Live in Paris 1973

Last updated

Live in Paris 1973
Can - Live in Paris 1973.jpg
Live album by
Can
ReleasedFebruary 23, 2024 (2024-02-23)
Recorded12 May 1973
Venue L'Olympia, Paris, France
Genre Krautrock
Length91:14
Label Spoon
Can chronology
Live in Cuxhaven 1976
(2022)		Live in Paris 1973
(2024)		Live in Aston 1977
(2024)

Live in Paris 1973 is a live double-album by German krautrock band Can, recorded at a performance of the band at L'Olympia in Paris, France. It was released on vinyl and CD by Spoon Records on 23 February 2024, [1] two weeks after the death of Can member Damo Suzuki on 9 February 2024. [2]

Contents

Live in Paris 1973 is the fourth live album in a series prepared by Can founding member Irmin Schmidt and producer/engineer René Tinner, and the first official live release to feature vocalist Suzuki. [3] [1] [a] The live performance features Schmidt, Holger Czukay, Michael Karoli, Jaki Liebezeit and Suzuki. It was one of the last concerts Suzuki performed in with Can. He left the band soon after Future Days was recorded. [3] [2]

Music

The material on Live in Paris 1973 was sourced from tapes archived at Spoon Records, plus concert recordings by British fan, Andrew Hall. [4] [5] Bootleg recordings of this concert of varying quality have circulated for many years; for this official release, however, the audio quality of the source tapes was restored and enhanced by engineer and producer René Tinner. [5] [6]

The five track titles on the album are numbered in German: “Eins” (“One”), “Zwei” (“Two”), "Drei" (Three"), “Vier” (“Four”) and "Fünf" ("Five"). [5] The music is improvised, with three of the tracks, "Zwei", "Drei" and "Fünf" being improvised extensions of three Can songs, "One More Night", "Spoon" and "Vitamin C" respectively. The songs are from their 1972 album Ege Bamyasi , which had been released three months before the L'Olympia concert. [4] [6]

Reception

Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
AllMusic Star full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar half.svg [4]
Financial Times Star full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar empty.svg [7]
Mojo Star full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar empty.svg [3]
Record Collector Star full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svg [8]

In a review at AllMusic, Paul Simpson wrote that "Live in Paris 1973 is Can at their on-stage best, and easily the band's most essential live release." [4] He called the band's improvisation around "Vitamin C" on "Paris 73 Fünf", "an extended freak-out", while "Paris 73 Zwei"'s reworking of "One More Night" showed their "mastery of killer grooves". [4] Simpson described the album as "a largely unfiltered display of the band's powers when they were at their prime". [4]

Reviewing the album in Mojo magazine, Ian Harrison called Live in Paris 1973 "the most astonishing" of the series of four live archival releases so far. [3] He wrote that Ege Bamyasi had just been released, and "Can were firing creatively and commercially", making this "one of the great[est] formations in Can’s history". [3]

Writing in a review in the Financial Times , Ludovic Hunter-Tilney described Live in Paris 1973 as "a vivid tribute to [Suzuki's] role in one of the best improvisational groups in rock’s history." [7] Hunter-Tilney stated that following the successes of Tago Mago and Ege Bamyasi, Can were "at the height of their powers." He said their long jams in Paris that night were "mesmerising", and Suzuki was often another instrument, "wailing with the guitar or barking chopped-up phrases in time to the rhythms." [7] Hunter-Tilney added that while Suzuki "didn’t like to look back", this album "allows us to do so, with gratitude." [7]

Sylvain Siclier wrote in a review of the album in Le Monde that Can's rendering of "Vitamin C" in "Fünf" is "beautiful" (belles), and added that Suzuki is "wonderful" (merveilleux) here. [6] Janne Oinonen wrote in The Yorkshire Post that Can "excelled in 'regressive rock', with the musicians scaling back every ounce of flab to arrive at a pure essence of groove that unveils a lean, fiercely potent European brand of avant-funk." [9] Oinonen called Live in Paris 1973 "electrifying", adding that despite being 50-year-old recordings, "it's difficult to think of a more timelessly fresh live album being released in 2024." [9]

Track listing

All tracks composed by Irmin Schmidt, Holger Czukay, Michael Karoli, Jaki Liebezeit and Damo Suzuki.

