Author: wamdines

Pearl Jam began the new millennium keen to show that they were not the same band who had helped define the music of the previous decade. Binaural, the Seattle legends’ sixth record, was released in mid-May, 2000, and turns 25 this month. The idea was that it would signify some sort of fresh start for Eddie Vedder & co., more exploratory and experimental than their already-exploratory and experimental previous two albums (No Code and Yield).

They have never been a band who traded happily on past glories, mixing it up each time in the quest to introduce a little fresh magic dust into the equation, and on Binaural the reset was double-pronged. One major difference since Yield was that ex-Soundgarden drummer Matt Cameron was now behind the kit. Another key change was that after working with producer Brendan O’Brien on every album since the all-conquering Vs., they now had a new face manning the mixing desk. Tchad Blake, celebrated for bringing a dynamic sound to records from Tom Waits, Tracey Chapman and more, was on board. His approach to recording was the technique from which the album took its title: binaural recording was a method that used two microphones to create a 3D stereo sound. “Tchad has a very distinctive way of recording the sound of the room,” Eddie Vedder said in the band tome Pearl Jam Twenty. “We were interested in exploring that atmosphere. A lot of the time on Binaural, it’s almost like the listener is there in the room with us.”

That listener might have felt a bit awkward, though. Pearl Jam had a lot to untangle as they got to work in Studio Litho, a recording facility owned by the group’s guitarist Stone Gossard, in Seattle. One major issue was that Vedder was suffering from writer’s block. “I almost went completely crazy,” he told the NYRock website at the time. “I kept changing the lyrics and then changed them again, just to write another version. I ended up with several versions and then used the best and put them together and that worked surprisingly well. But I before I did that, I thought it would never happen, I’d never be able to finish it… It was my own personal hell. I had a great time but at the same time the lyrics just didn’t come together and I was wrecking my head. I still can’t believe that it’s all done and over with, that I finally got all the lyrics together.”

He wasn’t helping himself, he added, by constantly comparing his work to that of his heroes, having recently noticed that his idol Pete Townshend had already written their rock opera Tommy by the time he was Vedder’s age. “That made it much harder to come up with good lyrics,” he said, understandably. “I was always comparing my lyrics to great lyrics. There’s so much junk on the radio that I set myself very high standards.”

He’d also noticed listening to the radio, he explained to Rolling Stone, that there was an alarming amount of Eddie Vedder soundalikes out there on the airwaves. “Last time I listened to the radio, I was like, ‘Who the fuck is this guy and maybe I should call an attorney!’,” he wise-cracked. “It’s kinda funny that you can copyright a note progression but you can’t copyright your voice and the way you sing.”

Vedder’s concerns over his lyrics – and his copycats – weren’t the only thing going awry at Pearl Jam HQ at the time with guitarist Mike McCready mired in prescription drug and health issues. “Binaural is a dark time for me,” he confessed. “I was struggling with Crohn’s disease and struggling with addiction. I was taking pills to take care of that. And then that got out of hand, and it was dark.” McCready would enter rehab for the second time during the recording sessions.

The band found a way to the end, though, creating a collection of songs that pinballed from surging rockers (Breakerfall, God’s Dice, Insignificance), yearning ballads (Light Years), experimental art-rock (Sleight Of Hand, Evacuation) and one ukulele-fuelled ditty (Soon Forget). But still, there were hurdles to get over. There found at the mixing stage that perhaps Blake wasn’t the guy to get the record across the finishing line and turned to their old pal Brendan O’Brien instead. “Tchad had some great ideas, he did a great job on the slow songs,” explained McCready. “But other songs were harder for him, so we called Brendan to remix, to make the songs heavier.”

Looking back on the record with a decade and more’s worth of hindsight, guitarist Stone Gossard viewed Binaural as a missed opportunity. “That’s an album I need to listen to in another ten years,” he shrugged. “We weren’t as loose with one another or sharing as well as we usually did. It was our first record with Matt Cameron. He’s a genius, one of the heaviest drummers of all time. It feels like we should have gotten more out of him… We’re never going to remember that record as one of the greats.”

