Püttlingen, a very small town (20.000 folks) in Saarland, near the french border, was at times a real boring city to live in - but, to my surprise turns out that 2 records from here found their way to the "1001 record collector dreams" collection. That's "The Blackbirds", a more beat related band who had a single hit ("Sherry baby") - fun fact: a friend once purchased his copy in a Record Store in London.
Their 2nd LP "No Destination" is listed in "1001" and understood as "Krautrock" (funny, this label is utter b#llsh#t sometimes) but in fact it's more "Beat"
Another band from Püttlingen may deserve that label more even (imho) it has more of early Deep Purple than it has to do with "real" Krautrock as "The Can", "Kraftwerk", "Neu", "Amon Düül II" for instance.
Fun fact: in the early days of the net I was in contact with a guy I traded CDs with and when he sent me his list, I found "Gäa - Auf der Bahn zum Uranus" in it and I laughed out loud "Are you kidding me? That's a band from my hometown and I can't imagine, that there's a CD of their only record. I purchased a copy at a show in the early 70ies standing behind me in my collection".
Which leads us to "Goldi" as part of the "Pre-Hinterwald"-scene who organized concerts in our small town as "JuSo" (young socialist) and so kickstarted a bit what later became this long-living Hinterwald-Thing, a scene that this year will present the 40th in a series of annual "Free & Outside" festivals (we hope that damned virus will then be not a reason to kick that event).
A self-managed youth center was founded (and closed because of ... hmmm ... you know, the guys & gals loved to smoke weed).
Being ousted from their fav place (I have to say "their", because there's one part of the scene in Köllerbach, the smaller part of the town, and one from Püttlingen. Even our youth center also were closed ... you may guess why. Well you're damned right!) ... we grabbed a place in the wood and from then on everyday that place was populated by longhaired hippies in tie-dyes ... smoking weed and used it as a place to go tripping in the forest - or playing football stoned on tuesdays with a soundtrack of Bob Marley shows.
In the beginning of the 80ies the first free festival took place, not right there, where we were "at home", but also on a very small place in our part of town, the original place is now occupied by a big festival "rocco del schlacko". Fun fact: There are now with "Little Woodstock" 3 (!) festivals in that small town every year.
'nough talking on that, let's go back to 1981, when the first festival took place, poster artworked every by "snoid studios" offering the just presented Sinalco Fluor S, Triebwagen and ... wow! ... the great "Bladie Mae", hookers & junkies with a really disturbing set.
There are 2 tracks in the files, first "Mohnblumenfeld" (a guy high on every drug available lies dreaming in a field of poppies ...) followed by the damned classic "ABC Alarm" (refrain: "ABC Alarm, ABC Alarm and I don't have a mask to wear on!" and "yellow protein in my ass", whatever that means ...)
There's a helicopter in the beginning. It's real - it's the police flying over the place what the damned drug users on the ground may do ... Perfect!
Also part of that first festival was "Triebwagen" (= railcar) which is one of the greatest band we had ... buuuut. Sorry, their lyrics are in a stangest german dialect, but base for some real great artworks by "Snoid studios" who made comics on the lyrics
In the files collection you'll find four songs.
It starts with "Schuh voll Batsch" in the radio recorded version with the sweetest and never seem to end guitar solo, Jose (imho) ever played. Have some patience with the sax and the german lyrics you may not be disappointed with Jose
It was part of the sampler that celebrated 10 years of free festival
The lyrics complain on living in a dead town, where nothing ever happens and you have the wish to leave it all behind. ("Schuh voll Batsch" = Having mud in the shoes or as they say over here "ich honn de flemm" = dialect for "I have the blues" and "mei hut, der passt mir nimme" = and my hat doesn't fit anymore)
The song ends with our hero sitting in a bar in front of a lady who looks him straight in the eyes - but he can't get his mouth open. Which is the perfect description of feelings you can't express - because you're stoned.
Great Comic by Mr Snoid on that btw. Time to realize that as a video as well.
Then from the soundcheck of the 2nd festval "Nix wie huddel mit de Fraue" (Nothing but trouble with the girls, first you're attracted by them and then you don't know how to go further - as I said, the pure sentiment of our hero) an announcement by a known guy ("rotz rock reggae" = "snot rock reggae") and "Was isn hia los?" ("What the fucking hell is going on here" where our hero comes back to town, finding his grandma ruling the trafic while the mayor working on the trash can, police & thieves making a basecap/coke deal and a lady in a grocery presenting her breast ... don't panic, just a dream! )
Triebwagen was kinda mother to a lot of bands then following also singing that dialect, go to the Hinterwald-Page, check "Bands" and you may listen to some more. But Triebwagen is essential. The singer ("Mohla") was by the way then working "under the ground" in a coal mine (Saarland had coal & steel) and .... chef de grill - the guy on the left. On the right the bassist of triebwagen ;)
Sorry, mucho words, but ... there's some more to be told of. Like "Les hommes volants", another band, Mike Schwisteg of Sinalco became member of later.
But most of all I have to add Andi Arroganti and his Casio VL 1.
He was member of the "Wartungsfrei"-Tape-Label from the near town Saarbrücken and he deserved then and now to be well remembered doing tat all alone at his home with a minimum of equipment but a maximum output.
His stuff is just great, his topics are mostly the experience of being gay ("Homo-Hetero", "Ruf doch mal an" which talks on gay phone sex in the early eighties, being "Krank & Pervers" = Sick & perverted) but my favourites are "Na jete trop po pro" and the funny "Alle Leute fallen um" = If I pull that red button, it will make BOOM in europe, radioactive fog, all the people will fall to the ground!
I remember my first contact with Andi, he was sitting in a bus in front of me and held this "It's A Beautyful Day" LP in his hands. I dunno why we didn't became friends, it became more of the opposite and I speculate a bit on sexual orientation. But as if for Volker I had the chance some decades later via internet to express my full admiration on his work.
All in all: A wide field in styles and stories ... for a small town like that.
Sorry for the wall of words andall of the anecdote-stuff, I hope I didn't bored you to much and you enjoyed a bit the ride. My part on that is more the one of the observer and the man with the archive, never played in one of the bands or wrote some lyrics for them - even I was befriended with the real essential guys and it's my job to tell that - because if I don't nobody will. The Hinterwald has some strange codices and not making a big thing of it or - god! beware! - making money or having success, are part of that. But moving to the date, when the 40th festival will take place, Snoid Studios and I are a bit working on telling the whole story.
In the mid 80ies, when they constructed an "autobahn" near our favourite place and destroyed it this way, I left the region and moved to the oldest town in Germany, where once the roman emperor Constantine ruled the whole then known world.
A friend of mine just formed a band there and asked me for some lyrics ... but that's another story ...
No comments:
Post a Comment