01	Pinch						09:29
	02	Sing Swan Song						04:47
	03	One More Night						05:35
	04	Vitamin C						03:32
	05	Soup						10:31
	06	I'm So Green						03:05
	07	Spoon						03:04

Spoon (CD 008)
Germany 1972

Holger Czukay, bass;
Michael Karoli, guitar;
Jaki Liebezeit, drums;
Irmin Schmidt: keyboards;
Damo Suzuki, vocals

Bob Eichler:
This was the second Can album I bought at the local Borders bookstore's grand opening sale (the first was Tago Mago). I'm not sure if it's because I was already familiar with that other album, or if it's because this disc has shorter tracks, a more composed feel and better sound quality, but I found this one a lot easier to digest than Tago Mago.
On this album, the band focused more on the trance-inducing grooves, mostly leaving behind the psychedelic freak-outs that made up a large portion of the previous album. "Sing Swan Song" is actually a very relaxing piece, and "One More Night" is downright catchy with its toe-tapping beat and bass harmonics. "Vitamin C" does a good job of summing up what the trancey side of the band is all about in a short three and a half minute song. "Soup" starts to drift into strange territory, but doesn't get quite as "out there" as the previous album and only lasts ten minutes (as opposed to Tago's side-long tracks).
While I like this album and there aren't any particular tracks that stand out as bad, there also aren't any that seem quite as good as "Mushroom" and "Oh Yeah" from Tago. So overall I'd say the earlier album is my favorite of the two, but both are enjoyable. If you'd like to ease into Can, then I'd recommend Ege Bamyasi, since it's the less experimental of the two that I've heard.

Dominique Leone:
After Tago Mago, Can began the transition from Velvets-inspired free-groovers to something like James Brown-inspired impressionists. While this may not seem like the kind of distinction worth burning brain cells on, it is significant when you consider where this kind of music went - namely to the dancefloor, via the mix tapes of DJs everywhere.
While beat had always been the center of Can's microcosmic sound, this album was like a radical of that small universe. It appears that they took what they had learned on the previous album (chiefly, that Stockhausen and dance patterns can co-exist), found a low common denominator, took the fat off the top, and commenced to write the book on experimental funk. If that all sounds a little, well, mathematic to you, it probably should. As much as the band were capable of composition through improvisation, and discovery through exploration (an ability doubtlessly cribbed from the late-60s, early 70s Miles records), they were the prog masters of sound manipulation and tape edits. That means that no matter how they got somewhere, here, we only got the barest derivative of their journey. Briefly, Ege Bamyasi is Can simplified.
The whole thing leads off with "Pinch", which is probably the best Miles tribute ever recorded by a prog band. Uptempo, free-form funk, with something of a chorus every now and then. So this was how it was going to be, huh? Stark, bare, relentless, funky, slightly bizarre. Damo Suzuki continues his travels into lands with no concept of the traditional vocal, and couldn't stop influencing lo-fi freaks if he tried.
Other tunes are closer to (gasp) conventional. "One More Night", "Vitamin C", "I'm So Green", and "Spoon" are all variations on the metronome theory, as brought to us by Jaki Liebezeit. Take a groove skeleton, admire it, sprinkle some harmony around the edges, get lost in said groove skeleton, follow strange detours courtesy of narrative navigator Suzuki, watch as groove disappears into nirvana. If the avant-garde was ever so inviting, I haven't heard it.
While this album pointed the way by which Can would travel on subsequent albums, it did retain enough of their experimental edge to ward off ambient/trance comparisons. The music here is often repetitive, but it isn't exactly soothing (in, say, the same manner as "Future Days" or "Bel Air Suite"). The rhythms seem more tightly wound than usual, and the newfound sense of brevity brings an angular touch to the music where later pieces would be rounded. I guess you could call it a "tense" Can album, but I prefer "focused", and in the end, that's the term I think of when Can comes to mind.

Joe McGlinchey:
Ege Bamyasi shows German rockers Can at the height of their power, and is a great representation of their unique, highly rhythmic sound at full throttle. As usual, the guitar and keyboards hang back providing atmosphere, while "human drum machine" Jaki Liebezeit handles each track with stunning precision and control, while avoiding flash. Bassist and engineer Holger Czukay holds the project together like the hub of a wheel. "Pinch" is Can at their most fiery and menacing, opening the album with slippery funk and Damo Suzuki's low growling vocals. "Sing Swan Song" is next and completely different in mood, with acoustic guitar and mellow mumblings from Damo. "One More Night" grooves along with electric piano set to an infectious 7/4 beat. "Vitamin C" and "Spoon" solidify this one as a must-have.

