More than Progressive Rock – THE SONICS play Ginsberg’s “Howl” = Anglian Krautrock mastery

More than Progressive Rock – THE SONICS play Ginsberg’s “Howl” = Anglian Krautrock mastery

Continued from my last blog entry

 

THE SONICS  play “Howl” part 1 (09:41)

THE SONICS  play “Howl” part 2 (08:54)

THE SONICS  play “Howl” part 3 (26:19)

 

Horst and Gertraude Riemer - Horst was a good lyricist – had a foot in a ballet to Alan Ginsberg’s “Howl” (“Das Geheul” in German – I must still have the first edition of the book somewhere) and they asked Ray to write the score to it. Which he did. And the music to the ballet was something special. It was first performed in Baden-Baden in 1971, and the accompanying events were on the sad side.

In Kassel, the band played the music live to the dancers a few times, before they recorded it in Hilgershausen and the music in the theatre was coming from a playback tape. Thus the Sonics were able to sit in the audience and listen to themselves. The first 7 or so minutes of the music (it was a collage of sounds making good use of backwards tape) were played in the theatre’s foyer while the audience arrived and ambled to their seats. Just when Brian’s kettle drums set in at 6:25, the audience had to be seated and then the show began. 

 

Ray King: “Despite the success of “Das Geheul”, gigs petered out and we were running low. Just when Polydor came round with an offer, Joe and Brian had quit the band and gone back to England.” Which meant The Sonics were no more. Unfortunately, as even bigger things could have been expected.

 

In order to read the whole band story and listen to some previous music, open the older post: From Garage Rock to Progressive masterpiece – The SONICS from UK = Anglian Krautrock.