Author Archives: Jammo

Workroom Playlist / KW40-2023

Read Time: 2 mins

Here’s a little rundown of what’s playing on the workroom stereo this week (Kalenderwoche 40):

Billy Byrd – Lost in The Crowd

A seminal piece of horn-heavy country soul, with an irrepressible rhythm section. Originally released on Scream and later revived on Soul 7. It doesn’t get much better!

Amon Düül II – She Came Through the Chimney

An absolute beauty from one of the best groups ever. Angelic reverb-soaked guitars, flutes, violins, bagpipes? And discordant synths, twist and turn their way around complex percussion. Burying themselves deep into your pineal gland.

Boards of Canada – In A Beautiful Place Out In The Country

Every single time I hear this track, I’m transported to a windy corner of the Kernowek peninsula. Somewhere between Flushing and Penryn. And, as the autumn blues set in, and metropolitan sickness looms in the air, that’s exactly the kind of escapism I need.

Roman Flügel – The Improviser

Taken from Herr Flügel’s 2011 meisterwerk Fatty Folders, this one has never left my box. Proper groovy minimal Techno. Ripping random-seeming bass accents, cute rhythmic stabs, and handclaps-a-plenty! Always building! Always going somewhere! 

 I’m suffering from a real post-pandemic lack of interest in dance music, but some things never fail to rekindle my love. Body music, pure and simple.

The Fall – Dedication not Medication

“And Pierce Brosnan how dare you prescribe, Sad grief and bed wet pills”– Mark E Smith still on top form, 30 albums deep into the Fall. The ominous synth bass tone, combined with loose disco drums, and killing joke-esque metallic guitar chops, make it a post-punk gold standard. An ideal soundtrack for a dirty city.

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Workroom Playlist / KW39-2023

Read Time: 2 mins

Here’s a little rundown of what’s playing on the workroom stereo this week (Kalenderwoche 39)

António Variações – O Corpo É Que Paga

A classic from Portugal’s New Wave meteoroid, António Variações. Growling synth bass and cute guitar flourishes, combine with António Variações’ fado-indebted vibrato, making for weird-pop perfection. 

Grace Jones – Warm Leatherette

Grace Jones’ cover version of The Normal’s JG Ballard-inspired synth-pop classic, Warm Leatherette, turns the original on its head. Where the erotic sound of the original version is derived from its sleazy, bleak electronics, Grace Jones –along with the Compass Point Allstars– channels a slower throbbing bass-heavy sound, with Grace Jones’ signature cat-like snarl “Hear the crushing steel, Feel the steering wheel”. The million-dollar sound of a limousine tumbling into a Caribbean ravine.

Low End Activist – Gossip is the Devil’s Radio

Metronomic dancehall from Cowley’s finest, Low End Activist. Jittering rythmik patterns scatter and spray under a cloud of smoked-out PlayStation ambiance.

Fatal Microbes – Violence Grows

It’s not often you get an opening line as good as “While you’re getting kicked to death, in a London pedestrian subway” is it? It’s visceral. A punch to the face! And when combined with a shimmering dreamy guitar and lurking bassline, it is utterly irresistible.

James Holden – Infinite Fadeout

On my walk through Neukölln this morning, I passed by what was previously Griessmühle –now some neolib-business-bro hellhole– and, as a predictable wave of saudade crashed over me, Infinite fadeout began to play in my headphones. The ever-growing synth pad. The saccharine lead, babbling and loose, untethered to the rest of the track. Reversing wind sounds and foghorn-like sax put me in the mind of Goldie’s ‘Timeless’, and I was transported back to The Bullingdon Arms, Port Meadow and Boars Hill Parties in Oxford, The Volks in Brighton, and all the various fields I’d happily misspent my youth in. I rode this wave of nostalgia all the way home and felt hope.

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Review: Aşk, Mark ve Ölüm

Read Time: 3 mins

Film: Aşk, Mark ve Ölüm (Love, D-Mark and Death) (2021)
Directors: Cem Kaya
Starring: N/A (Documentary, featuring various interviewees and archival footage)
Soundtrack: Various Artists
Genre: Documentary, Music

Aşk, Mark ve Ölüm/Liebe, D-Mark und Tod (Love, Deutsch Mark and Death) follows the musical story of the Turkish migrant workers in Germany. The so-called ‘Gastarbeiters’ or ‘Guest workers’ –A dehumanising term if ever there was one– first arrived at the behest of the Bundesrepublik Deutschland in the early 1960s, to help rebuild post-war Germany and its industry.

Cem Kaya’s video essay follows the musical story of the German/Turkish diaspora from the first generation of migrant workers to their children and grandchildren. It tells the tale of a culture clash, promises unfulfilled, and the confusion of a people trapped between two worlds.

The film opens with an out-of-this-world psychedelic Saz solo, from the inimitable Ismet Topçu; a man blessed with incredible talent and oodles of charisma. Explaining the inspiration for his Saz playing style, he says:

“Sometimes, I dream that NASA calls me up, and says, Topçu, we want to hear you play the Saz on the moon” ruminating “Can you imagine if I played on the moon? If I looked down at the earth while playing, and if I recorded it? What would I play at that moment? Which sounds, and which melodies, could I play there?”.

Cem Kaya delivers an inspiring social history, following the music from its early beginnings with labels like Türküola, Türkofon and Minareci, through to 80s and 90s Rap acts such as Cartel and Islamic Force, up to the more recent ‘mainstreaming’ of Turkish and Turkish/German pop music, with artists like Elif and Muhabbet. Taking care to contextualise the music with its contemporary history, the film lays out the racism and the socio-economic pressure that the Turkish diaspora in Germany has experienced over the last 60+ years.

Protest songs such as ‘Alamanya Destanı’ by Metin Türköz, “Instead of Feathers, they gave me a straw mattress, bathroom and toilet are in the factory they said” are interspersed with images of young Turkish migrants being loaded, like cattle, onto trains and shipped to Germany for work. Or stripped half naked, undergoing rudimentary medical tests, in order to gauge their ‘usefulness’ for the factory.

“Alamanya Destanı” by Metin Türköz

Far from a tale of suffering, this is a heroic story of rebellion and DIY attitude. A story of a people and a musical culture that would not be subdued, no matter how much it was sidelined. Music as a weapon, a warning and a balm to heal homesickness. There’s so much amazing music from the likes of Cem Karaca, Cavidan Ünal and Yüksel Özkasap that I can’t write about them all. One of my favourite scenes features a VHS recording of Derdiyoklar playing at a wedding. The guests stuffing wads of Deutsch marks into their outfits as they bash out Turkish folk songs in a heavy metal style.

Derdiyoklar

I recommend this film to anyone who –like me– is interested in and inspired by Turkish music. But, especially at a time when right-wing Nationalism is on the rise in Germany once again, with the anti-immigration party AFD experiencing record highs in polls, it’s an important lesson in racism in Germany.

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