Can

Can – Rite Time (1989) [2006 Remaster]
PS3 Rip | ISO | SACD DSD64 2.0 > 1-bit/2.8224 MHz | Scans included | 1,68 GB
SACD-ISO PS3 Rip to FLAC 2.0 | 24 bit / 88,2 kHz | 41:37 min | Scans included | 948 MB

An unexpected reunion from Can (made even more unexpected by the presence of original singer Malcolm Mooney, who left the band in 1969), 1989’s Rite Time is in large part a return to form for the group, especially when one considers how weak Can’s last few ’70s albums were. Wisely, the quintet doesn’t try to replicate the sound they created over two decades before on albums like Monster Movie. Instead, Mooney and company make Rite Time a document of where they’re at musically at the time. In short, it’s funkier (“Give the Drummer Some”), funnier (“Hoolah Hoolah,” which takes that old schoolyard rhyme about how they don’t wear pants on the other side of France as the jumping-off point for its melody and lyrics), and more abstractly ambient (the elliptical closer “In the Distance Lies the Future”) than before. Rite Time doesn’t have the rubbery, polyrhythmic intensity of classic Can albums like Ege Bamyasi or Future Days, but it’s a solidly listenable album that, unlike the majority of reunion albums, doesn’t soil the memory of the band.

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Can – CAN (1979) [2006 Remaster]
PS3 Rip | ISO | SACD DSD64 2.0 > 1-bit/2.8224 MHz | Scans included | 1,58 GB
SACD-ISO PS3 Rip to FLAC 2.0 | 24 bit / 88,2 kHz |39:16 min | Scans included | 912 MB

The final studio effort from the first decade run of Can signifies not only a changing of the guard for the progressive Krautrock icons, but a nod to the shifting tastes of the times. Losing the great bassist Holger Czukay as a bandmember who moved into the production/editing room had a telling effect, but his replacement Rosko Gee was more than adequate. Percussionist Rebop Kwaku Baah and Gee (both coming off stints with Traffic) buoyed the band and modified Can’s sound as they collectively continued exploring amplified and processed experimentation. Electric guitarist Michael Karoli continued expanding his horizons and sound palette, Irmin Schmidt dug deeper into keyboard sounds running parallel to fellow countrymen from the bands Passport, Cluster, and Kraftwerk, while Jaki Liebezeit, simply put, remained one of the more consistent and steady rock drummers of the era. But disco beats, on the way out in 1979, remained a part of Can’s appeal, and a precursor for the acid jazz dance music to come. At their best, “All Gates Open” whips space blues harmonica, buried vocals, and Robert Fripp-inspired guitar into a clean and simple jam. The exotic influence of African music infused into the instrumental “Sunday Jam” suggests strains of the famous jazz standard “Caravan.” The purely electric “Sodom” resonates along the lines of Cluster welded to Jimi Hendrix-style inferences, while also plodding. A campy take of the can can “Ethnological Forger Series #99” parallels the Love Sculpture/Dave Edmunds adaptation of “Sabre Dance.” Of the more dance-oriented tracks, “A Spectacle” is relevant from a contemporary standpoint with Karoli’s spiky, choppy wah-wah sound, while “Safe” is completely spaced out. A scintillating attempt at R&B fusion, “Can Be” veers into epic big hair arena corpo-rock territory, held together by Karoli’s excellent playing. While Can emerged in ensuing years with different lineups and further sub-developments, this last vestige of the initial band holds firm in resolve, and is at the least an intriguing aside to their more potent earlier albums.

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Can – Saw Delight (1977) [2006 Remaster]
PS3 Rip | ISO | SACD DSD64 2.0 > 1-bit/2.8224 MHz | Scans included | 1,53 GB
SACD-ISO PS3 Rip to FLAC 2.0 | 24 bit / 88,2 kHz | 37:48 min | Scans included | 896 MB