Incidentally, it has been over ten years since Gossard made that comment so, if you’re reading Stone, it’s time to stick on Binaural and see what you make of it, 25 years on…

Niall Doherty is a writer and editor whose work can be found in Classic Rock, The Guardian, Music Week, FourFourTwo, on Apple Music and more. Formerly the Deputy Editor of Q magazine, he co-runs the music Substack letter The New Cue with fellow former Q colleagues Ted Kessler and Chris Catchpole. He is also Reviews Editor at Record Collector. Over the years, he’s interviewed some of the world’s biggest stars, including Elton John, Coldplay, Arctic Monkeys, Muse, Pearl Jam, Radiohead, Depeche Mode, Robert Plant and more. Radiohead was only for eight minutes but he still counts it.

Featuring ex-Deep Purple bassist/co-vocalist Glenn Hughes, blues guitar star Joe Bonamassa, keyboard king Derek Sherinian and drummer Jason Bonham, Black Country Communion have established themselves as one of the greatest supergroups of the last two decades. In 2011, as they geared up to release their second album, the four members sat down with Classic Rock to talk about how it was on the way to becoming bigger than any of them could have imagined.

What began as a brief side-project for Glenn Hughes, Joe Bonamassa, Jason Bonham and Derek Sherinian has grown into something closely resembling the real deal: a contemporary classic rock group comprised of four musical over-achievers with their collective artistic compass pointing to some time in the early 1970s.

There is also another component to the group: the man whose vision it was the persuaded them to work together, producer (“don’t call me ‘svengali”) and co-songwriter Kevin Shirley. Like the band, whose combined CV includes time with Led Zeppelin, Deep Purple, Black Sabbath and Dream Theater, Shirley’s resumé also includes some of the biggest names in rock: Led Zeppelin, Iron Maiden, the Black Crowes, Journey… The full list is huge and impressive.

According to Shirley, “The master plan was begun before we even started. To the point where we scripted the ‘no touring until we had enough for a two-album set’. We had a little hiccup at the beginning of the second record, which was the result of many managers in the room, but other than that it’s been pretty much like clockwork.” Well, almost. With so many super-egos involved, ‘clockwork’ was never going to be an accurate description of how things work in Black Country Communion. But, as we learn, it’s been amazingly close – so far, anyway.

How did this whole journey begin for you?

Glenn Hughes: John Bonham was my good friend, and I had Jason on my knee when he was a kid, though he doesn’t remember that. I met Joe at a NAMM show five years ago. Joe and I started to hang out and write a couple of vignettes, nothing heavy, just kind of bluesy Americana. Then he invited me to sing a couple of songs with him at the House Of Blues. He loved Medusa from Trapeze, and he liked Mistreated from Purple. And Joe’s audience, you know, they’re a blues audience. But when I went on there and did my shtick they went fucking mad! Kevin Shirley ran backstage, sweating going: “I can see it! I can fucking see it now! We’ve gotta get Jason and Derek…” Me and Joe went, okay. Then the next day, a conference call and the band is born.

Derek Sherinian: Any time Kevin gives me a call I always make myself available. I’ve known Glenn for a long time, and of course I knew who Jason was. I’d never heard of Joe before. I think I’d heard his name, but I didn’t know anything about him. So I just went down there blindly to see if there was some kind of vibe, and we ended up doing a whole album.

Jason Bonham: I was doing the weekly grocery shop in Florida, where I live, and Kevin called me. I knew Glenn, I know Joe, I didn’t really know who Derek was. I didn’t do any homework, I didn’t listen to any of the songs, and kind of just went in there with that: “Okay, we’ll see what happens.” I think I was six hours late the first day. And then they had bets the second day what time I’d get there. I didn’t take it very seriously at all. I kind of had a bee in my bonnet about how it was being put together. I was still kind of upset that my dream hadn’t come true.

With Led Zeppelin, you mean?

Bonham: Yeah. And I was still kind of in a bitter place. So I was a little bit off. Not so much with everybody – Kevin. I didn’t kind of get the deal. And I made quite a bit of a problem. I’ve since very much apologised to the guys. You know, the old, ‘You’re exploiting the talents of Led Zeppelin. How much kick-back you getting?’ kind of vibe. And then when I heard the album I was like, hey, well, this is pretty good. I’m so pleased with my drumming on it. But I couldn’t really imagine it being a success, I don’t know why. I just didn’t really get it, until people started to go: “Oh my god. This album’s fantastic!” And it just grew on me. You know, on the new album the song Cold is one of my… I’m getting goose bumps talking about it. That is to me just beautiful, beautiful writing.

Joe, you and Kevin had a longstanding relationship before BCC. How does it work and why?

