Black Monk Time
| Black Monk Time | |
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| Studio album by The Monks | |
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Publication |
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admission |
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| Label (s) | Polydor |
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Format (s) |
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Garage rock , protopunk , beat |
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Title (number) |
12 |
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running time |
30:21 |
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Studio (s) |
Polydor Studios, Cologne |
Black Monk Time is the debut album by the German-American rock band The Monks , which was released in the spring of 1966 on the German label Polydor . The innovative rock music inspired numerous subsequent bands and musicians. Black Monk Time is one of the most influential rock albums in music history.
Release history
The album was recorded in March at the Polydor Studios in Cologne and was released in March 1966. It was officially presented at the Bremen Beat Club in July 1966 by Uschi Nerke .
The album was first re-released on LP in 1979 and on repertoire as CD in 1994 . It was released again in 2009 based on the documentary Monks - The Transatlantic Feedback (Grimme Prize 2008). At the same time as the album and the film DVD, the former single complication / oh, how to do now was re-released.
Origin of the Monks
In 1961 the five future members of the Monks came to the Hessian garrison town of Gelnhausen as US soldiers . They soon began making music together in the local military band. In her spare time, the cover band The Five Torquays was formed , initially with different line- ups , but from 1964 with the five musicians who would later form the Monks. After being released from the US Army, the Five Torquays played in clubs in southern Germany for a year in 1964. At one of these appearances in the Stuttgart Rio-Bar they were played by Walther Niemann (former Folkwang student , among others with Max Burchartz ) and Karl-H. Remy (former student of the Ulm School of Design ) addressed. Niemann and Remy had been looking for a band for some time that they could model according to their ideas. In the same month of June 1965, the five musicians began to work on a new sound under the guidance of their two managers. In September, a ten-song rehearsal tape was recorded in the Ludwigsburg studio. With these test recordings, the managers tried to get a contract with the major German record companies. They finally signed this with the major label Polydor , because there the young producer Jimmy Bowien, known for his collaboration with Franz Josef Degenhardt , recognized them as the "music of the future".
Niemann and Remy worked on the further development of their overall concept. The still rather tame texts of the test recordings (published in 2007 as monks demo tapes 1965 ) turned into sharp Dadaesque accusations against the Vietnam War . Aesthetically, they broke new ground by choosing the black and white contrasts of the Cold War instead of the soft, long-haired, flower-child-like pop outfit . On top of that, the two producers put the five musicians in monk's robes and the musicians received a tonsure . Instead of a tie , which was particularly popular with beat groups , one wore gallows ropes around the neck.
background
The music that will later be heard on Black Monk Time is in every way wilder, harder, faster than the rehearsal recordings made seven months earlier. Black Monk Time , similar to the first album by Velvet Underground , meant a deep cut in the history of the rather sweet pop music influenced by R&B and blues . For the first time, these influences were deliberately negated and a type of art rock was created , which , according to Rolling Stone , was recorded in the belief in its popular effect: It set the standard for the subsequent garage rock and, according to the critics, also for punk and grunge music . Julian Cope even said in his Krautrock sampler that the record represented the intermediate piece between the beat music and the Krautrock of German groups such as Can , Faust and Kraftwerk . Filmmaker Dietmar Post, on the other hand, said that the Monks in no way represented garage rock, as this term only applied to American bands. For him, the musical experiment referred more to the future genres of heavy metal , punk, industrial and techno .
When the tribute album Silver Monk Time was presented in connection with the documentary film Monks - The Transatlantic Feedback , it became clear how much bands like The Fall , Jon Spencer , Faust or Mouse on Mars relate to the Monks. Mouse on Mars went so far as to claim that their homage Monks Time was an attempt to carry the importance and sound of the Monks into the 21st century.
The record cover of Monks manager Walther Niemann
“As part of the overall Remy / Niemann concept, Walther Niemann designed the record cover for Black Monk Time . A black album cover, decorated only with the Helvetica script , is reminiscent of 'The Black Square on a White Background' (1915) by Malevich . As with the Russian painter, a new beginning is also marked here. The back consists of sixteen squares of equal size. These contain the accompanying text, the list of titles and Monks photos, which in black and white constellations highlight areas of shadow and light, lines and circles. "
Track list
All songs are penned by Gary Burger, Larry Clark, Roger Johnston and Eddie Shaw.
- page A
- Monk Time - 2:45
- Shut up - 3:10
- Boys Are Boys and Girls Are choice - 1:25
- Higgle-dy - Piggle-dy - 2:30
- I Hate You - 3:25
- Oh, How to Do Now - 3:15
- Side B
- Complication - 2:33
- We Do like you - 2:12
- Drunken Maria - 1:45
- Love Came Tumblin 'Down - 2:30
- Blast off! - 2:15
- That's My Girl - 2:25
Individual evidence
- ↑ Data on Black Monk Time at www.the-monks.com/discography.htm (English)
- ↑ a b This edition also contained the two singles from 1967. See Internet discography The Monks
- ↑ Will Bedard: The Year of the Monks (1999)
- ↑ David Fricke: Review in Rolling Stone 1997
- ↑ Quoted from Anthony Carew: Review for About.com
- ↑ Dietmar Post: Interview with Robert Mießner satt.org 2007
- ↑ Silver Monk Time 2CD, play loud! productions, 2009
- ^ Monks - The Transatlantic Feedback , documentary, 2006