Dear Mike:
Olaf Kuebler who is the producer of AM0N DUUL II -there must have been some wrong information somehow- handed us your letter which was really good news. Hopefully our answer is not much too late, please excuse the delay. By the way we had no idea that anyone had ever heard of us in the US. It is not certain yet if the album TAGO MAGO will be released by United Artists US, anyway we will send to them a photocopy of your letter so they will give you the date of release and maybe some more information.
You asked for some story information on the group--your guess about the printed lyrics was right (did you hear that from the music?) actually the voice is just one of five instruments and the words part of the music. The singer did not work as a poet but just sang what he heard or so; even for him it is sometimes difficult or impossible to understand what he has been singing when we have to write it down for the publisher. Maybe we can send you some sometime just for your own information or fun (or the magazine).
History:
CAN exists since october 68, the people who founded it came from very different kinds of music, had never before played together and hardly knew each other
JAKI LIEBEZEIT had been a free jazz drummer and had then lived as a hermit in Spain for a year before he joined the group.
IRMIN SCHMIDT had been a composer and performer of New Music and been conducting symphonies, plays now organ.
HOLGER CZUKAY had been studying electronic music and double- bass and been a music teacher. He also knows a lot about tape recorders, mixers and amplifiers and has constructed most of the electronic equipment used by CAN at INNER SPACE STUDIO in Cologne.
MICHAEL KAROLI had been playing guitar as amateur and broke off law study to form CAN.
MALCOLM MOONEY was a sculptor from New York and met the others by chance in Paris on a world hitch hike tour and sang with the group for 18 months.
During this time the group released their first 1p MONSTER MOVIE in a private pressing (later released by UA) and after CAN's most scandalful three months live gig at ZURICHER SCHAUSPIELHAUS. (ZURICH THEATRE) in Switzerland Mal left the group to go back to US. After Mooney's leaving, Japanese DAMO SUZUKI joined the group. He had been hitch-hiking around the world and met the group by accident in Munich.
Personnel on TAGO MAGO: Jaki Liebezeit........percussion Irmin Schmidt .......organ, piano Holger Czukay .......bass guitar Michael Karoli........guitar Damo Suzuki .......vocal
The music is recorded and produced by CAN at INNER SPACE STUDIO in Koln (Cologne) which is the studio of the group. Until now CAN has made 14 motion picture and tv film soundtracks You might be able to see in the US
DEADLOCK by Roland Klick
DEEP END by Jerzy Skolimovsky
DEAD PIDGEON ON by Samuel Fuller
All of CAN's music is developed out of playing, nobody writes the music except for the publisher (CANMUSIC) after it is on tape already. We know that this kind of making music is dependent on having much time in the studio, that is why in the beginning we worked much more on building up our own studio than on having a live equipment.
The music is based on improvisation, not like head arrangements and chorusing in Jazz where the tune is the basis of improvisation. ln a live performance you might hear something which you remember from 'TAGO MAGO, a song can appear as a part of the evening or there might be five songs played in the same moment by five different instruments, we do never fix a program so every night is different .The evening makes the program. That much about live music, it is not so good to describe it. We hope you will hear it soon or see the film.
We are just finishing a film (7O minutes) about the group. 70 per cent of it was shot at a free concert in Cologne with 10,000 people audience, the rest in the studio.It will be on German tv in autumn and we hope at least a part of it will also be shown in Britain and in the US. Anyway we hope you will see it (it is a CAN production too).
We have just come back from a British tour which was a success so we will go back there in November for 20 concerts. We would like to tour the US next year but there seems to be not enough money to do it on our own.
Thank you again for your letter and interest, we will try to send more photos (it would take us another month to get them now)we hope you get along with this German English.
All the best, Michael for CAN
letter to Triad