light shading, and lots of stagey Hungarian monologues,in the style of those early Kluster albums (get them here and here). Again, I dunno what the voice is going on about,and I don't wanna know, it invariably lessens the mystery. I avoided seeing pictures of Joy Division, and I avoid translations of dark foreign language solioquies, to maintain the enigma.Nothing beats the perfection of the human imagination.
There's choirs too, like some Magyar version of the Omen.
Chimps could not make this,not even the infinate chimp,unlike the chumps who make that random knob twisting "I've got an expensive synth and you haven't" electronica' waving their Karl Heinz Stockhausen correspondence course certificate in your face mockingly,chanting "you don't understaaaand, you don't understaaand, nah nah n-nah naaaah!"
Tracklist:
A1 Madrigál 10:03
A2 144 Hang 12:00
B1 A Balgaság Dícsérete 18:26
B2 Sesquiatera 7:22
Any cover with close ups of an EMS synth is always iminently purchasable,and doubly so if it comes from behind the Iron Curtain during the cold war times.
For some reason communist Hungarians had a Stockhausen fixation, and enthusiastically made silly electronic noises and drew charts with the same efficiency as they helped Eichmann deport a million jewish citizens to the Auschwitz labour camp (notice how i called it 'a labour camp' to avoid know all anti-zion conspiracists telling me how many really died and how.....yeah we got holocaust fatigue as well as conspiracy fatique.....look I Don't Care understand!?...and yeah yeah yeah, I'm a Fascist,which is different to a Nazi by the way...well done you keyboard finger pointers....well done).
I figure that the only western records they could smuggle through customs were by Stockhausen,which would explain the number of serious electronic composers in Magyar land.....But that does not explain their numerous ,badly dressed prog bands, like the dreadful 'Omega',which i did feature on the blog, but ,true communists that they were/are, they made a DCMA complaint against me and the download had to be withdrawn(but you can check it here in the post on the terrible hungaro-rock album "Bum".
Its funny how former commies now make for the very worst capitalists.Humans do have a natural tendancy to burn down their houses to keep themselves warm,capitaist or communist.That's why, neither dogma works.
These electronic pieces are from the 'I've got a Synth and I'm gonna Use It school of 'Because I Can'.
A series of very pointless sound effects rechristened as music. Its great background music to a slow moving science fiction epic, or a wacky off-kilter fondue evening, but taking it seriously as a modern composition is strictly for the pseudo-intellectual in your cell.
Maybe this was an easy way to get a more favourable appartment in the brutalist tower block that László was allocated before he became an 'Artist', I dunno.Basically, he had access to an astronomically expensive EMS synth and his fellow brothers and sisters did not.....that's equality for you.
Good cover though.
Tracklist:
A1 "A²" (16:38)
A2 Oscillations No. 3 (9:45)
B1 Oscillations No. 1 (18:00)
B2 Oscillations No. 2 (11:50)
It's the Iron Curtain Village People! The one on the left is a Leninist Architect from Hungarian Special Forces, the one in the dungerees is a highly decorated Plumber, moonlighting in the Polit Bureau. Then we have Gabor, he's a state dentist and concrete technician, and the last one on the right isn't in the band at all, he's a secret policeman following the other three,taking notes and logging their sex lives for future blackmail useages.It ain't called 'Bummmm' for nothing y'know!
Formed by ex-members of Hungarian Prog nancy boys Omega,(Sorry, the Omega post has been removed due to a DCMA copyright violation????Though who'd want to copy that I'd like to see their psychological profiling?) Locomotiv GT wanted to 'butch' it up a fraction,get rocking,and wear western clothing.They certainly knew how to have fun in the Communist Bloc,but these chaps were disappointingly lacking in essential Polit Bureau Chic.Their purpose may have well have been to infiltrate the evil western youth culture and when they were number one on zer billboard chart-ess, call for that longed for socialist revolution.
The only thing wrong with that plan was that they were Shit!
They certainly try very hard ,but fail, to 'Kék Asszony' in the same way le Royaume-Uni fails to kick ass on the Eurovision Song Contest while the former Soviet Bloc states chuckle heartily at our dismal attempts at talent show Schlager pop.Don't be surprised to see Locomotiv GT ,reformed and rockin' at the next Eurovision,and....WINNING!
"You may have zer Beatles but vee hapf zer Locomotiv GT....vee arse laffink out loud hahahahahaaaaaaa!" said the Norwegian judge; the same one that commentated on the 2-1 defeat of England in world cup qualifying in 1981....check this out HERE!
NB. You won't believe this but the previous post of very shit Hungarian prog ice dancers, Omega, has been pulled due to a DMCA complaint!?... those communists eh? The cover was funny anyhow so i'll put a link here so you don't miss out.