Bonamassa: First of all, we wouldn’t be having this conversation without Kevin. He really is the fifth member. He basically took those ramshackle tracks [on the first album] and made something out of it. I mean, you should have seen the look on my face when I heard the first record! I didn’t even remember doing it, we’d just cut it so quickly. He was the guy who kind of gave the mandate at the very beginning. Like, “Let’s get in our time machine, go back to 1970-71 but make it new and make it original and make it in 2010. Because I think there is a gap where bands are not doing that anymore.” You can’t buy any new music that sounds like the old school. There’s old school bands doing new music but there’s not like a brand new band. So I thought it was really clever of him to come up with that, and I was like, “Yeah, that should be fun”. And it’s been a blast.

With this second album, the band have suddenly got something to live up to. Did that make it more difficult for you?

Hughes: Kevin said to us: “I want you all to go write music for the next album.” I don’t write for a project, I just write every day because I like to write. It makes me feel good. So I wrote a lot of songs. But Joe doesn’t write on the road, so I said: “I need you for two weeks,” right after the two live shows. But he went up to Hogmanay with his girlfriend and I had him for three days. We went in with no pre-production, we went in cold again. And Jason and Derek hadn’t really heard what I’d been writing. They’d heard little bits and pieces. We just huddled together and I shared my music with the guys, and built the songs from there.

Bonamassa: We’d done Black Country, the first one, then four months later I’m in the studio again doing what would become [this year’s solo album] Dust Bowl. Then as soon as I get off the road after nine months of hard touring, Glenn’s ringing like: ‘So, Joseph, on Monday you’re going to come to my house and we’re going to start writing…’ I’m like, whoa! Fellas! Man, I’m not a machine! Give me a second to get my head-space! [laughs] But it did work out well. I warned Glenn: “I won’t be able to bring in half the record this time, but I will be able to commit to like doing two [new songs],” which took a little bit of the pressure, and he and I collaborated on some other songs. But it was basically ideas that he had gestated.

Bonham: It was a much better experience. Like we were a big fucking family, honestly. I felt in a completely different place. I didn’t want to say to Kevin: “You were right and I was wrong,” but I did. Me and Kevin had a really good chat and we both left hugging, and since then we’re getting on in leaps and bounds and speak to each other quite often. The strangest thing, I haven’t stopped listening to it since we finished it. I listen to it on a daily basis. Which is really bizarre for me.

Let’s talk about some of the songs on the new album, starting with the opener, The Outsider.

Hughes: I wrote that riff at the start of the song. Joe freaked when he heard that. But it’s so simple – it’s five notes, it’s a scale, you know? I wrote a song called Good Man. It broke down into a half-time on the chorus, with a really acoustic, almost Crosby, Stills & Nash vibe. And it sounded fantastic. But when we got into the chorus after playing that intense lick, it just went somewhere else.

The Battle For Hadrian’s Wall is something of an epic.

Bonamassa: I brought in Ordinary Son and I wrote The Battle For Hadrian’s Wall. Live, I may have to lower the key just slightly on …Hadrian’s Wall. I kind of sang myself into a corner on that one.

Bonham: In my head I was still thinking of a Zeppelin song at the end when the drums come back in. I kept thinking: “What would dad do in an environment like this?” I remember Kevin saying something like: “Don’t worry what your dad would do, just do what Jason would do.” And I was like: “Well, yeah, you’re right.” But in my head I use him as a building block.

How about Save Me?

Bonham: That actually started back with me, Jimmy Page and John Paul Jones, one of the days we were working in 2008, when we got together just as a three-piece to see what we could come up with. I remember one day, the greatest day of anyone’s kind of life, Jimmy Page turns to you and says: “Hey, you got any ideas?” Like, what? “Er, yeah. Hold on a minute…” Rush to the computer and suddenly go through all of my favourite Zeppy kind of riffs that I had flying around my head. And that was it. I had the basis of the song, of the main riff, but I never got to finish it. Glenn took my idea and finished it. I was so stoked when I first heard it. And Derek came up with the chorus chords, and Joe with the bridge.

The tag, like the Indian part, was through a friend called Chris Blackwell who played with Robert [drumming in Plant’s 90s backing band]. I contacted him a long, long time ago: “You haven’t got any more ideas like Calling To You [from Plant’s Fate Of Nations], have you?” And he sent me an idea of a song. And that was just the one part of the song I really liked. So I said, you know what, we need that kind of part there. So I had to give him a writing credit on it. It’s like a collection of bits and piece that kind of all stem back to the boys [Zeppelin], I suppose.

