I read a lot about the Velvet Underground, before ever hearing their music. The reason was simple, their records weren't available, nor were they played on the radio. I stumpled on the Velvet Underground reading "The Illustrated NME Encyclopedia of Rock". I quote verbatim, "The seminal New York City band and one of the most important influences in rock, through never accorded during their existence the recognition their pioneering music warranted". In retrospect the sentence was longer than it need to be, but it sounded intriging none the less.  There was a Warhol connection, minimalislm, Lou Reed and sex, drugs and rock'n'roll.  So in 1977 I went on a search for the "Velvet Underground and Nico", some ten years after its release. The effort was in vain, the record was unavailable in all of Melbourne's record shops. Not to be deterred, I continued to read a lot more about the Velvet Underground before finally managing to find a copy of "the banana album", at "Archie & Jugheads" (soon to be Missing Link Records, the home of Birthday Party).

On finding the new treasure, I played it on the best headphones of my dad's hi-fi (not stereo ;-) ). "Sunday Morning" was so plaintive and melodic, not what I was expecting. All the songs were immediately accessible.  There was no "avant garde" barrier to scale to like the music.  No need listen to it 5 times to appreciate its musical qualities or lyrical content. Even my sister liked it. I became a Velvets collector from albums to books to related music.

So this blog is mostly about how the Velvet Underground became "connection central" for many areas of musical interest plus a small observation of one of the key qualities of Velvets music that makes it distinctly different from most rock music.

First the connections that the Velvet Underground feed into:

A unique quality of the Velvet Underground, that rarely seems to raise a comment, is how the music brings context to the lyrical content. This is different from most pop/rock music, where you have a melody and rythym with some lyrics and vocals spooned on top.

Examples of this are on everywhere...from beginning to end.

How thing have changed. I regularly hear Velvets songs, while queuing for coffee in the morning, on the radio and recently I heard a busker covering Heroin outside the supermarket. The Velvets are no-ones secret interest anymore.

References:

• The Illustrated New Musical Express Encyclopedia of Rock - Nick Logan / Bob Woffinden (Salamander 1977)
• Experimental Music - Cage and beyond - Michael Nyman (Schirmer Books 1974)
• The Evolution of Electronic Music - David Ernst  (Schirmer Books 1977)
• The Rolling Stone Illustrated History of Rock & Roll - Edited by Jim Miller (Rolling Stone Press 1976)

Blame it on Dr Who, like many others I suspect, the first piece of "electronic music" I heards was the "Dr Who Theme" by Delia Derbyshire.  I was hooked and wanted to hear more of this new strange sounding music. I went to the library and learnt that electronic music had rich beginnings in the classical avante garde. I learnt of: Varese, Stockhausen, Xenakis and a raft of other composers who mostly dabbled with electronic music. Stockhausen being the exception in that he dove in never to return. "Popcorn" (originally created to demonstrate the Moog synthesiser) become a radio hit in the hands of "Hot Butter", Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon was my first LP and along came Kraftwerk and Jean-Michel Jarre.

So there was a rich musical vein to mine here.

This listening list, highlights commerical highlights, when pure Electronic Music broke through into the mainstream and some of the still musically interesting listening peices from the underlying rich history of electronics musics sonic development:

References & Links:

• The Illustrated New Musical Express Encyclopedia of Rock - Nick Logan / Bob Woffinden (Salamander 1977)
• The Development and Practice of Electronic Music - Jon H. Appleton / Ronald C. Perera (Prentice Hall 1975)
• A Guide to Electronic Music - Paul Griffiths (Thames and Hudson 1979)
• Modern Music - The avant garde since 1945 - Paul Griffiths (J M Dent & Sons 1981)
• A Concise History of Modern Music (From Debussy to Boulez) - Paul Griffiths (Thames and Hudson 178)
• Twentieth-Century Music: An Introduction (2nd Edition) - Eric Salzman (Prentice Hall 1974)
• Music in the Twentieth Century - William W. Austin (J. M. Dent & Sons 1966)
• Experimental Music - Cage and beyond - Michael Nyman (Schirmer Books 1974)
• The Evolution of Electronic Music - David Ernst  (Schirmer Books 1977)
• The Rolling Stone Illustrated History of Rock & Roll - Edited by Jim Miller (Rolling Stone Press 1976)

For your ears only, a listeners blog on things musical and related

We know that first impressions are important, so we've populated your new site with some initial Getting Started posts that will help you get familiar with everything in no time. This is the first one!

