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In March 1973 the band recorded its first LP, with Conny Plank as co-producer and sound-engineer, for the legendary Brain-Metronome Label. Acclaimed by progressive and krautrock fans and critics alike, it showed a different, more innvative style of playing contemporary German rock music and was honoured with a nomination for the German Schallplattenpreis. They produced an incomparable, unmistakeable sound with echoes of Organisation and early Kraftwerk: spacey but melodic, elevated yet rocking, innovative: progressive in the best sense, consequent in the realisation of intent, forging new musical territory without denying its roots. The musicians did not set great store by making the kind of music that would „match“ the common stereotypes. Instead, they mocked the tendency of music critics and listeners to ascribe each song to a certain genre, by allowing the owners of the album to decide for themselves what kind of music they were listening to. The movable “snippets” on the album’s fold-back inside would produce bizarre names, such as Rozz-Pack, Pack-Jack, but also Pop-Rock and Jazz-Pop...
On the album‘s inner cover, however, the musicians eventually commented on the recordings:
Rambo Zambo A rocky improvisation, created by sound cascades of the flute connected with an echo machine.
Baldrian The most atmospheric piece on the record has Jürgen playing on a self-made instrument with 56 strings, built from a zither and parts of a guitar.
Försterlied Our contribution to jazz and lyrics. With a text by Robert Gernhardt. Nicely kaput.
Gageg Starting point was a melody consisting of the notes g-a-g-e-g. This developed into a three part piece containing the movements: Andante, Allegro, Compressed Air. The most versatile piece on the record.
A glance at the bands evolution and musicial roots of the individual musicians helps explain Kollektiv’s musical self-confidence.
Waldo Karpenkiel remembers: “Influenced by Beat music coming from England we started a school band, The Generals, in 1964: My twin brother Jogi Karpenkiel was on bass, Jürgen Havix played guitar and I was the drummer. We gradually got bored with Beat music and started listening to early Frank Zappa, Blodwyn Pig and King Crimson records. Jazz musicians like Jimmy Smith, Wes Montgomery and Cannonball Adderly also influenced us. Then Jogi started to experiment with the Phantoms, another Krefeld band with Ralf Hütter on organ, Klaus Dapper from Duisburg on the flute and saxophone. In 1968 Jogi returned to the Generals. We decided we should work together with a windplayer and contacted Klaus Dapper. In the meantime, Ralf Hütter had founded Organisation, the forerunner to Kraftwerk.
In 1970 the Generals and Klaus D. became Kollektiv. Our maxim: Everything is allowed! Music as experiment! Effect machines, sometimes homemade, were used: a zither, with an electrical amplifier played with drum sticks, the bass played with a bow. Metal sheets and rotating metal discs were used, in addition to any type of exotic instrument or outlandish machine. The musical pieces are improvisations of minimal themes, often in excess of 10, 15 or more minutes. In 1971 we were ready to go on tour. The first concert was 400 km away in Wilhelmshaven (North Germany). On the day before the tour we hurriedly bought an old Volkswagen bus for DM 400. It has Campari-Bitter written on it and served us well from many years. We played in almost all the relevant music clubs, at university fests and small and large festivals. We often played with Sweet Smoke, who we had befriended.
After intensive practising and all the performances we felt ready to record an LP. My brother Jogi travelled to Hamburg to meet Conny Plank and make arrangements. In March 1973 we did the recordings that were released on the Brain LP. After that we sent SWF some demo cassettes and they invited us to a recording session (Kollektiv, SWF- Sessions, Vol. 5, Long Hair, LHC 05).
The first split in the band came in 1975. My brother Jogi left the band and joined Guru Guru, were he played bass until 1979. Also Klaus Dapper left the band. In 1976 Waldo and Jürgen played a number of concerts with organ and piano player Klaus Hackspiel (a.o. at the legendary club Onkel Pö in Hamburg and at University Krefeld), which best moments will be released on a forthcoming CD on Long Hair.
Once this line-up split up as well, Waldo was joined by Axel Zinowski (guitar), Georg Funke (bass) and Christoph (electric piano). The recordings of the bonus tracks included in the CD were done in this formation in the band‘s rehearsal room. Meanwhile Volker Hahn (violin), of the Mainz based band Unterrock, who had formerly replaced Klaus Dapper while Dapper was sitting for his exams, had chipped in. Unfortunately the short ”Intro“ is the only piece surviving of that time. Further information on Kollektiv are available in the Kollektiv-CD booklet already mentioned, containing SWF- recordings (LHC 05), as well as on the CD Kollektiv Live 1973, LHC 40, also published on Long
Hair.
Manfred Steinheuer, November 2007
Translation: Trevor Wilson, Dr. Martina Häusler
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