Einsturzende Neubauten- Grundstuck (2005)

Einsturzende Neubauten is in my top 5 favorite all time bands, ever.  Mr. Chelmets introduced them to me, years ago, and I have loved them ever since.  Gene Cesspool & I once drove 10 hours to see them live, then directly after the show, turned around and drove the same 10 hours back.  (On a side note, that was the first, and only, time that I fell asleep driving; which is a really weird/scary feeling.  The trip was tons of fun, and the venue was awesome; even though it was horribly hot in Austin Texas that time of year.)

Grundstuck is an amazing album; and honestly it's hard to find an EN album that is not amazing. 10 tracks of the most amazing post-industrial/melodic/experimental/etc. releases.  If you are not familiar with E.N., you absolutely have to get familiar with them.  This is one of those bands that are historic, I personally have most of their albums, copies of some of the albums on vinyl, a few dvds, I pretty much get everything that I can that is E.N. related.  These guys are from Germany, and are so liked, they get to record in water towers, under the Autobahn, travel the world, and for the last few years have released their albums on their own.  (They have such a huge following that you can become a "member" and get the cd or dvd and the money goes to the completion of the album, the manufacturing, printing, etc.)  Grundstuck is just 1 of many examples of the possibility within music when played and composed by highly skilled highly intuitive musicians.

This album has quite a few changes, from song to song, so it doesn't grow old, even after the un-teenth listen.  Post-Industrial meets studio effects meets vocals that are working along home-made instruments that are all corralled in a symposium of sweet auditory bliss.  I wish that I could write a small periodical on what E.N. has done with music, with the amount of influence they have had on other musicians and the music scene as a whole.  Whenever I get into a conversation regarding music, I usually get asked who are my favorite bands; and when I say E.N., I always get this crazy weird look from whomever I am conversing with. 

This review might not be the most thorough of reviews, regarding the album itself; and I apologize.  But E.N. is one of those bands that will always be pioneers, and will always be revered as one of the all time bests by true music enthusiasts. 

Official score- 4.75/5
(If I ever do another E.N. review, it will always be 4.75/5.  It should be 5/5, but with a lot of people being music ignorant, I toned down the Official Score.)

Can- Delay 1968 (1981)

(I will say up front that I am not finding an official release date.  I have seen everything from 68/69 to 81 to 2010.  So, for this review, I am going with '81.)

I will have to admit, it took awhile for this album to grow on me.  At first listen, I didn't really care for it that much, but after a couple more go-thru's, I dig it.  Can is one of the best early prog-rock, kraut rock pioneers, out of Germany, and they should be a band that any major music enthusiast should be familiar with. Can has had many different vocalists and musicians, and this line up is one of the better ones.  This album has some of their earlier sounding tracks and has a great example of their early progressive sound, as all the tracks have great breakdowns and some signature vocal styles mixed with early Kraut style guitar work. Track 2- Pnoom, is a short track with a great rhythm mixed found sounds and early style electric beeps and blarps, short- but still one of my favorites on the album.  I was a little disappointed with the track "Thief", not because it's a bad track, but it slows down the pace of the actual songs and their place on the album.  Lots of the tracks remind me of early garage rock/kraut rock/prog type sound, the guitar sound pretty dirty, which I like, but in my opinion, not a must have. 

Anyone that is familiar with Can, should definitely try and check this out, this is not their best work, but not their worst, by far.  The album contains 7 tracks, with a running time a little over 35 minutes, so it's a short listen.  If you like early Prog/Kraut, then go find this, or save yourself the effort and find a way to download it.


Official Score: 3/5