Bearing bar none the worst title pun of any Can album — and with titles like Cannibalism, that’s saying something — 1977’s Saw Delight was the German progressive group’s farewell. Clearly, the core quartet had found themselves in a rut by the recording of this album, bringing in percussionist Reebop Kwaku Baah and bassist Rosko Gee from a late-era lineup of Traffic to add a sort of Afro-Cuban jazz feel to their sound. What’s frustrating is that this idea could have worked brilliantly, but the execution is all wrong. Instead of the polyrhythmic fireworks expected from a drum duel between Baah and the African-influenced Jaki Liebezeit, Can’s senior drummer basically rolls over, keeping time with simple beats while the percussionist takes on the hard work. Similarly, Rosko Gee’s handling of the bass duties (which he performs superbly throughout, adding an almost Mingus-like rhythmic intensity to even the loosest songs) frees Holger Czukay to add electronics and sound effects to the proceedings, an opportunity he doesn’t make much of. On the up side, the opening “Don’t Say No” recalls the controlled fury of earlier tunes like “Moonshake,” and side two, consisting of Gee’s lengthy, jazz-based composition “Animal Waves” and the lovely instrumental “Fly by Night,” is largely excellent, but the two lengthy tracks that close side one are melodically and rhythmically pale in comparison, and there’s a tired, somewhat dispirited vibe to the whole album that makes it an unsatisfying send-off to Can’s career.

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Can – Flow Motion (1976) [2006 Remaster]
PS3 Rip | ISO | SACD DSD64 2.0 > 1-bit/2.8224 MHz | Scans included | 1,52 GB
SACD-ISO PS3 Rip to FLAC 2.0 | 24 bit / 88,2 kHz | 37:47 min | Scans included | 860 MB

The second of Can’s three Virgin albums, 1976’s Flow Motion, is a divisive record in the group’s canon. It was their most commercially successful album (the opening track, “I Want More,” was released as a single in the U.K. and actually charted, thanks to its smoothly percolating near-disco groove, which makes it resemble a late-period Roxy Music hit), but many fans dismiss it as the group’s feint toward commercial success. That fluke hit aside, the charge doesn’t really hold water. There’s a newfound smoothness to the group’s interplay, which Holger Czukay attributes to an interest in reggae music, yet the Caribbean influence is quite subtle; only on “Cascade Waltz” and, particularly, “Laugh Till You Cry Live Till You Die” is there a noticeable reggae lilt. The two highlight tracks are “Smoke,” a wild, Moroccan-styled entry in their ever-growing Ethnological Forgery Series, and the limber title track, a ten-and-a-half minute instrumental groove that recalls the best moments of earlier albums like Soon Over Babaluma. By no means one of Can’s very best albums, Flow Motion deserves better than its poor reputation in some circles.

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Can – Unlimited Edition (1976) [2005 Remaster]
PS3 Rip | ISO | SACD DSD64 2.0 > 1-bit/2.8224 MHz | Scans included |3,1 GB
SACD-ISO PS3 Rip to FLAC 2.0 | 24 bit / 88,2 kHz | 77:32 min | Scans included | 1,61 GB

Unlimited Edition is a compilation album by the band Can. Released in 1976 as a double album, it was an expanded version of the 1974 LP Limited Edition on United Artists Records which, as the name suggests, was a limited release of 15,000 copies (tracks 14–19 were added). The album collects unreleased music from throughout the band’s history from 1968 until 1976, and both the band’s major singers (Damo Suzuki and Malcolm Mooney) are featured. The cover photos were taken among the Elgin Marbles in the Duveen Gallery of the British Museum.

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Can – Landed (1975) [2005 Remaster]
PS3 Rip | ISO | SACD DSD64 2.0 > 1-bit/2.8224 MHz | Scans included | 1,61 GB
SACD-ISO PS3 Rip to FLAC 2.0 | 24 bit / 88,2 kHz | 40:18 min | Scans included | 875 MB

Another erratic waxing features some great guitar and Babaluma-style grooves, but is unfocused on the whole.

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Can – Soon Over Babaluma (1974) [2005 Remaster]
PS3 Rip | ISO | SACD DSD64 2.0 > 1-bit/2.8224 MHz | Scans included | 1,55 GB
SACD-ISO PS3 Rip to FLAC 2.0 | 24 bit / 88,2 kHz | 38:50 min | Scans included | 854 MB