Hughes: I said to Jason when he played it to me: “Can I have that?” And he said: “Yeah. Write something that’s gonna make me cry.” He’s really emotional, that boy. So I wrote something… But these songs sort of wrote themselves. Kevin is in the studio, directing, conducting us with the headphones on. We know what key we’re in and we’ve run through it once in the control room with acoustic guitars. Then we go out there and the tape is rolling, and the magic, I swear, just happens.

What can we expect from the shows this summer?

Hughes: This is my first band since Purple. It’s been fucking 34 years, for Christ’s sake! Come on! It’s out of this world. I’m back in a rock band again. And I’m in it for the right reasons now; I’m not in it for the drugs and the booze and the blow and the birds. I’m really enjoying being in a rock band, a real rock band, a great band. I said to Joe early last year: “We have got to do shows before the end of this year, and we’ve got to do it in England.” It wasn’t hard to convince him.

Bonamassa: Well we certainly had that not-knowing-what’s-going-to-happen-next thing at those gigs in Wolverhampton and London [laughs]. I felt we didn’t have enough material. There’s no reason for me in Black Country Communion to be singing [solo song] …John Henry, you know? Now that we have a second record we’ll have a really comfortable hour-and-a-half of all of the band stuff, and we can still throw in a [Led Zep’s] No Quarter cos that was one of my favourite songs to play. Then you have a real show, and it won’t be like a 20-minute guitar solo.

Glenn, Joe told us he was taken aback at the start of the first show in Wolverhampton when you just ran on from the wings all guns blazing. That he felt he had to try and keep up.

Hughes: [Smiles] That’s a work in progress. Jason won’t look at you onstage. And I like to engage everybody but Joe won’t look at me either. He’s never had anybody engage him [onstage]. His manager’s going, ‘Push him! Push him!’ Kevin’s going, ‘Give him a fucking…’ you know? But we’re a work in progress, we’re like two gigs! So God knows what happens after three months. I see us being another Purple, Zeppelin, where live the songs will morph into longer things, because we have the musicianship in the band. Jason Bonham, pound for pound, right now has gotta be the best musical rock drummer we have – period. He is fucking insane!

How do you see BCC proceeding from here?

Bonamassa: Our next real challenge is to go out there and make a real live show out of it. Everybody was kind of running on adrenalin those first two gigs, but now let’s make sure we can keep that spirit three or four weeks into the tour when the novelty of it wears off and we’re grinding it out on the road.

Bonham: I’d love to give it the proper attention that it needs. To make sure the albums get toured and the band gets seen all over the world. I just hope the band gets a chance to progress and be what it could be. At the same time, you can’t really ask Joe to give up such a successful solo career. Glenn is a hundred per cent into it. I’m a hundred percent into it. Obviously we’d all like to do more, but I’m totally behind whatever the decision is of the band. We will play to our best ability at every show we play.

Hughes: I said to Joe at dinner last week: “Joe, I need you to invest your time into this band as well as your solo career.” And he told me very frankly: “I absolutely love this band. I love being the guitar player. I don’t have to be the leader, and I love being your partner.” My dream is to establish ourselves even more so next year. I shouldn’t really talk about next year, cos I’m in the program and we’re supposed to deal with today and stuff. But I know that I’ve got tour dates coming up with BCC. I’ve got my own full European tour in the fall. But Black Country to me, truly, is my first love. When people think of Glenn Hughes I want them to think of Black Country Communion. Glenn has actually found a band again and he’s not fucked up and he’s focused and he’s hungry to be part of it.

Now is our time. What the beautiful thing about those two shows and the second one you saw was – if we were that good on those first two shows, my fucking word, how is it gonna go after like three weeks?

Originally published in Classic Rock issue 160, June 2011

Mick Wall is the UK’s best-known rock writer, author and TV and radio programme maker, and is the author of numerous critically-acclaimed books, including definitive, bestselling titles on Led Zeppelin (When Giants Walked the Earth), Metallica (Enter Night), AC/DC (Hell Ain’t a Bad Place To Be), Black Sabbath (Symptom of the Universe), Lou Reed, The Doors (Love Becomes a Funeral Pyre), Guns N’ Roses and Lemmy. He lives in England.

