Customer Reviews

Movies

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Holger Czukay's debut solo album is such an astonishing technical achievement that it deserves 5 stars just for the incredible care and precision that must have been required to painstakingly piece it together.

Pre-samplers, a track like "Cool In The Pool" is a remarkable patchwork of hundreds of tape edits (sit down one day and try and count them - and work put where they came from!). While "Persian Love" is a virtouso piece of editing and exqusite into the bargain.

These two tracks are virtually worth 5 stars on their own. "Cool In The Pool" is a bouncy, funky pop song which will probably be a hit in 10 years time when everyone catches up with Holger!

"Persian Love" is simply one of the most beautiful pieces of music you are ever likely to hear. The idea of sampling a singer from another culture is commonplace nowadays - now a repetitive dance beat would simply be slapped on. Instead Holger weaves a complex and sinuous chord structure around the voice (which is pitch-changed to be either male or female) which is Bach by way of Lee Perry. Over this he overlays exquisite varispeeded guitar in his signature style - like a cross between African high life and Austrian zither, a nice encapsulation of his influences perhaps? As I say, this is sheer brilliance, the only time anything like this had ever been attempted before was in the realms of the classical avant garde (as a former pupil of Stockhausen, Czukay would certainly have been aware of "Gesang der Junglinge", "Telemusik" and "Hymnen") but you can dance to this!

As noted elsewhere, the two long tracks are less convincing. However, as Holger had just been booted out from Can for (in his words) not being a good enough bass player then maybe the flashy musicianship on these tracks represent a bit thumb-nosing at his former colleagues. Both tracks contain passages that are much closer to prog-rock and jazz-fusion than anything Can ever attempted, as if to say "you think I can't play - well listen to this! However Holger's humour and musicianship shine through and both tracks contain a lot of very interesting and amusing "samples" (not samples of course but scissors and paste tape edits).

As far as I'm concerned this easily the most consistent CD of Czukay's solo career - later albums suffer from a Can-like self-indulgence at times. What I'm really trying to say is - BUY THIS CD!

Cool In The Pool is a busy mix of funky beats, pop lyrics and samples, including an operatic voice, whilst Oh Lord Give Us More Money is a long exploratory piece in the progressive rock tradition, with jazzy sections, interesting edits of voices that flow in and out of the mix and strange sound effects.

The other long track, Hollywood Symphony, provides more of the same spoken vocals, voice samples and what sounds like a symphony orchestra on acid. One can see whence bands like Throbbing Gristle and Psychic TV got some of their inspiration!

What makes Movies really worthwhile however, is the exquisite Persian Love, an Iranian love song taped from short-wave radio and embellished with just the right elements to turn it into an atmospheric jewel of a track. The longing in the voices is carried on a lilting beat and exquisitely edited to form a perfect whole.

Brian Eno and David Byrne did the same on tracks like The Carrier and A Secret Life on their classic collaboration. So if you love My Life In The Bush Of Ghosts, you'll be enthralled by Persian Love.

Long before I ever heard the band Can, I heard this album and LOVED it. It WILL change your life. Holger is a madman, hearing music in everything---he incorporates noises from a variety of sources. The guitar and keyboard work are very pleasing...it's all beautiful. I used to sneak cuts from this album onto an FM jazz show I used to do...Some people freaked right out, some people worshipped me for playing it, but I always got phone calls. Buy this release. It's Hula music for ice cream lovers. It's summer and swimming, it's the rings of a tree.

This release, partly recorded as Holger's band Can was in decline and completed in the period just after the band's breakup, is a daring initial effort. Tracks such as the playfully chaotic 'Cool in the Pool' and the delightful shortwave-based 'Persian Love' are not only brilliant in of themselves, but also supplied a lot of impetus to others' explorations of the then-seminal art of sampling. The longer pieces, while also interesting, don't quite sustain total fascination however. It's clear from, say, 'Hollywood Symphony', that Holger was honing his skills with his new techniques and methods and engaging in work that was very exploratory...and certainly extremely advanced for its time. But to hear where this led, the next album "On the Way to the Peak of Normal" is a better showcase, as tracks such as 'Ode to Perfume' demonstrate Holger's sampling/editing mayhem in full flower. Still, this is a must-have record for anyone who thinks they 'know' sampling. Until you've absorbed this...'taint true!

Holger Czukay ... the great, almost unknown, artist. Almost as obscure as "the Toads" but thats another story. Movies is a great album for those that like to be excited and drawn into another dimension. Holger is the master of blending sounds from many sources with snappy real instriments! He was doing this long before the genre' was even accepted. Movies is the kind of album that can be played over and over. Even without the use of mind altering substances this album will lead you astray definitely ! Play it at party's and people will wonder who the hell this is ... some will freak 'cos it just goes on and on almost evolving seemlessly yet always entertaining and extremely tasteful. Final word... anyone who thinks they have a great CD collection doesn't have one unless this is in your rack .... just buy it!