With Suzuki departed, vocal responsibilities were now split between Karoli and Schmidt. Wisely, neither try to clone Mooney or Suzuki, instead aiming for their own low-key way around things. The guitarist half speaks/half whispers his lines on the opening groover, “Dizzy Dizzy,” while on “Come Sta, La Luna” Schmidt uses a higher pitch that is mostly buried in the background. Czukay sounds like he’s throwing in some odd movie samples on that particular track, though perhaps it’s just heavy flanging on Schmidt’s vocals. Karoli’s guitar achieves near-flamenco levels on the song, an attractive development that matches up nicely with the slightly lighter and jazzier rhythms the band comes up with on tracks like “Splash.” Also, his violin work — uncredited on earlier releases — is a bit more prominent here. Musically, if things are a touch less intense on Babaluma, the sense of a band perfectly living in each other’s musical pocket and able to react on a dime hasn’t changed at all. “Chain Reaction,” the longest track on the album, shows that the combination of lengthy jam and slight relaxation actually can go together rather well. After an initial four minutes of quicker pulsing and rhythm (which sounds partly machine provided), things downshift into a slower vocal section before firing up again; Karoli’s blistering guitar work at this point is striking to behold. “Chain Reaction” bleeds into Babaluma’s final song, “Quantum Physics,” a more ominous piece with Czukay’s bass closer to the fore, shaded by Schmidt’s work and sometimes accompanied by Liebezeit. It makes for a nicely mysterious conclusion to the album.

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Can – Future Days (1973) [2005 Remaster]
PS3 Rip | ISO | SACD DSD64 2.0 > 1-bit/2.8224 MHz | Scans included | 1,64 GB
SACD-ISO PS3 Rip to FLAC 2.0 | 24 bit / 88,2 kHz | 40:57 min | Scans included | 917 MB

On Future Days, Can fully explored the ambient direction they had introduced into their sound on the previous year’s Ege Bamyasi, and in the process created a landmark in European electronic music. Where Ege Bamyasi had played fast and loose with elements of rock song structure, Future Days dispensed with these elements altogether, creating hazy, expansive soundscapes dominated by percolating rhythms and evocative layers of keys. Vocalist Damo Suzuki turns in his final and most inspired performance with the band. His singing, which takes the form here of a rhythmic, nonsensical murmur, is all minimal texture and shading. Apart from the delightfully concise single “Moonshake,” the album is comprised of just three long atmospheric pieces of music. The title track eases us into the sonic wash, while “Spray” is built around Suzuki’s eerie vocals, which weave in and out of the shimmering instrumental tracks. The closing “Bel Air” is a gloriously expansive piece of music that progresses almost imperceptibly, ending abruptly after exactly 20 minutes. Aptly titled, Future Days is fiercely progressive, calming, complex, intense, and beautiful all at once. It is one of Can’s most fully realized and lasting achievements.

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Can – Ege Bamyasi (1972) [2004 Remaster]
PS3 Rip | ISO | SACD DSD64 2.0 > 1-bit/2.8224 MHz | Scans included | 1,61 GB
SACD-ISO PS3 Rip to FLAC 2.0 | 24 bit / 88,2 kHz | 40:06 min | Scans included | 868 MB

The follow-up to Tago Mago is only lesser in terms of being shorter; otherwise the Can collective delivers its expected musical recombination act with the usual power and ability. Liebezeit, at once minimalist and utterly funky, provides another base of key beat action for everyone to go off on — from the buried, lengthy solos by Karoli on “Pinch” to the rhythm box/keyboard action on “Spoon.” The latter song, which closes the album, is particularly fine, its sound hinting at an influence on everything from early Ultravox songs like “Hiroshima Mon Amour” to the hollower rhythms on many of Gary Numan’s first efforts. Liebezeit and Czukay’s groove on “One More Night,” calling to mind a particularly cool nightclub at the end of the evening, shows that Stereolab didn’t just take the brain-melting crunch side of Can as inspiration. The longest track, “Soup,” lets the band take off on another one of its trademark lengthy rhythm explorations, though not without some tweaks to the expected sound. About four minutes in, nearly everything drops away, with Schmidt and Liebezeit doing the most prominent work; after that, it shifts into some wonderfully grating and crumbling keyboards combined with Suzuki’s strange pronouncements, before ending with a series of random interjections from all the members. Playfulness abounds as much as skill: Slide whistles trade off with Suzuki on “Pinch”; squiggly keyboards end “Vitamin C”; and rollicking guitar highlights “I’m So Green.” The underrated and equally intriguing sense of drift that the band brings to its recordings continues as always. “Sing Swan Song” is particularly fine, a gentle float with Schmidt’s keyboards and Czukay’s bass taking the fore to support Suzuki’s sing-song vocal.

