LA! NEU?

An ambient version of NEU!? - Perhaps. It certainly is a soothing and floating piece of work this one. Consisting of only 3 tracks, with one of those being a short intro, the album is as open to soundscapes and laid back improv as you´ll ever hear Klaus Dinger get. Oh yes, that old Krautrocker/proto punker that was the second half of NEU! and instigator of La Düsseldorf. Well there´s no hiding from those facts, and coming from a long time fan of both bands - I think it would have been a humongous mistake - bordering on futile, if he´d started listening to the actual music scene of the 90s, and said to himself: How would I sound like with a Backstreet Boys´ choir and a spicy rap to go with it? Not to worry then, as this record truly is a natural development of the motorik filled Krautrock that Klaus helped generate back when the world was full of beards and space tobacco.

As I said Year of the Tiger is very much an ambient venture, but not to the point of comatose muzak, where you´ll need an alarm clock to go off every once in a while to check your vital signs. No. This comes off as an electronic experiment, that true to Klaus´ rather staccato way of utilizing the beat bounces its way through these towering sound sculptures - evoking dreams of turquoise glaciers in steam filled saunas, old school Nintendo music and lullabies performed at sea by an airy siren - seducing you into the music.

It´s tribal, improvised, pulsating, relaxing, serene, imaginative, undisturbed, droning, clear as a freezing cold winter morning, healing and simple like an old tjuh tjuh train galloping up the rail-roads. Some would probably call this monotonous, and as much as I love this kind of music, I would have to agree with them, but only to a certain extent, because Dinger was always like this - chanting rhythmically away through the drums, that on this particular outing sound like old oak barrels. Over and under the beat flutters this female voice seeping in and out of the music, like a flying witch surfing the northern winds. She really sounds like she hails from a time of magic and sorcery. Underneath all of this, the synths and sparsely used acoustic guitars steam, no - ooze through the notes, and I get images of sitting in a Turkish sauna suddenly baffled by the strange sounds that rise up from the evaporating water - like the ghost of an Arabian belly dancer.

This is an album that dissolves itself. It melts. It could have been orchestrated by those cheeky winds that snuffles their way through the city, lifting up in women´s skirts, tickling playfully - never ever climaxing, but just like the art of Kama Sutra - it was never about the odd stains on your linen - it was about being open to virtuous and gracious living that discusses the nature of love. This is just about music.