Track Listing

1. Pinch
2. Sing Swan Song
3. One More Night
4. Vitamin C
5. Soup
6. I'm So Green
7. Spoon

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #246693 in Music
• Released on: 1998-05-19
• Number of discs: 1
• Format: Original recording reissued

Amazon.com
By the time of 1972's Ege Bamyasi, Can had consolidated, with singer Damo Suzuki fully entrenched as the unstable Michael Mooney's replacement. Suzuki's vocals range from shrieks to inaudible chanting, tackling subjects as mundane as "your vitamin C" while implying an archetypal depth. Evidence of a band at the height of their interactive powers is here. Anchored by the "percussion and flexation" (as he's credited) of Jaki Liebezeit, Can delivers seven pounding sermons of rhythmic prowess, peaking with the 10:30 sound storm of "Soup." Liebezeit's long drum riff in "Pinch"--pegged by a resounding bass thoom at the end of each repetition--creates an ellipse in which feedback bursts, guitar and keyboard note clusters, and Damo's vocal witchery combine into a perfectly balanced, loping cyclone, with each element beautifully playing off the next. Like Miles's On the Corner, Ege Bamyasi is a definitive statement on merging jazz ideology with the surging menace of rock & roll. --Gene Booth

Customer Reviews

Their best? . . . Certainly one of the coolest albums ever.
This may be CAN's most fun album. My personal favorite by this band, the album starts out with a simultaneous squawk from the guitar, a crash from drums, and a smiling sigh from out-there vocal stylist Damo Suzuki. "Pinch" proceeds to loosely veer into dangerous and unpredictable territory for nearly 10 minutes. "Sing Swan Song" is subdued and beautiful, perfectly transforming into the rhythm and quiet feel of flowing of water that begins the track. "Sing Swan Song" also serves as a precursor to the more ambient explorations of their next album FUTURE DAYS. It also, like the lighter, airier "One More Night" features a haunting (without the "haunt") keyboard sound. "Vitamin C" is such a cool song. Jaki L. steps up the intensity with a poly-rhythmic drum march and M. Karoli delivers a sinister descending jazz-guitar.

"You! You're losing! you're losing! you're losing yer Vitamin C!"

"Vitamin C" dissolves into a computerized scramble which turns into the more challenging "Soup" - actually it contains a good song or 2 in there before it goes off the map into some fascinating experimental territory a la the wierder moments on TAGO MAGO. "I'm So Green" is truly the epitome of COOL (unlike what some frankly misguided reviewer wrote here). We get that great jazz guitar style again from Michael and an irressistably catchy rhythm that breaks into an even catchier one at the end - very smooth. "Spoon" could be the coolest of all CAN songs. It's trippier with a distinctive atmosphere, delivered in large manner once again by those haunted keys.

This band was so creative. This album shows them in top form. I know this music isn't for everyone . . . but it should be!

A Beautiful Album
This is absolutly beautiful music. This music can take you off to another land if you let it. Can was a band of brilliant musicians,and were considered to be the best experimental band of the 70's. This album has a very psychedelic feel and sound to it,but also a gloomy one. It kind of gives me the feeling of a rainy day,but yet has a mysticl feeling to it. Songs like Sing Swan Song and Spoon are Dreary and surreal,whilst songs such as Vitamin C and One More Night are run on tight beats and funky rythums. Damo Suzuki's lyrics are basically incomprehensible but also add to the beauty of the music(especially the harmony in Spoon)Jaki Liebezit is one of my favorite drummers. He has some of the most complex rhythums iv'e ever heard eg:One more night,Vitamin C and soup. Michael Karoli's guitar playing is also brilliant and is pretty much toned down very much in comparison with their first three albums. Irmin Schmitt adds some "otherworldly" keyboard effects,and Holger Czukay is one hell of a basist, and a genious! This is a must have album for music fans of Psychedelic,experimental/avant garde music!

For Mingus fans
Charles Mingus is my favorite jazzman, and I loved this release by Can. The two are not similar. In fact, they are in no way related. The point of this review is to make sure that Mingus fans are not frightened off by the reviewer below.

Thanks.