Cool In The Pool is a busy mix of funky beats, pop lyrics and samples, including an operatic voice but not quite Klaus Nomi. Oh Lord Give Us More Money is a long exploratory piece in the progressive rock tradition, with jazzy sections, interesting edits of voices that flow in and out of the mix and strange sound effects.

The other long track, Hollywood Symphony, provides more of the same spoken vocals, voice samples and what sounds like a symphony orchestra on acid. One can see whence bands like Throbbing Gristle and Psychic TV got some of their inspiration!

What makes Movies really worthwhile however, is the exquisite Persian Love, an Iranian love song taped from short-wave radio and embellished with just the right elements to turn it into an atmospheric jewel of a track. The longing in the voices is carried on a lilting beat and exquisitely edited to form a perfect whole.

Brian Eno and David Byrne did the same on tracks like The Carrier and A Secret Life on their classic collaboration. So if you love My Life in the Bush of Ghosts, you'll be enthralled by Persian Love.

I pretty much agree with the review of Steve from near Dundee who gave this CD 2 stars, except that I would give it 4 stars.

Persian Love is one of the best tunes of all time. The rest of the tunes are quite enjoyable. There is a nice blend of groove music, sampling, humor, and Holger's trademark sound. Holger was a pioneer in the world of sampling.

I want to give this 5 stars but even I realize that is excessive. There is not much pop music from more than 25 years ago that I am not embarrassed to be still listening to ... this certainly holds up with time.

I have always enjoyed CAN, they exhibit fine musical sense of humor, and have been a great "break" from listening to bop & Post-Bop jazz-- they are the quintessential minimalists! Mr Czukay just let me in on the fact that he too can be a bit "funky" ,and really does have some nice "musical chops"! ( HIS "IMAGE" WAS ALWAYS MORE CEREBRAL, IT SEEMED) He tastefully uses samples, and even a singsongy nurseryrhyme melody like "Cool inna Pool" is saved by the really nice little phrases throughout the remainder of the tune.( i realize the melody is "toungue-in -cheek). Persian Love is a rather wonderful interpolation of Persian vocal samples and the typical CAN quasi-funk , led by Jaki Leibzeit, the human drum machine! Accessable for someone looking for something new, and a must have for fans of C-C-C-AN! ENJOY!!

Technically speaking, this record is excellent, with lots of complex arrangement and studio tricks. it's recorded nearly the time Can's broken up and this record surely recaptured the late post 1975 Can's standard. But, it's not the same old Can, the weird, avant-grade, kosmic Can that we love, it's a extremely polished, yet lacking some inspiration which made Krautrock so special. So, if you think that you love Can's early (pre-1975) works, DON'T BUY THIS ALBUM. I give 3 stars for the studio technique only. For Krautrock fans I would rather recommend Irmin Schmidt, an underrated creative force in Can, his solo work that combined classical influence is very endurable. Try "Musk at Dusk" and "Irmin Schmidt anthology" and you won't regret.

I agree with the other reviewer who describes this as one of THE albums of the last 30 years: it really is that good. Wonderfully rich textures, melodies and chords through all the tracks. Underpinning it is the incomparable Jaki Liebezeit on drums, and if you are into sampling this is - along with Randy California's 'Future Games' - a very early example of the genre. Having said that, you will probably hate or love it! For me it's a masterpiece, others have dismissed it as camp or nasty. Hopefully that excites your curiosity! Right from the start Can (the band for which Holger was bass player) had a mysterious, Eastern feel to their music. Live performances (I was lucky enough to experience several) were quite mesmerizing, though this album has less the hypnotic rhythms of some early Can work and is far more melodic, offering in its dream-like flow, a sequence that includes the exquisitely beautiful Persian Love, which Holger composed around a sample from Persian radio. It is frankly sensational, no wonder it's had 75,000 hits - as I write - on Youtube. All of the album is brilliant: Cool in the Pool is catchy and great fun - could still be released as a single, and Hollywood Symphony is a swirling trip through the Hollywood dream that lopes along to Jaki's drumming till it unwinds into the most meltingly gorgeous finale. I remember looking for Holger on the stage at a 1975 Can concert then realizing after a while that he was sitting off to the side in the dark, his hair like a giant dishevelled brillo pad, engrossed in dials and buttons. 'Movies' was composed over two years from 1977-79, leading to a complex, rich creation. For me it is up there with Can's Tago Mago, Soon Over Babaluma and Future Days...but an even more ambitous and successful work: the summit of Can's achievement. Not to be missed!