If there’s one day that every sci-fi fan has circled in their calendars, it’s not Boonta Eve or the Wookiee-favourite Life Day – no, it’s May the 4th, officially known as Star Wars Day! Today, fans across the galaxy (and right here on Earth) will don their Jedi robes and stormtrooper helmets, celebrating all things Star Wars with enthusiasm that can be felt across the stars. Sites such as Amazon and Logo are ready to join the intergalactic party, rolling out epic deals on everything from Star Wars-themed Lego sets to an array of out-of-this-world memorabilia.

Now, with an entire galaxy packed with Star Wars treasures, you might feel like you need to make a few hyper jumps just to track them all down. But fear not, my fellow Jedi! I’m here to guide you on this thrilling quest through the cosmos of collectables. 

Below, I’ve curated a list of my top picks for Star Wars merch that’s sure to get your heart racing faster than a Podracer at full speed. With these stellar selections, finding a fantastic deal this Star Wars Day will be easier than winning a game of holochess against Chewie! 

Okay, let’s start with Lego. With so many cut-price sets, there’s no time like the present to start building your collection. Lego is celebrating Star Wars Day with some special discounts and even some brand-new sets to build. Lego Insiders members can get access right now, and it’s easy and totally free to get set up. You can check out all the deals over at the Lego site.

Notable discounts include £84 off the Venator-Class Republic Attack Cruiser, £42 off the X-Wing Starfighter, and the Mos Espa Podrace Diorama is down to only £59.49.

Moving over to Amazon, I’ve picked out the incredible Black Series Sabine Wren Premium Electronic Helmet. Sabine is a fan favourite who made her debut in the animated Star Wars Rebels, but has recently made the jump to live action, showing up in the Ahsoka mini-series. A trademark of the character is her very cool Mandalorian helmet, and now you can snag one for yourself at a heavily discounted price. Over at Amazon, you can pick one up for only $73.99, down from $99.99.

Sticking with fan favourites, next up I have to mention this Vintage Collection Cad Bane action figure, donning his look from The Book of Boba Fett series. Down from $18.99 to only $10.99, this is a must-have collectable for anyone who is a fan of this gunslinging, galactic bounty hunter.

Of course, as you’d expect, there is much more on offer, so I highly recommend heading over to Amazon and Lego to see what else is available. Not sure where to start? You might also enjoy our guide to the best Lego sets for adults, which includes everything from band logos and guitars to Beatles sets and our favourite Star Wars models.

Daryl’s a Senior Deals Writer on Louder’s sister sites MusicRadar, Guitar World and Guitar Player. He has a passion for anything that makes a sound, in particular guitars, pianos and recording equipment. In a previous life, he worked in music retail, giving advice on all aspects of music creation, selling everything from digital pianos to electric guitars, and entire PA systems to ukuleles. He’s also a fully qualified sound engineer with experience working in various venues in Scotland.

Back in the days when God was a boy and bath nights were as much a weekly treat as they were a necessity, the local flea-pit cinema would occasionally open its doors late to deviate from its scheduled programming to indulge in all-night horror marathons, cult movies or concert films, catering for those whose tastes and interests ran counter to the mainstream.

It may seem rather quaint now in a time of information overload, instant-access entertainment and short attention spans, but for those who made the effort to rock up with smuggled beers, a packet of 10 fags and perhaps something more exotic, these encounters with the counterculture were as meaningfully informative and impactful as they were fun.

Ergo Pink Floyd‘s Live At Pompeii, which showed the generation that latched on to music in the 70s and 80s that there was so much more to the band than the imperial period that ran from the release of 1973’s The Dark Side Of The Moon to the final brick that built The Wall six years later.

Filmed and recorded live over several days in October 1971 in the ruins of Pompeii’s Roman amphitheatre with only the camera crew as the audience, these performances show a band in transition as they begin to find their direction and identity following the enforced departure of founder member Syd Barrett after his drug-induced meltdown.

With one foot in the band’s psychedelic past and the other pointing at the future, the updated and retitled Pink Floyd At Pompeii – MCMLXXII is a vital historical snapshot. Earlier material such as Set The Controls For The Heart Of The Sun and Careful With That Axe, Eugene are less concerned with the discipline of song structure – or indeed songcraft – as they are with creating music that enhances altered states of consciousness via the exploitation of sound effects and guitar pedals. Looking forward with the then-contemporary dips into Meddle via One Of These Days and the monumental Echoes (here split into two parts), Pink Floyd take off from the more disciplined launch pads of melody and purpose.

