Customer Reviews

30 Jahre Live

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Pleasantly surprised with the top notch overall quality of this exclusive Japanese triple disc release.Not only is the sound quality great,but the band sounds full of life.Disc one:recorded live in July,1998 in Finki,Germany.Founder/drummer Mani Neumeier and guitarist Luige Archetti share the vocal duties as tracks I dug the MOST were "Space Baby","Jet Lag" and the Guru Guru gems "Ooga Booga" and "Elektrolurch".Sax player Roland Schaeffer(of Brainstorm) is back in the band and can be heard,especially on "Moshi Moshi","Idli Killer" and the somewhat jazz influenced "Kleines Pyjama".Maybe not the earth-shattering krautrock they played in the early '70's,but rest assure.The in-depth diversity and experimental chemistry is still very much intact.Disc two:is dubbed as 'supersession'.Starts off with "30 Years Celebration" featuring guests former band guitarist Ax Genrich and former Can members vocalist Damo Suzuki and guitarist Michael Karoli.Needless to say,this cut kicks some serious cosmic ass!!Genrich also shows up on "House Of Wah Wah".I was caught off guard with "Odenwald Witt" that's nearly good enough to be mistaken for an old recently discovered unreleased Guru Guru song."Canguru Jam" is also pretty happening.Oh,I get it...members of BOTH Can and Guru Guru."The Owls Go To Bed" is the finale,eleven minutes of pure galactic magic - like a reprise of "30 Years Celebration".Well,sort of.Disc three:labeled as a 'A Special Gift' and THAT it is.Nearly an hour's worth of a live 1971 gig that took place in Frankfurt,with each of the three tracks running an average of twenty minutes."LSD Marsch" is good,but for unexplainable reason(s),I think I like "Girl Call" and "Space Ship" better.Let's face it.Archive CD's rarely get better than this.This release is also available,minus disc three,on vinyl from the Funfundvierzig label.Highly recommended.

Lots of hippie bands indulge in live retrospectives of their careers anymore, in one way or another. Either they are recreating a favorite album live, or they gather all their friends and former band members, and record a concert to celebrate their own longevity in the business. 30 YEARS LIVE, is of course an example of the later. I'm a bit ashamed to admit, that one of the BIG reasons I bought this 3 CD boxset, is to get the 50 minute "BONUS CD" of GURU GURU LIVE from 1971. Even with that CD included , I still anticipated GURU GURU's jam with members of KRAAN, and CAN. So, the package arrived and I threw the 1971 CONCERT CD in the stereo. First off, if you think that LIVE 1971 CD is going to sound like that GARDEN OF DELIGHTS 1970 radio show of GURU GURU, you will be SADLY mistaken. This 1971 show was recorded by some guy in the audience, who later sent the cassette to Mani as a present. So, the soundquality is closer to a B- bootleg. It's very hissy, but you can hear what's going on OKAY. Once your mind accepts the sloppy quality of the sound recording, you are free to enjoy the sloppy quality of their playing at the time. (Early GURU GURU always reminded me of three guys in a garage on acid, just messing around and recording whatever happens.) The 1971 FREE CONCERT CD mostly derives from the third album, KANGURU. (The first song BO DIDDLEY is from their 2nd album). At that time, GURU GURU were still a heavy psychedelic band. For them, that means almost no lyrics, and LONG, meandering jams, with tons of drum rolls, and the lead guitar player moving from choppy chords, into leads, back to chords, and so on. Like their work on the first three albums, its VERY loose, very flipped out, and very difficult to follow. But it's not technical like other three peice acid bands CREAM or JIMI HENDRIX EXPERIENCE. By that, i mean they dont have 3 or 4 minute blues or folk cover songs, or poetic lyrics. Its just freeform freaking. So, if you enjoy long, spaced out, punkish jams, recorded live under FAIR to MIDDLING condistions, you'll dig that live 1971 CD.

What i DID enjoy was the 1998 concert. The first CD is just GURU GURU jamming away. Of course by 1998 these guys had some serious chops, lots of various musical and cultural influences, and had integrated a teutonic version of Zappa's "COMEDY MUSIC", into their act. I have a DVD with GURU GURU playing live from the late 90s, and they are one of those bands that are SO visual, incorperating so many visual jokes, that you lose something just hearing them. Their set list for the first CD, runs the gamet from DER ELEKTROLURCH, (their concerts traditional, flipped out comedic final song), to many "hits" from Mani's solo years. Other songs like KLEINES PAJAMAS, is gentle, very disciplined, almost like a cross between King Crimson and Zappa. Then, you have OOGA BOOGA, which is all over the place again. (tho not like their early days.) So, the first CD is fun to listen to, and even if one or two numbers may not strike you in the gut, its a good bet since they have SO MUCH variety in their sound, that SOMETHING is going to wow your ears. The thing to remember, is that this band NEVER focused on 3-4 minute long pop songs live, but relied on their free form jamming for most concert numbers. This is not pop music, it's experimental rock.

Which leads us to the SECOND CD, the "GURU GURU JAM". This CD makes the whole set worthwild. Some numbers like PFAD, have the GURU GURU band in deep grooving territory, while some nutcase with a soprano sax, and someone else on Shanai (that indian double reed instrument), try to make Coltrane's spirit resurrect on stage. That kind of shock-fusion is fun to hear, definately. ODENWALD RITT is the jam with some of the guys from KRAAN, another famous krautrock- fusion band, from the early 70s. Other songs include the ORIGINAL guitarist from the "acid" version of the band. (OWLS GO TO BED.) That's another great song. This is a band who relies on FREEDOM, no matter if the idiom they embrace is ACID ROCK, or World fusion, or Jazz, or punk or whatever. The number with DAMO SUZUKI (Can's second singer), and Michael Karoli (Can's guitarist, now unliving) is OKAY, 6 minutes of freeform krautrock exploration. I enjoy the second megajam CD, just to hear the band stretch into ROCKESTRA territory. For those who find the three piece rock band concept to be too limited texturally, GURU GURU BIG BAND really cook. Fluid, unpredictable, freaky, yet they produce consistantly interesting sonic results. Towards the end of CD 2's last number (the "reunion jam"), the band even revisits their ambient freak out sound, found on side two of their first album UFO. Since you are getting three CDS for the price of ONE CD (amazon listed this title incorrectly, when they said 2 CD SET), you are BOUND to find something fun to hear, with so many songs, guest artists, and the free 1971 concert as well. Is GURU GURU as great as they were back in the early 1970s? Well, maybe they're better, in some ways. They have more songs structure to explore, they have solid technique, instead of punked out trippy noodling, and they have their jazz/world music influences, to color their jams as well. All in all, even tho I'm unsure if it deserves four stars, or just three, I'm not disappointed in the purchase. For those who have NEVER heard of GURU GURU, dont start with this release. But I'd be lying if I said FOR COMPLETEISTS ONLY. EROC does a great job mastering the project, as he always does. If you already LIKE or LOVE the band, have at least 3 of their CDs, and enjoy their anarchy humor, mixed with jazzy/ world beat/ psychedelic/ hard rock/ punk/ krautrock sound, then it's a good purchase to make.