Double-LP release

Side A
No.TitleLength
1."Paris 73 Eins (Part 1)" 
Side B
No.TitleLength
1."Paris 73 Eins (Part 2)" 
Side C
No.TitleLength
1."Paris 73 Zwei" 
2."Paris 73 Drei" 
Side D
No.TitleLength
1."Paris 73 Vier" 
2."Paris 73 Fünf" 

Double-CD release

CD 1
No.TitleLength
1."Paris 73 Eins"36:27
2."Paris 73 Zwei"9:20
CD 2
No.TitleLength
1."Paris 73 Drei"16:35
2."Paris 73 Vier"15:09
3."Paris 73 Fünf"13:46

Source: Liner notes [10]

Personnel

Sound and production

Source: Liner notes [10]

Notes

  1. ↑ The four live albums prepared by Irmin Schmidt and René Tinner are Live in Stuttgart 1975 (2021), Live in Brighton 1975 (2021), Live in Cuxhaven 1976 (2022) and Live in Paris 1973 (2024).

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Can (band)</span> German experimental rock band

Can were a German experimental rock band formed in Cologne in 1968 by Holger Czukay, Irmin Schmidt (keyboards), Michael Karoli (guitar), and Jaki Liebezeit (drums). They featured several vocalists, including the American Malcolm Mooney (1968–70) and the Japanese Damo Suzuki (1970–73). They have been hailed as pioneers of the German krautrock scene.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jaki Liebezeit</span> German musician

Jaki Liebezeit was a German drummer, best known as a founding member of experimental rock band Can. He was called "one of the few drummers to convincingly meld the funky and the cerebral".

Michael Karoli was a German guitarist, violinist, and sound-mixer. He was a founding member of the krautrock band Can.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Damo Suzuki</span> Japanese musician (1950–2024)

Kenji Suzuki, known as Damo Suzuki (ダモ鈴木), was a Japanese musician best known as the vocalist for the German Krautrock group Can between 1970 and 1973. Born in 1950 in Kobe, Japan, he moved to Europe in the late 1960s where he was spotted busking in Munich, West Germany, by Can bassist Holger Czukay and drummer Jaki Liebezeit. Can had just split with their vocalist Malcolm Mooney, and asked Suzuki to sing over tracks from their 1970 compilation album Soundtracks. Afterwards, he became their full time singer, appearing on the three influential albums Tago Mago (1971), Ege Bamyası (1972) and Future Days (1973).

<i>Monster Movie</i> (Can album) 1969 studio album by Can

Monster Movie is the debut studio album by German rock band Can, released in August 1969 by Music Factory and Liberty Records.

<i>Tago Mago</i> 1971 album by Can

Tago Mago is the second studio album by the German krautrock band Can, originally released as a double LP in August 1971 on United Artists Records. It was the band's first full studio album to feature vocalist Damo Suzuki after the departure of Malcolm Mooney the year prior, though Suzuki had been featured on most tracks on the 1970 compilation album Soundtracks. The was recorded at the Can Studio in the Schloss Nörvenich, a medieval castle near Cologne.

<i>Ege Bamyasi</i> 1972 album by Can

Ege Bamyası is the third studio album by German krautrock band Can, released on 29 November 1972 by United Artists Records. The album contains the single "Spoon", which charted in the Top 10 in Germany after being used as the theme song to the German television mini-series Das Messer (1971). The success of the single allowed Can to establish their own studio, Inner Space Studio, in Weilerswist, where they recorded the rest of the album. In 2004, Spoon Records remastered Ege Bamyası and reissued it as a hybrid Super Audio CD.

<i>Future Days</i> 1973 studio album by Can

Future Days is the fourth studio album by the German experimental rock group Can, released on 1 August 1973 by United Artists. It was the group's final album to feature vocalist Damo Suzuki, who subsequently left the band, and explores a more atmospheric sound than their previous releases.

<i>Soon Over Babaluma</i> 1974 studio album by Can

Soon Over Babaluma is the fifth studio album by the rock music group Can. This is the band's first album following the departure of Damo Suzuki in 1973. The vocals are provided by guitarist Michael Karoli and keyboardist Irmin Schmidt. It is also their last album that was created using a two-track tape recorder.

<i>Out of Reach</i> (album) 1978 studio album by Can

Out of Reach is the ninth studio album by the German krautrock band Can, released as an LP in 1978 on Harvest Records. It is their tenth official studio album, discounting compilations such as Unlimited Edition.

<i>Rite Time</i> 1989 album by the German krautrock band Can

Rite Time is the eleventh and final studio album by the German krautrock band Can, released in later Summer 1989 by Mercury Records. The album features the vocals of the band's original singer, Malcolm Mooney, who had left the group in 1970 after their debut album Monster Movie. Upon the album's initial release, "In the Distance Lies the Future" only appeared on the CD version, but it was included on the 2014 vinyl reissue.

"Moonshake" is a song by the krautrock band Can, on their 1973 album Future Days. Unusually for this album, known for its ambient, lengthy tracks, the song is short and has a pop structure, and was released as a single.