Visually cleaned up, and remixed by Steven Wilson, Pink Floyd At Pompeii – MCMLXXII is liberated from memories of scratchy sound and grainy visuals. Crucially, as a document of four hungry musicians working in common cause and without later bells, whistles and recriminations, this stands as Pink Floyd’s best live album.

Julian Marszalek is the former Reviews Editor of The Blues Magazine. He has written about music for Music365, Yahoo! Music, The Quietus, The Guardian, NME and Shindig! among many others. As the Deputy Online News Editor at Xfm he revealed exclusively that Nick Cave’s second novel was on the way. During his two-decade career, he’s interviewed the likes of Keith Richards, Jimmy Page and Ozzy Osbourne, and has been ranted at by John Lydon. He’s also in the select group of music journalists to have actually got on with Lou Reed. Marszalek taught music journalism at Middlesex University and co-ran the genre-fluid Stow Festival in Walthamstow for six years.

Readers of a certain age may recall seeing Pink Floyd At Pompeii as part of a series of all-nighter screenings featuring various rock docs in the mid-70s – events frequently accompanied by a large alcohol intake beforehand. Inevitably, as the movies in the dark and warmth of the cinema ticked by, and the booze and the wee hours took their toll, falling asleep was often the outcome.

Happily there’s no danger of nodding off in front of this extended edition of Floyd’s historic performance exhumed from their archives. With the 85-minute feature film version and a 60-minute edit, lovingly restored from the original 35mm negative, and audio remixed by Steven Wilson in Dolby Atmos, 5.1 and stereo, this 54-year-old concert now boasts crisp audio that nicely complements the improved visuals. Vinyl fans will also covet the two-LP soundtrack accompanying this release.

Taking place in a deserted amphitheatre in October 1971 with roadies and director Adrian Maben’s camera crew looking on, the group roam through a memorable set including A Saucerful Of Secrets, Set The Controls For The Heart Of The Sun, Careful With That Axe, Eugene and a truly vibrant rendition of Echoes from Meddle – which the band had only finished mixing the previous month.

The performance, interspersed with studio footage and interviews, captures Floyd at a major transition in their career. While the music of Echoes has a foot in their psych/underground past, it also points to future elements they’re seen honing for The Dark Side Of The Moon, which will arrive just three months later.

Hindsight inevitably freights portions of the interviews with a degree of extra resonance. Roger Waters – seen in Abbey Road studios working on a record that would sell more than four million copies in the UK alone – scoffs at the then-media reports that rock was a dying art form, declaring, “The market in rock’n’roll is expanding at a phenomenal rate.”

Elsewhere, the ever-diplomatic Nick Mason, asked about the state of the band’s interpersonal relationships, states that all is well; but admits that the real danger to future cohesion could be “when one person finds that what he’s doing doesn’t interest him, or he feels he could do something better by himself.”

Even the amphitheatre’s oval in which the band play seems to foreshadow the famous circular projection screen that would feature in Floyd shows from 1974 onwards.

All told, this is a truly historic artefact.

Pink Floyd At Pompeii – MCMLXXII is out now in DVD, Blu-ray, CD and vinyl formats.

Sid’s feature articles and reviews have appeared in numerous publications including Prog, Classic Rock, Record Collector, Q, Mojo and Uncut. A full-time freelance writer with hundreds of sleevenotes and essays for both indie and major record labels to his credit, his book, In The Court Of King Crimson, an acclaimed biography of King Crimson, was substantially revised and expanded in 2019 to coincide with the band’s 50th Anniversary. Alongside appearances on radio and TV, he has lectured on jazz and progressive music in the UK and Europe.  

A resident of Whitley Bay in north-east England, he spends far too much time posting photographs of LPs he’s listening to on Twitter and Facebook.

A music writer since 1993, formerly Editor of Kerrang! and Planet Rock magazine (RIP), Paul Brannigan is a Contributing Editor to Louder. Having previously written books on Lemmy, Dave Grohl (the Sunday Times best-seller This Is A Call) and Metallica (Birth School Metallica Death, co-authored with Ian Winwood), his Eddie Van Halen biography (Eruption in the UK, Unchained in the US) emerged in 2021. He has written for Rolling Stone, Mojo and Q, hung out with Fugazi at Dischord House, flown on Ozzy Osbourne’s private jet, played Angus Young’s Gibson SG, and interviewed everyone from Aerosmith and Beastie Boys to Young Gods and ZZ Top. Born in the North of Ireland, Brannigan lives in North London and supports The Arsenal.

