A couple of months ago, I posted Ash Ra Tempel's Light: Look at Your Sun. The second half of that theme is Darkness: Flowers Must Die. In his book, Krautrocksampler, Julian Cope writes 'Beware of Schwingungen', the album that contains these tunes. You really need to beware of Flowers Must Die.
It begins harmlessly enough, some electronic noises pulsating about for the first 3:00 or so, cymbals creeping around, some drum sounds, bongos. Then a single note guitar starts up, followed by the suffering voice of John L, who sings about the existential pain of living in the city. By the end of the song he decides that he wants to be a stone, a thing without warm blood in the city.
The music continues to build, a saxophone sneaks in here and there, the drums pound with more intensity. At 7:03, the guitar picks out some notes, and phasing effects tingle our ears at 7:17. It is all suddenly turned inside out by a massive phaser at 7:29 as John L howls and Manuel Göttsching wails on the guitar. Run for your life! That's the eye of the storm. Things continue along for another few minutes, with bursts of phasing and more guitars and drums, a storm of emotions from which we are finally free.
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