"Mushroom" is a song by the German krautrock band Can, from their 1971 album Tago Mago. It's the shortest song on the album, lasting for 4 minutes and 8 seconds. A video was made for the track which has been shown on MTV.

Spoon Records is an independent record label founded and managed by the spouse of keyboard player Irmin Schmidt, Hildegard Schmidt, since 1979. The label, and its sister publishing operation Messer Music, are headquartered in the Luberon district of France, mostly releasing and reissuing music made by the krautrock band Can and its members. Hildegard and Irmin Schmidt's daughter Sandra Podmore has been directors of Spoon Records since 2008.

<i>Can Live Music (Live 1971–1977)</i> 1999 live album by Can

Can Live Music is a double live album by the band Can, released in 1999 and recorded in the UK and West Germany between 1972 and 1977. It was originally included in the now out-of-print Can box set, Can Box.

<i>Anthology</i> (Can album) 1994 compilation album by Can

Anthology, also called Anthology - 25 Years and Anthology 1968-1993, is a compilation double album by Krautrock artists Can which was released in 1994. Several of the songs are presented in edited form. The first CD has the same track listing as Can's previous compilation, Cannibalism.

"Mother Sky" is a song by the krautrock group Can, written by members Holger Czukay, Jaki Liebezeit, Michael Karoli, Irmin Schmidt, and Damo Suzuki. Lasting fourteen and a half minutes, it was recorded in July 1970 for the soundtrack of Jerzy Skolimowski's film Deep End and released in 1970 on Can's Soundtracks album. It opens in mid guitar solo before settling down into a familiar Can groove as singer Damo Suzuki mulls the relative merits of madness and "Mother Sky".

<i>The Peel Sessions</i> (Can album) 1995 compilation album by Can

The Peel Sessions is a compilation album by the German experimental rock band Can. Released in November 1995, it contains songs from four sessions recorded for John Peel's Radio 1 show. The sessions took place in February 1973, January 1974, October 1974, and May 1975. The songs are mostly unreleased improvisations. Different recordings of "Geheim" and "Mighty Girl" were released on Landed and Out of Reach respectively.

<i>Unlimited Edition</i> (album) 1976 compilation album by Can

Unlimited Edition is a compilation album by the krautrock band Can, released by Harvest Records in 1976 as a double album. Beforehand, United Artists Records released Limited Edition LP in 1974, which was a limited release of 15,000 copies. Unlimited Edition is a re-release of Limited Edition, adding tracks 14–19 tracks.

<i>The Lost Tapes</i> (Can album) 2012 compilation album by Can

The Lost Tapes is a compilation album of studio outtakes and live recordings by the German experimental rock band Can, which was originally released as an LP in 2012 by Spoon Records in conjunction with Mute Records. The compilation was curated by Irmin Schmidt and Daniel Miller, compiled by Irmin Schmidt and Jono Podmore, and edited by Jono Podmore.

References

  1. 1 2 "Live In Paris 1973". Bandcamp . Retrieved 4 March 2024.
  2. 1 2 Chelosky, Danielle (10 February 2024). "Can vocalist Damo Suzuki dead at 74". Stereogum . Retrieved 29 February 2024.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 "Can Live In Paris Review: Krautrock pioneers' power and potency continues to astound". Mojo . April 2024. Retrieved 29 February 2024.
  4. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Simpson, Paul. "Live in Paris 1973 Review by Paul Simpson". AllMusic . Retrieved 29 February 2024.
  5. 1 2 3 Gu, Marshall (12 February 2024). "Live In Paris 1973 Captures Damo Suzuki And Can At Their Absolute Peak". Stereogum . Retrieved 2 March 2024.
  6. 1 2 3 Siclier, Sylvain (26 February 2024). "Réécouter Can en concert, un soir de mai 1973, à l'Olympia". Le Monde (in French). Paris. p. 21. ISSN   0395-2037. ProQuest   2931112167.
  7. 1 2 3 4 Hunter-Tilney, Ludovic (21 February 2024). "Can: Live in Paris 1973 album review – vivid tribute to one of rock's best improvisational groups". Financial Times . London, England. ISSN   0307-1766 . Retrieved 5 March 2024.
  8. ↑ Needs, Kris (1 March 2024). "Future Proof". Record Collector . p. 98. ISSN   0261-250X . Retrieved 2 March 2024.
  9. 1 2 Oinonen, Janne (17 February 2024). "Can – Live in Paris 1973 Review by Janne Oinonen". The Yorkshire Post . Leeds. p. 51. ISSN   0963-1496. ProQuest   2927553475.
  10. 1 2 Spoon Records (23 February 2024). Live In Paris 1973 (CD liner notes). Can.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.