Bill Bailey - Parodies Lost (2021)

I've mentioned before on the blog that, as well as being passionate about music, I also love comedy, and have posted the odd thing here and there from Peter Cook & Dudley Moore, Ricky Gervais, and Monty Python. One of my favourite stand-ups of the last 15 years has been Bill Bailey, and not only because he's a great comic, but also because he's a brilliant musician, able to play a multitude of instruments, and to knock off a pin-sharp musical parody at the drop of a hat. I decided to collect some of my favourite pieces from his various DVD's and to segue them together into a 35-minute 'live concert', and so that's what we have here. The songs vary from unnervingly accurate take-offs of particular artists like Tom Waits, Kraftwerk, and Portishead, to usurping whole genres, such as country music (and the evils thereof), emo, prog rock, and Adele-style confessionals. He then rounds it all off with such flights of fancy as a dub reggae version of the 'Downton Abbey' theme, an instrumental based on a mobile ringtone, the BBC News theme as an acid-house rave tune, and the wisdom of George W Bush set to a drum 'n' bass backing. If you like these, and you certainly should, then the videos for most of them are on Youtube, along with excerpts from his stand-up routines, so do check them out after you've enjoyed this 'live concert' from the always inventive Bill Bailey.   

Track listing

01 Insect Nation
02 I'm Going to Kill You So I Can Ignore You In Heaven (The Evils Of Country Music)
03 Theme from Downton Abbey (Dub Reggae Version)
04 BBC News Rave
05 Leg Of Time
06 Duelling Sitars
07 Zippedee Do Dah by Portishead
08 Oblivion (The Emo Song)
09 Ring Tone Symphony
10 Old MacDonald by Tom Waits
11 Das Hokey Cokey by Kraftwerk
12 You Left Me, But I'm Not Gonna Go On About It (Song for Adele)
13 Drum 'n' Bush
14 Love Song

Kraftwerk - Pop Und Avantgarde (1974)

In early 1974 Kraftwerk were on the cusp of international recognition with the imminent release of their 'Autobahn' album, when they were asked to perform at the large broadcasting hall of the Hessischer Rundfunk HR1 as part of a festival of music. The theme was to be various minimalist musical concepts under the title "Between Pop And Avantgarde", with Kraftwerk performing their set on the 25 January 1974, and with some of the performances being recorded and broadcast on German radio. At this point the band had released three albums of minimalist electronic music, one under the name Ralf & Florian, and two as Kraftwerk, and for this performance the core trio of Ralf Hutter, Florian Schneider and Wolfgang Flur were joined by Klaus Röder on electro-violin and guitar, making a unique line-up for this one concert. The band played pieces from their three albums, as well as one from the forthcoming 'Autobahn' record, and as it was recorded for radio broadcast the sound quality is excellent. There were some very long announcements in German throughout the broadcast which I've removed or edited out, so that we can enjoy the music uninterrupted, and although I don't usually post live albums, this is of such historical importance that it deserves to be heard, as it features a line-up of the band which never made it to a recording studio. 

Track listing

01 Klingklang
02 Ruckzuck
03 Atem
04 Tongebirge
05 Tanzmusik
06 Kohoutek/Kometenmelodie I & II

Personnel
Ralf Hutter: minimoog, farfisa professional piano, mixer
Klaus Röder: electronic violin & guitar
Wolfgang Flur: electronic percussion
Florian Schneider: Arp Odyssey, EMS Synthi AKS, amplfied flute, mixer

Kraftwerk - K4 (1971)

By 1971 Kraftwerk had recorded three albums (four if you count the 1970 opus they recorded as 'Organisation') of electronic systems music, and had become one of the founding members of the new genre referred to as Krautrock. When Ralf Hütter took a sabbatical following 'Kraftwerk 1' – apparently to finish his college studies – Florian Schneider brought in drummer Klaus Dinger’s guitarist partner in Neu!, Michael Rother, and the result was a Neu! takeover. One of their concerts was recorded live for Radio Bremen, and these five tracks span over an hour of challenging electronic music, dominated by Dinger’s thunderous Sabbath drums and Rother’s white-hot guitar. Such freak-outery would not survive Hütter’s return, and so Dinger and Rother went back to Neu! and continued their own take on the genre, while Kraftwerk went down a more melodious route to become the commercially acceptable face of Krautrock. Although this could probably be classed more as Neu! with Florian Schneider loosely reworking some of Kraftwerk's early songs, rather than an actual Kraftwerk recording, it's still some of the best Krautrock of the period and deserves to be hear by fans of both bands.  

Track listing

01 Heavy Metal Kids
02 K1
03 K2 'Ruckzuck'
04 K3
05 K4

Kraftwerk - Techno Pop (1983)

In 1983 Kraftwerk had just released the successful 'Tour de France' EP, and plans were in place to follow this up with an album called 'Techno Pop'. But 1983 became 1984 and nothing appeared. In fact, nothing would appear for a further two years, when the 'Electric Cafe' album was released in 1986. Confusion abounded as to whether this was a reworked version of 'Techno Pop' or if it was a brand new album, and that it had created a mysterious 'lost album' in between. When 'Electric Cafe' was reissued in 2004 under the name 'Techno Pop' we got our answer. Apparently the band had just had a crisis of confidence about it when comparing it to the dance music they were hearing in New York at the time, and coupled with Ralf Hutter's serious cycling injury which put him out of action for a while, they'd decided to shelve the whole album. As most of the tracks from the proposed 'Techno Pop' eventually turned up on 'Electric Cafe', this isn't so much a reconstruction as a 'what could have been', so I've used alternate versions and demos, to make the album that should have come out in 1983. I'd rounded it off with a rare track called 'Cybernetik Interspace', but Steve W has pointed out this is actually from a Kraftwerk tribute album by DJ Steve Lombardoni and not by Kraftwerk, but it sort of fitted with the rest so I've left it on. 

Track listing

01 Techno Pop/Sex Object (Unreleased Demo 1983)
02 The Telephone Call (original mix)
03 Sex Object (Unreleased Demo 1983)
04 Tour de France (allemande)
05 Cybernetik Interspace (Unreleased mix)
06 Sex Object (Spanish Version)
07 Boing Boom Tschak (Funkstar Deluxe)