Tracklist:
A1 Ringasd El Magad 4:50
A2 Kék Asszony 3:30
A3 Gyere, Gyere Ki A Hegyoldalba 2:45
A4 Visszamegyek A Falumba 4:00
A5 Bárzene 4:15
B1 Ő Még Csak Most 14. 3:45
B2 Szabadíts Meg 3:40
B3 Vallomás 3:55
B4 Mondd Mire Van 2:35
B5 Miénk Itt A Tér 3:00
If there was anything funnier than seeing butch professional working class Geordie Eric Burdon 'turning on and tuning in' with his hilarious 'New' Animals project (Whose four albums are a consistent laugh a minute), its hearing Erics biggest psychedelic era 'hit' 'San Franciscan Nights' being covered by Gabor Szabo backed up by ex-Ray Coniff singers, The California Dreamers;who had also seemingly 'Turned on and Tuned In', and told Ray to shove his easy listening miesterwerks where the sun don't shine.
They rebeled by making soft psychedelic sunshine pop (aka Easy Listening with paisley neckerchiefs) backing vocals for jazz also ran bandwagon jumpers in suits and ties.
That should show Ray Coniff a thing or two.
My earliest musical memory was hearing 'A Day In The Life'(Beatles version I may add!) on the Jimmy Young Show on BBC Radio 1 when one was about three. It frightened the living bejeeesus out of me,and had nightmares about the Beatles coming to get me.The Beatles in my dream were all dressed in Leather,like in the Hamburg years.I Couldn't believe it when I first saw the pictures of the Fab Five in Hamburg....exactly as I had imagined them!? Horrifying!
The version by Gabor and the California Nightmares manges to squeeze every ounce of drama,psychedelia, and danger out of the Sergeant Pepper classic,and leave just a dry lifeless husk behind.....it takes some special kind of insipid anti- talent to be able to turn out some flavourless product thats akin to a platter of beige unseasoned cous cous.
The punks hated The Beatles,but never did anything to flesh these emotions out,whereas Szabo and the gang manage to make the fab four irrelevent in the very same year they released their concept album that launched a thousand dreary clones.
Erstwhile Sitar mate Bill Plummer, makes an appearance on the neutralising of Jefferson Airplanes "White Rabbit";but nothing neuitralised the psych legend of the Airplane more than the fact that they eventually morphed into Starship,who were unforgiveably responsible for giving the world "We Built This City"(on Rock'n'Roll)...for which they should be put on trial for, declared incredibly GUILTY,then sentenced to a lifetime of listening to non-stop world music and French Reggae.
This dazzling display of Lysergic anti-venom, is astonishing in its power to neutralise anything meaningful and makes pointlessness seem like a desirable career path.
But why then do I love it?....I'm kind of jealous of its bland power and ability to dispel the myth of the Narcisistic fools who made the original tunes,and paint over the colours of the Psychedelic bandwagon with two coats of magnolia matt emulsion......Dare to be Bland.
Tracklist:
A1 San Franciscan Nights 3:18
A2 A Day In The Life 3:20
A3 Twelve-Thirty (Young Girls Are Coming To The Canyon) 3:00
A4 To Sir With Love 2:28
A5 White Rabbit 2:30
A6 Guantanamera 3:09
B1 Saigon Bride 2:10
B2 The End Of Life 2:55
B3 Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds 3:44
B4 Are You There? 3:31
B5 W.C. Fields 3:40
Gabor Szabo, either escaped the Soviet invasion of 1956, or the communists threw him out for crimes against music?
Somehow he found his way to California,found Bob Thiele who signed him to Impulse records, and released around half a dozen Szabo albums in a couple of years......someone must have bought them,but I dunno who? He did in fact beat the other besuited Sitar exponent on the block,Mr Bill Plummer, to the punch by a year or so.Being a political refugee does tend to focus the mind somewhat,spotting potential new ways to integrate and avoid being sent back.Although this album should have been reason enough to reject his application for US Citizenship alone.
Only in 1966 could an balding asylum seeker from behind the Iron Curtain be seen whizzing around LA on a Vespa with a sitar strapped to the back of his tweed blazer, with an adoring,heavily made up Modette in tow. On top of this, someone was cool,or fool, enough to have him banging out albums.
Just slapping any image portraying Indian Instrumentation was enough to shift enough units to finance another record in 1966-68, so fittingly there is a capitalist motive at work here.
The Sitar, is most definitely NOT an instrument one can just pick up and play at a whim.In the hands of Gabor it sounds like a badly tuned guitar with buzzing frets,and regularly snapping strings.
When he overdubs his semi-acoustic guitar part with the Sitar, it really does just sound like he's snapping the strings.
The cover versions are shameless Psychsploitation at its worst and naffest.Despite being abley backed up by the legendary Bernard Purdie on the skins,just Gabors heavily Hungarian accented vocals are enough to cause ones jaw to drop in disbelief.I suppose the Jazz labels had to do this shit to survive the Rock'n'Roll fad,and thank goodness they did.They really are quite hilarious indeed.
Tracklist:
A1 Walking On Nails 2:46
A2 Mizrab 3:32
A3 Search For Nirvana 2:07
A4 Krishna 3:11
A5 Raga Doll 3:42
A6 Comin' Back 1:55
B1 Paint It Black 4:40
B2 Sophisticated Wheels 3:52
B3 Ravi 2:59
B4 Caravan 2:58
B5 Summertime 2:58