Half a century on from the release of their first post-Damo Suzuki release, Soon Over Babaluma, Can remain one of the most unique bands out there. As their late-period live albums campaign continues, keyboardist Irmin Schmidt looks back on the creation of their fifth record and explores the genius of the krautrock pioneers.

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Of all the exceptional bands that emerged from Germany during the 1960s and 70s, none were more daring than Can. The pioneering group are now back in the public eye thanks to their ongoing series of archival live performances. They’ve also been celebrating the 50th anniversary of Soon Over Babaluma, the band’s first studio release following the departure of charismatic frontman Damo Suzuki in 1973.

Vocals on the album were handled by late guitarist Michael Karoli and keyboard player Irmin Schmidt. The latter, now 87, and original vocalist Malcolm Mooney are the only surviving members of Can’s early and classic eras, following the passing of Suzuki last year.

“It happened one generation after culture was cancelled and ruined and devastated,” says Schmidt, pondering the great wave of German musical invention. “The courage arose not to imitate, but to create something that could only be done when you grew up in this country.”

Born in Berlin in 1937, the war naturally had a profound effect on his childhood. “I heard a lot of music at home. My parents both played piano. It was normal for me. Then came the bombing and we were evacuated. After the war we had nothing. Our house was bombed – everything was lost.”

He began taking lessons on the piano and it soon became apparent that he had an instinctive talent. “From 12, 13, it was just part of my life: I was conducting the school orchestra when I was 16,” he says. “I studied piano, conducting and composition at university. I founded an ensemble and performed a lot of contemporary music in my early 20s.”

In Cologne he studied under Karlheinz Stockhausen, the groundbreaking composer dubbed ‘the father of electronic music’ – until, in 1968, Schmidt took the fateful decision to pursue a different kind of project. “I was conducting and making piano recitals,” he recalls, “especially contemporary classical music. I had studied with Stockhausen and thought, ‘This is not the only contemporary music.’

“Jazz is as much of basic importance as contemporary music of the 20th century, so I was looking for other people who were based in jazz or in contemporary electronics, and also in the most recent contemporary music: rock. I wanted to create an ensemble where the members had roots in different genres.”

I was very unsure when Jaki said he was the drummer I was looking for. He said, ‘Don’t worry, I won’t play free jazz!’

Drummer Jaki Liebezeit was the first recruit. “I had played with him before in film and theatre productions. He was based in Cologne, like me, and I heard him very often with his free-jazz group – although I distrusted free jazz. I didn’t see the sense in playing drums using a bow for the cymbals and this kind of thing. So I was very unsure if it was right when Jaki said he was the drummer I was looking for. My idea of a jazz drummer was Max Roach. Jaki said, ‘Don’t worry, I won’t play free jazz!’”

Bassist Holger Czukay, guitarist Michael Karoli and vocalist Malcolm Mooney rounded out the original version of Can. Czukay had also studied under Stockhausen and had a keen interest in experimental music. Karoli came from a jazz background but had been turned on to rock by the Rolling Stones.

“The idea was that already there was this collage of four musicians, which came from totally different routes,” says Schmidt. “Jaki was a jazz drummer, Holger was into electronics, and Michael was a rock musician. My idea was also that it should be totally spontaneous – finding our way together, composing together; not me again, sitting down and composing and then telling others what to play. I had done that already.”

They found their direction by playing together, he reports. “I don’t think improvising is really the right word; it was kind of intuitive, instant composing. We were just playing. Playing for hours and hours, and all of a sudden the right groove was there. Which doesn’t mean that Jaki alone created the groove – the groove can be created by four people at the same time. And from this groove we created the song.”

We wanted our own production means, and not be dependent on any producer, record company or whatever

A lucky break gave Can an unusual venue for the recording of their first two albums, Monster Movie (1969) and Tago Mago (1971). Schloss Nörvenich, a sprawling 15th-century castle located just outside of Cologne, was being rented by art collector Christoph Vohwinkel, who became a friend of Schmidt.

“I was very active in the art scene,” says the keyboardist. “Most of my friends were not musicians, but painters. I made features and wrote speeches for the opening of art shows and things like this.” The pair were introduced via a gallery. “The gallery told him, ‘There’s this group looking for a place and you have this big castle – maybe there’s room for them.’ And he said, ‘Yes, there is!’”