What I like:

• Rock & Pop -

• African & World - Th.

• Glass, Riech and Reily - the minimalists

Keep tuned in for tips and guides

While at school (early 1970s) a friend, Mark Weeks, used to regulary visit to tell me about his latest music discoveries.  We would play the records he brought on my old battery powered mono "phonograph".

I remember sitting next to the family pool, listening to and getting briefed on his lastest find... Can - Tago Mago. The one with the United Artist envelope sleeve.  He talked about "the explosion", the drumming and the incredible guitar and that this was the "ultimate trip music".

This was my introduction to "Krautrock".  Later I heard Kraftwerk's Autobahn and learned about Tangerine Dream, all of which feed into my general interest in "Electronic Music".  While rifeling through the second hand section at "Batman Records" (now long gone from Melbourne) I found a copy of Tago Mago, for my record collection. This was recorded onto cassette and when it was available on CD I again got a copy.  So it is one of my most listened to recordings. In Melbourne there was a shop called "Pipe Music", owned by a very pushy German guy, who was always insisting on putting ear cans on your head to listen to the latest and greatest things from Germany.

"Krautrock" was a term applied by the English music press. As a label it does not pass the "p.c. test" and the bands and artists universally refuted the term.  To me it simply meant rock (ish) music from Germany and the term "kosmische musik" (cosmic music) was also applied to the genre. As I did more research and listening (rock or rock audience targeted music from Germany in late '60s to mid '70s) I found the music fell into three camps: primitive feedback/noise heavy, rock based (krautrock) and colour/timbre focused peices (kosmische).

This listening guide (I realy tried to keep it down to 10, but the scope of content is large), provides samples of each type and its chronological evolution.

The list is complete... but the coverage is far from comprehensive. There is a huge volume of music out there. Much of it is by various ex-Krafwerkers or ex-Tangerine Dreamers with Conny Plank often listed on production credits. Klaus Schulze alone has over 50 releases. The Krautrock and Kosmiche crews all followed their muse and churned out music prolifically irrespective of any particular current musical trend. My list includes material beyond 1975, as even while the English press lost interest and turned their focus to UK punk, the artist continued to produce new material at a huge rate and also continued to evolve as artists. The original Krautrocker's outlasted the "New Deutsche Welle" bands.

Reference & Links:

• The Illustrated New Musical Express Encyclopedia of Rock / Nick Logan & Bob Woffinden (Amom Düül II, Can, Kraftwerk, Tangerine Dream/Edgar Froese)
• Recommended Records Catalog - reissued Faust albums and brought to wider audience
• New Musical Express - championed Dusseldorf/ATA TAK/Neue Deutsche Welle bands

No Wave - I found it via "No New York" the Brian Eno produced compilation near the time of its release. I know that was true as I read a review of the record in "Rollingstone" magazine, after I had already got he record.  It had an instant appeal to me and even now when I listen to the Contortion tracks is sounds like the angriest record every made. The Contortions make the Sex Pistols sound polite. Lydia Lunch was ironic teen poet extraordinaire, Mars were unsettling and DNA was kids doing rock'n'roll for adults.

The Reaction

Rollingstone, always on the look out for "important" said, "But even the Contortions, good as they are, arent quite convincing enough to prove that No Wave will ever be more than a fringe movement".

Funny how hindsight works as now No Wave is seen as highly influential, so I guess they got that wrong.

Edgar Varese, Karlheinz Stockhausen, La Monte Young, Philip Glass and Steve Riech have all had impact on rock musicians.