KLUSTER QBICO Vinyl LPs Grand Finale Cluster Brian Eno

$

225

For auction: MINT/MINT extremely limited edition (1/26) release from German Avant Garde artists KLUSTER on Italian records QBICO. The box was opened to check the contents.  LPs remain unplayed.  Members of KLUSTER have included:  A. Rodedelius, Boris Schak,  D. Moebius and Conrad Schnitzler.  D. Moebius and H. Rodedelius went on later to form Cluster and Harmonia, collaborate with Brian Eno as such, and have tremendous solo careers as well.  The Box Set you are bidding on is 1 of 26 and Silver (not Gold as pictured).  Here is a description of Kluster by founding member Conrad Schnitzler:      

I founded the music group Kluster after my exit 1969 from the group GERÄUSCHE
(Zodiak with A.Roedelius and Boris Schak).
Between 1969 to 1972 I worked with different friends, with TD among others. With them I tried to perform the music of my imagination.
Finally Klaus Freudigmann and Wolfgang Seidel remained at the work continuously over the years.
In addition there were several actions with A. Roedelius and D. Möbius where the LPs KLUSTER Klopfzeichen, Osterei and Eruption were made.
Instruments, amplifier and effects I gave D. Moebius because he had had no own equipment.
I didn't want the music to remind of the normal. My criteria were not folk music, not rock music, not pop songs and not dance music.
The idea for "Cluster" later "Kluster" (I wanted to avoid americanisms) is not only a name for a group but a form of music.
I had amplifier, instruments, contact mics and effects, that could used by the others, too.
Klaus had tape machines and microphones. In addition he constructed instruments and electronic sound generators, which made the most undescribable sounds.
Wolfgang had everything connected with drum and bass and in addition amplifier and effects.
Klaus had rooms where we could work out our music performances.
The tapes "Electric Meditation" with TD were made in one of those spaces.
Most of the performances happened with friends who took part in the actions; therefore Conrad, Klaus, Wolfgang and friends.
For special activities we used the name ERUPTION.

About the Box Set:

This is release information. Qbico released the BIG one!!!!!!

6LP (black vinyls/black labels/black inner sleeves; Con's suggestion) box, spray painted (stencils by Troglosound) in gold or silver (2 versions) and with clear plastic insert (rare photos). UNRELEASED MUSIC, available here for the 1st time !

+
26 hand-made boxes by qbico, numbered from A to Z with:
the 6 LPs and

-clear plastic insert with rare photos.

How the Box Set came to be:

Here's a little story for you from QBICO records in Italy:

when i mailed the news about the closure of qbico in 2010, some friends and musicians wrote me back... one was Conrad Schnitzler wondering if i wanna close with DA BOMB ! I said "yes, why not !?" (or "yes, you can bet !" now i can't remember :-). so Con sent me 6 CD-R of UNRELEASED Kluster music, rec. in 1969-72 along with Klaus Freudigmann and Wolfgang Seidel ! he said to choose yr favourite 40 (+/-) from the 1 hour lenght of each CD-R, so to adjust to vinyl format... well, that's was one of the most joyful experience of my life ! this 6LP box collect that music which it's simply some of the most outstanding and revolutionary music that i ever heard (instrumental stuff only, no voices = the REAL DEAL) !!! one of the most legendary release on qbico ?! YES (in a loud voice/tone) !

more about Kluster:

Conrad Schnitzler

Wolfgang Seidel about Kluster:
Summer of Love? Kluster was formed in West-Berlin – much closer to Siberia than to San Francisco, Haight Ashbury and Golden Gate Park. What came to Berlin with a two years delay were only the outer fringes of the “Summer of Love”. Its blossom would have died soon in the Cold War breeze. And 1970 a lot of the optimism of the mid 60ies had already ceased. It became obvious that creating a better world needs more than flowers in your hair. But the political movements of the late sixties were a child of the same optimism that fuelled the rapid developments changing not only the material side of life but also arts, music and the way people interacted. The new left and the hippie movement where all these ideas concentrated wasn’t the result of poverty but build on the belief that with modern technology there is enough for everybody. It’s only a question of a fair distribution.

That optimism had a soundtrack that was based on the same technology. From the electric guitar, reverb and echo units to the first synthesizers, everything was welcome that sounded as if it came from the future. Future meant space travel – so it’s quite natural that the first effects wildly used where those who send you to a space you’ve never been before: artificial reverb and echo. A lot of people had their first encounter with this new music at the movies – watching scifi-film like Forbidden Planet with the electronic tonalities of Louis and Bebe Barron (1956 – and their work wasn’t called music to avoid paying royalties and having to quarrel with the conservative musicians trade unions). For a few years rock music was the most popular of new sounds and for a lot of people the door opener. It was one of the rare moments when you could be at the same time avant-garde and mainstream. But this did not last long. Pop music quickly became old music with new instruments when it turned into highly standardized entertainment. And the use of the electric guitar developed rules like any other traditional instrument.

Amongst that people that met to form Kluster were Klaus Freudigmann and Wolfgang Seidel, who both grew disenchanted with pop music and Conrad Schnitzler who came from a complete different direction as sculptor. While the others discovered the new territories of sound via psychedelic music Schnitzler was a fan of Stockhausen, Cage etc. but was distracted by the highbrowed elite attitude with which this music surrounded itself in Germany. What met was the self empowerment of early rock music with the search for new sounds and structures of 20th century avant-garde music.

That Kluster made simple music on DIY instruments, droning and banging on one note for half an hour, did not mean we were into any kind of primitivism. We hated the bongo playing hippie and his backward dreams of tribal ‘healthy’ societies (forgetting that hunger, war and oppression were not invented this year). To us the longing for sweet melodies was a regressive refuge from a world that isn’t sweet. We did not want to go back. If the future was inevitable, we wanted to shape it – at least sonically. That we preferred slow tempos sometimes gets mistaken as ‘dark’. We just gave every sound enough time to be listened to. And we wanted to draw a line between us and the ‘look I am the fastest‘ guitar heroes that began to rule the stages. What we did was getting rid of the schemes of pop and popular classic and find out, what else we can do with our tools, polishing and lubricating them for a future music.