The band’s equipment was basic, but that was never a problem. “We wanted to have our own production means,” says Schmidt, “and not be dependent on any producer or record company or whatever. So we only recorded on two two-track machines. On the second you could overdub, but only once.

“During recording, it forces you to listen exactly to the others to create the right balance. It’s an extremely good education; an extremely good way to get the group together, because you’re so dependent on listening more than playing. Listening was the secret.”

Although not a driving factor, money was also a consideration. “Of course, we wanted to make a living because we were professional musicians. I hadn’t learned anything else. When you study music, you do it because you want to become a musician. That doesn’t mean I wanted to get rich. You just want to make a living; not be dependent on anything else.”

We had to move out of the castle. Sculptor Ulrich Rückriem lived there with his kids. We were working at night – that was too much noise

Helpfully, Can’s popularity was steadily growing via the use of their single Spoon as the theme tune to the German TV series Das Messer. By 1972 and third album, Ege Bamyasi, they’d found a new working space. “We had to move out of the castle – we were not the only guests. The sculptor Ulrich Rückriem lived there with his family, and they had kids. We were working at night, and of course, that was too much noise.”

Schmidt’s wife Hildegard, who was also Can’s manager, discovered an abandoned cinema in the municipality of Weilerswist, which became the band’s official studio, Inner Space. Schmidt recalls: “It gradually grew from two two-track machines. By the time of Landed in 1975, we had a 16-track recording machine and a mixing desk.”

New equipment meant new ways of working. “We all had doubts about whether it changed for the good. The way we did it before forced us to listen. I think Soon Over Babaluma was the last one we recorded on two-track – and I think it’s the last of our best albums.”

Released in November 1974, Soon Over Babaluma combines elements of ambient, jazz and rock into a dazzling display of invention. “I remember the recording of Come Sta, La Luna,” says Schmidt, “because that was one of the most refined and subtle recording processes you could achieve on a two-track machine. It’s full of nuance with background sounds like in a restaurant or in a saloon, and all these very, very subtle touches – the maximum you could get with overdubbing on two tracks.”

We realised playing without a singer was just as good. Jaki always said: ‘Singers are only troublemakers!’

Opening number Dizzy Dizzy made for another highlight. “It’s a wonderful piece and one of our best,” Schmidt enthuses. “We put it in our new series of live recordings, and it’s also on The Lost Tapes [a 2012 compilation]. It shows the potential – it could grow.”

With Mooney long gone, and replacement Suzuki also having departed after three albums, Schmidt stepped up for vocals on Babaluma. “Damo left, but we thought there should be some vocals. So Michael sang on Dizzy Dizzy, and I sang on Come Sta, La Luna. Then from the next record on we said, ‘We don’t really need a singer.’

“We realised – and you can hear it now with this live series – that when we played without a singer it was just as good. And it was so intense. Jaki always said: ‘Forget about singers; they’re only troublemakers!’ Playing live was always a strong point of the band.”

He admits: “Before going onstage I have terrible anxiety, but the moment I go on I feel at home – all anxiety is gone.” It had been the same since his earliest days of professional work. “My teachers, when they saw me performing, said, ‘Why can’t you play like this in our lessons?’ I was always better, much better, when I had an audience.”

It was not that we said we had to make everything different… we didn’t want to repeat ourselves

It’s the unpredictability and adaptability of Can that makes listening to their music such an engrossing experience. As Schmidt says, “No record of Can repeats the same feeling; the same style. Every record was different. It was not that we said we had to make everything different. It grew totally naturally; we didn’t want to repeat ourselves.”

From the start, they knew they were charting a new path. “When we listened to what we’d done, of course we realised it sounded totally different. Everybody in Germany – journalists mostly – said we were not able to play like the American and English groups. We didn’t want to.”

Is Schmidt surprised that the music Can made 50 years ago is still being listened to? “Not really,” he says. “I mean, I’m very glad that it succeeded in a way, but with a classical education, you play music which is four or five hundred years old. Being successful means you last.

“If you make sense as a composer, then it should last at least as long as you live. And since I’m 87, and it still lasts, I have some hope that it will last for the rest of my life!”

Chris Wheatley is an author and writer based in Oxford, UK. You can find his writing in Prog magazine, Vintage Rock, Longreads, What Culture, Songlines, Loudwire, London Jazz News and many other websites and publications. He has too many records, too many guitars, and not enough cats.