37:Neu! - Neu! 2

So my chin sagged under the weight of this years inaugural CHI beard. The weight and the looming deadline, meant that blogging was off the radar as I raced to get my 10 pages done and polished. Neu! 2 is cheap! The sleeve says 1,000,000 vorbestellungen which seemingly translates as 1,000,000 preorders. Well that's 1,000,00 people that are going to pretty pissed off when the record arrives.

The first side is wonderous. Fur Immer is right out the book of Hallogallo, all drums and wandering guitars, utter Motorik heaven. Spitzenqualitat is huge drums in a huge cave, Gedenkminute is exactly one minute of chimes and processing. Lila Engal is a sneering Hallogallo, pre-punk Neu! at it's finest.

Then the second side. The bonkers, stupid mess of the second side. The side that makes you feel ripped off. The real fuck off as Cope says. The legend says that Neu! ran out of money recording the first side - but that feels unlikely to me, it's more likely that they got bored, and decided to stick two fingers up at the world. So the second side is the single Neuschnee / Super played at different record speeds. So Neuschnee played at 78 / Super played at 16 and 78. Neuschnee played back on a tape whilst someone holds the tape player down, slowing it up and speeding it down. The songs themselves are superb - Neuschnee is played slow, Super starts off with somone saying "Neu!" and then leading into superb riffage territory. BUT the "edits" (One of them described them as the precursor of remixes) are utter dross and make you feel like you've been ripped off. It's unlistenable rubbish - a joke taken way too far.

What they were thinking I'll never know but it's just not good nor defensible. It defies sense. They're not a soft target. Neu! 2 makes me feel dirty and ashamed. It should have been solid but it's somewhat embarrassing.

38:Neu! - Neu! 75

Though this should be called Neu! - the '75 bit being added on the inner sleeve only (at least on the reissue copy that I have at least). For this record I swapped the sunny skies and cute dogs of San Francisco for the cold and wet picturesque Sheffield. This one accompanied me as I dashed round the city, down to Palo Alto, back to the Mission and then onwards; lugging my case to Oakland for my last meal in the US and tearful farewells. It's almost ironic that the record almost sums up my time on the west coast - dazzling, beautiful, accomplished and that byword of the best krautrock: optimistic.

Neu! 75 totally makes up for the awfulness of Neu! 2. The terror of that second side washes away with the opener Isi - classic Neu! in the Hallogallo style but with a light piano. Then two tracks of that contemplative noisy ambiance that they do so well. Side 2 kicks off with Hero - proto punk? maybe but only in the sneer. Riffs and drums and some barely coherent singing, it's wondrous and fills the record with joy and sneer. E-Musik is back to the drums and riffing and then After Eight, revisits Hero with more sneer and more impudence.

All in this is just a great record and such a relief after the last one disappointed so. If you only get one Neu! record then get this.

36: Neu! - Neu!

The band that defined the sound. Dinger and Rother together at last. Speedfreak clean as Cope says. I had my Neu! spiel all ready to go. Oh yeah, Hallogallo's great but the rest of the album is all those stupid noise experiments. But, as usual, I'm dead dead wrong and I've completly underestimated how good Neu! are in their totality.

So Hallogallo (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ItXUqk_eIE8), Dinger's drums, that wikky-wikky sound and the rest. 10 minutes of pure joy and non stop fury. It's as incredible as you remember and it's way better than the last time you listened to it. They could retire on that and go down as one of the greatest bands in the world. But then they go off into "experimental" territory and do things that most groups would completely fail at. BUT. And it's a big BUT. They do it really really well. Between Hallogallo and Negativland are three beautiful meandering tracks that drift in and out of your consciousness and are just stunning. Negativland is slower than hallogallo and adds some aggressiveness to the mix, but the pattern of drums and bass is the same. Then it rounds off with Lieber Honig which is more drifty but with strange child like horror vocals.

I was never sure if they were trying to re-create music or if that was just something that people made up. But this is just a really fantastic record and the best thing is that it's a record that you can listen to from start to finish and every track is an eye opener. Maybe they weren't trying but they sure achieved something.

35: Moebius and Plank - Rastakraut Pasta

So Labour Day (or Labor Day) caught me out. Labour Day is like bank holiday monday but for the US, and seemingly has some link with May Day but the specifics escape me. I spent my Labour Day Day on a foggy beach watching crabs, eating burgers and drinking beer. So pretty much a typical bank holiday affair.

The week prior had been spent in the company of the oldball entry in the list. Except that, now that I've heard it, I don't think it's particularly oddball any more. The Moebius is Dieter from Cluster and the Plank is Conny from everywhere. It's all a bit worthy but has moments of excellence. This was a funny one as it seemed like a crappy record from the cover and I seem to recall that all the purists hated it's inclusion, though I don't really know why.

It has the fun elements of Harmonia and Cluster but with a bit of an arch overtone. The first track is all grates and cluster drums. The title track veers slightly towards reggae but is quite listenable - it's weird how takes on reggae often turn out all right. There's a bit of a noise break and then the best song on the record Missi Cacadou. Over reggae-ish drums and guitars Plank (presumably) puts down tons of electronic squiggles and bleeps and some bonkers processed vocals. I have doubly no idea what whoever it is is going on about but it's a fun journey nonetheless. The album then rounds off with some noodling.

So, overall, this is pretty good - not amazing, or as good as the cluster axis and not as fun as the La Dusseldorf things but better than the cosmic jokers at their worst.