AMG EXPERT REVIEW: The follow-up to Tago Mago is only lesser in terms of being shorter; otherwise the Can collective delivers its expected musical recombination act with the usual power and ability. Liebezeit, at once minimalist and utterly funky, provides another base of key beat action for everyone to go off on - from the buried, lengthy solos by Karoli on "Pinch" to the rhythm box/keyboard action on "Spoon." The latter song, which closes the album, is particularly fine, its sound hinting at an influence on everything from early Ultravox songs like "Hiroshima Mon Amour" to the hollower rhythms on many of Gary Numan's first efforts. Liebezeit and Czukay's groove on "One More Night," calling to mind a particularly cool nightclub at the end of the evening, shows that Stereolab didn't just take the brain-melting crunch side of Can as inspiration. The longest track, "Soup," lets the band take off on another one of its trademark lengthy rhythm explorations, though not without some tweaks to the expected sound. About four minutes in, nearly everything drops away, with Schmidt and Liebezeit doing the most prominent work; after that, it shifts into some wonderfully grating and crumbling keyboards combined with Suzuki's strange pronouncements, before ending with a series of random interjections from all the members. Playfulness abounds as much as skill: Slide whistles trade off with Suzuki on "Pinch"; squiggly keyboards end "Vitamin C"; and rollicking guitar highlights "I'm So Green." The underrated and equally intriguing sense of drift that the band brings to its recordings continues as always. "Sing Swan Song" is particularly fine, a gentle float with Schmidt's keyboards and Czukay's bass taking the fore to support Suzuki's sing-song vocal. - Ned Raggett






Can
Formed 1968 in Cologne, Germany
Group Members Irmin Schmidt Rebop Kwaku Baah Holger Czukay Rosko Gee Michael Karoli Malcolm Mooney Damo Suzuki Jaki Liebezeit

Always at least three steps ahead of contemporary popular music, Can was the leading avant-garde rock group of the '70s. From their very beginning, their music didn't conform to any commonly held notions about rock & roll — not even those of the countercultures. Inspired more by 20th century classical music than Chuck Berry, their closest contemporaries were Frank Zappa or possibly the Velvet Underground. Yet their music was more serious and inaccessible than either of those artists. Instead of recording tight pop songs or satire, Can experimented with noise, synthesizers, nontraditional music, cut-and-paste techniques, and, most importantly, electronic music; each album marked a significant step forward from the previous album, investigating new territories that other rock bands weren't interested in exploring.
Throughout their career, Can's lineup was fluid, featuring several different vocalists over the years; the core band members remained keyboardist Irmin Schmidt, drummer Jaki Leibezeit, guitarist Michael Karoli, and bassist Holger Czukay. During the '70s, they were extremely prolific, recording as many as three albums a year at the height of their career. Apart from a surprise U.K. Top 30 hit in 1978 — "I Want More" — they were never much more than a cult band; even critics had a hard time appreciating their music.

Can debuted in 1969 with the primitive, bracing Monster Movie, the only full-length effort to feature American-born vocalist Malcolm Mooney. 1970's Soundtracks, a collection of film music, introduced Japanese singer Kenji "Damo" Suzuki, and featured "Mother Sky," one of the group's best-known compositions. With 1971's two-record set Tago Mago, Can hit its visionary stride, shedding the contraints of pop forms and structures to explore long improvisations, angular rhythms and experimental textures.

1972's Ege Bamayasi refined the approach, and incorporated an increasingly jazz-like sensibility into the mix; Future Days, recorded the following year as Suzuki's swan song, travelled even further afield into minimalist, almost ambient territory. With 1974's Soon Over Babaluma, Can returned to more complicated and abrasive ground, introducing dub rhythms as well as Karoli's shrieking violin. 1976's Unlimited Edition and 1977's Saw Delight proved equally restless, and drew on a wide range of ethnic musics.

When the band split in 1978 following the success of the album Flow Motion and the hit "I Want More," they left behind a body of work that has proven surprisingly groundbreaking; echoes of Can's music can be heard in Public Image Limited, the Fall, and Einsturzende Neubauten, among others. As with much aggressive and challenging experimental music, Can's music can be difficult to appreciate, yet their albums offer some of the best experimental rock ever recorded. — Jason Ankeny


1969 Monster Movie Mute
1970 Soundtracks Mute
1971 Tago Mago Mute
1972 Ege Bamyasi Mute
1973 Future Days Mute
1974 Soon Over Babaluma Mute
1975 Landed Mute
1976 Flow Motion Mute
1977 Saw Delight Mute
1978 Out of Reach Harvest
1979 Can Mute
1989 Rite Time Mute
1997 Radio Waves Sonic Platten
Mother Sky Astroid
Horror Trip in the Paperhouse Mind the Magic
Unopened Astroid

1970 Deep End
1974 Limited Edition United Artists
1976 Opener Sunset
1976 Classic Germ Rock Scene Sonopresse
1976 Unlimited Edition Mute
1978 Cannibalisms United Artists
1980 Cannibalism 1 Mute
1981 Rock in Deutschland, Vol. 6 [live] Straud
1981 Incandescence Virgin
1981 Delay...1968 Mute
1982 Onlyou Pure Freude
1984 Prehistoric Future Tago Mago
1985 Inner Space Thunderbolt
1989 Time Rite Fink & Star
1990 Cannibalism 2 Mute
1990 Cannibalism 3 Mute
1995 The Peel Sessions Strange Fruit
1995 Anthology 1968-1993 Mute
1997 Sacrilege: The Remixes Mute
1998 Inner Space/Out of Reach Thunderbolt
1999 Can Box [UK] Import x
1999 Can Box [US] [live] Mute x
1999 Can Box Music (Live 1971-77) Mute