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Can – Tago Mago (1971) [2004 Remaster]
PS3 Rip | ISO | SACD DSD64 2.0 > 1-bit/2.8224 MHz | Scans included |2,94 GB
SACD-ISO PS3 Rip to FLAC 2.0 | 24 bit / 88,2 kHz | 73:18 min | Scans included | 1,5 GB

With the band in full artistic flower and Damo Suzuki’s sometimes moody, sometimes frenetic speak/sing/shrieking in full effect, Can released not merely one of the best Krautrock albums of all time, but one of the best albums ever, period. Tago Mago is that rarity of the early ’70s, a double album without a wasted note, ranging from sweetly gentle float to full-on monster grooves. “Paperhouse” starts things brilliantly, beginning with a low-key chime and beat, before amping up into a rumbling roll in the midsection, then calming down again before one last blast. Both “Mushroom” and “Oh Yeah,” the latter with Schmidt filling out the quicker pace with nicely spooky keyboards, continue the fine vibe. After that, though, come the huge highlights — three long examples of Can at its absolute best. “Halleluwah” — featuring the Liebezeit/Czukay rhythm section pounding out a monster trance/funk beat; Karoli’s and Schmidt’s always impressive fills and leads; and Suzuki’s slow-building ranting above everything — is 19 minutes of pure genius. The near-rhythmless flow of “Aumgn” is equally mind-blowing, with swaths of sound from all the members floating from speaker to speaker in an ever-evolving wash, leading up to a final jam. “Peking O” continues that same sort of feeling, but with a touch more focus, throwing in everything from Chinese-inspired melodies and jazzy piano breaks to cheap organ rhythm boxes and near babbling from Suzuki along the way. “Bring Me Coffee or Tea” wraps things up as a fine, fun little coda to a landmark record.

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Can – Soundtracks (1970) [2004 Remaster]
PS3 Rip | ISO | SACD DSD64 2.0 > 1-bit/2.8224 MHz | Scans included | 1,41 GB
SACD-ISO PS3 Rip to FLAC 2.0 | 24 bit / 88,2 kHz | 35:09 min | Scans included | 759 MB

Malcolm Mooney passes the baton to Damo Suzuki for Soundtracks, a collection of film music featuring contributions from both vocalists. The dichotomy between the two singers is readily apparent: Suzuki’s odd, strangulated vocals fit far more comfortably into the group’s increasingly intricate and subtle sound, allowing for greater variation than Mooney’s stream-of-consciousness discourse.

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Can – Monster Movie (1969) [2004 Remaster]
PS3 Rip | ISO | SACD DSD64 2.0 > 1-bit/2.8224 MHz | Scans included | 1,53 GB
SACD-ISO PS3 Rip to FLAC 2.0 | 24 bit / 88,2 kHz | 38:00 min | Scans included | 789 MB

Though Monster Movie was the first full-length album in what would become a sprawling and often genre-defining discography, Can were on a level well ahead of the curve even in their most formative days. Recorded and released in 1969, Monster Movie bears many of the trademarks that Can would explore as they went on, as well as elements that would set the scene for the burgeoning Krautrock movement. This would be the only album Can’s first singer Malcolm Mooney would sing the entirety of, as he was replaced by Damo Suzuki by the time of 1970’s Soundtracks, leaving the band after going through a highly unstable time. Mooney was known for his erratic ways, and some of that mania undoubtedly comes through here, with his caterwauling howls on the unexpectedly garage-influenced “Outside My Door” as well as the sung-spoken pseudo-poetry rants of album opener “Father Cannot Yell.” Riding a particularly Velvet Underground vibe, “Father Cannot Yell” sounds like post-punk before punk even existed. Irmin Schmidt’s brittle keyboard squalls and dissonant rhythms and Mooney’s buried recitations predated the Fall, Swell Maps, the noise scene, and generations of difficult sound by years and in some cases decades. Holger Czukay’s pensive basslines are also an already distinctive calling card of the band on this debut, providing a steadfast glue for the barrages of noisy tones, edits, and pulses the record offers from all angles. The 20-minute album closer “Yoo Doo Right” is an enormous highlight, cementing the locked-in hypnotic exploration Can would extrapolate on for the rest of their time and come to be known for. Mooney’s raspy vocals range from whispery incantations to throaty rock & roll shouts, building with the band into an almost mantra-level meditation as the song repeats its patterns and multi-layered grooves into what feels like infinity. Legend has it that the final side-long version of the song was edited down from a six-hour recording session focusing on that tune alone. Given the level of commitment to experimentation Can would go on to show, it’s not hard to believe they’d play one song for six hours to find its core, nor is it unfathomable that Monster Movie was the more accessible album they recorded after their first attempts were deemed too out there to be commercially released. Even in their earliest phases, Can were making their name by blowing away all expectations and notions that rock & roll had limits of any kind.

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