SCHICKE & FÜHRS & FRÖHLING

This album is very, very great. This is atmospheric, beautiful, relaxing, very progressive of course, hypnotic, etc.... This is the first of album of SFF without the drummer Schicke. So it's credited as Fuhrs & Frohling. The trio already made "Symphonic Pictures" which is one of the best 1976 progressive rock albums. The songs of "Ammerland" are based on acoustic guitar and synth melodies, with great developpement, some soloing, and great sound effects. The album is very calming and reminds me some Mike Oldfield moments. I think that "Ammerland" is one of the best discoveries that I made in 2015. Thanks to ProgLine who uploaded this masterpiece !

There are two scenarios how the ''Ammerland'' album came up.First one says that Eduard Schicke had already parted ways with Fuehrs and Froehling, even if a third studio album by SFF had been recorded but not yet released.Second one appears Schicke to be still involved with SFF, but Fuehrs and Froehling had found time to create their own work in absence of drums and ''Ammerland'' was the fruit of their collaboration.One way or another this album marked the first effort of Fuehrs and Froehling as a duo, released in 1978 on Brain. Heinz Froehling appears to handle only acoustic/classical guitars, while Gerd Fuehrs plays Mellotron, Moog synth and grand piano.

As expected this work is quite different from the album of Fuehrs and Froehling with SFF, even if it has a strong symphonic flavor.Armored only with a guitar and some keyboards they leave SFF's powerful, symphonic textures for good to deliver dreamy, sensitive and very mellow instrumental music, which flirts with New Age and tends to be pretty minimalistic.First side actually sounds very one-dimensional, where the talent of Froehling is much highlighted and Fuehrs remaining in the background.So this is dedicated to classical guitar-drenched soundscapes with basically some nervous keyboard notes performed by Fuehrs.The exception comes from the short title-track, which contains some beautiful Mellotron waves next to atmospheric synths and the classical guitar alternating between cinematic and more sweet textures, while ''Circles'' has slightly more pronounced keyboard flavors in the vein of TONY BANKS, but even so it sounds pretty hypnotic.''Every land tells a story'' clocks at 14 minutes and seems to be not only the centerpiece of the flipside but of the whole album as well.This comes closer to SFF's classic works, switching from the melodic and ethereal lines to decent synth soloing and evident Classical vibes during the guitar parts, having a more balanced performance and sounding somewhere between SFF, MIKE OLDFIELD and STEVE HACKETT.The New Age atmosphere is still present and the absence of drums holds down the energy level, but this arrangement overall sounds charming and interesting.''Ammernoon'' will close the album in a spacey way with orchestral keyboards and cosmic synthesizers providing a not very familiar mood by Fuehrs and Froehling.

I would not recommend this work to fans of rich, progressive and intricate compositions, because it sounds rather hypnotic and extremely sophisticated.Basically the fan base should be New Age afficionados and lovers of minimalistic textures along the attempts of MIKE OLDFIELD.Rather dissapointing effort after the previous work of the duo with Schicke.

"Sunburst" is the 2nd full-length studio album by German progressive rock act Schicke, Fürhs & Fröhling. The album was released through Brain Records in 1977. "Symphonic Pictures (1976)" was to my ears a really well played, well produced and well composed progressive rock album and fortunately "Sunburst" more or less continues down the same path.

The music is fully instrumental and features a semi-jazzy rythm section, vintage synths/keyboards in spades and some nice guitar playing too. There´s a mellow and ambient atmosphere to the procedings, but there are also more dark and dramatic moments on the album like some of the parts in "Troja". The album is well produced featuring a warm and organic sound production and paired with some excellent musicianship "Sunburst" comes off as a quality release. Some of the compositions are slightly shallow/forgettable (as an example I don´t particularly find the ambient and repetitive nature of "Artificial Energy" that exciting), but when Schicke, Fürhs & Fröhling shine, they shine brightly.

I prefer "Symphonic Pictures (1976)" to "Sunburst", but "Sunburst" is still a great album in it´s own right and a 3 - 3.5 star (65%) rating is deserved.

''Symphonic Pictures'' sold no less than 12000 copies and the fascinating following live shows made SFF one of the very succesful bands in Germany.The next year the talented trio entered Dieter Dierk's studio to record the second album.In order to come up with a more spontaneous result they even recruited bassist Eduard Brumund Ruther to play during the sessions.''Sunburst'' was released in 1977 again on Brain label.

Already from the opening tracks it is clear that Schicke, Führs & Fröhling were determined to produce a different style compared to their debut.So ''Sunburst'' ended up as a compilation of diverse tracks with SFF leaving the highly symphonic attitude of the debut for more flexible still quite demanding compositions.A couple of tracks have a strong TANGERINE DREAM influence, being Electronic pieces of hypnotic soudscapes with melodic guitars surrounding and a very spacey atmosphere overall, not quite conveincing yet decent material.The rest of the album is split between Symphonic Rock and powerful Fusion stylings, where Führs' Mellotron shines again along with his synth acrobatics.Nice keyboard breaks and piano interludes are all over the place.These are combined with Fröhling's fiery guitar solos and rhythms, however ''Sunburst'' has a strong felling of improvisation from the very start.The awaited interplays are really good and even a track has a powerful GENTLE GIANT atmosphere due to Führs' dominant clavinet.

Not so tight or grandiose as their debut, but ''Sunburst'' has a lovely atmosphere and you can sure tell these guys were definitely talented.Recommended to fans of keyboard-driven proggy adventures.

Although it cannot consider this second studio work "Sunburst" from German band SFF in the same level of first "Symphonioc Pictures", nevertheless I consider also worthy of receiving the maximum quotation of 5 stars!!!. An excellent mixture of several styles of progressive music. Besides that in this albun the band counts with the bassist Edward Brumund Ruthe, what provides a more little of "swing" in some musics. Leaving of Track 1 "Wzard" a 'delicious' mixture of techno-music with a jazz-prog, commanded by Heinz Frohling's eletric guitar, going by meditative themes (almost) new age music as in the tracks 2 & 3. In the track 4 "Driftin' " I could identify a certain influence of Gentle Giant, for his syncopated rhythm.The track 5 "Troja" the more eclectic of the album, and maybe the one that more approaches the style presented in the first album. The track 6 "1580" has as prominence Gerard Furhs's acoustic-piano and of Edward Schicke's drums . and finally we have the track 7 "Explorer", that it begins in a style also quite approximate of the new age music and part for a theme that "honors" the music of Yes "Siberian Khatru." As I already spoke before my rate is 5 stars!!!

I absolutely give this release a five star treatment.

Why you might ask?

Well because progressive rock doesn't always require the drum, bass, vocal formula to make a musical statement.

Ammerland is a lush adventure both thru the emerald ponds, tall forest of the Black Forest cultured with the Mellotron flutes, strings robust choirs, Moogesque leads and romantic nylon strings guitars.

From the start of listening to this release you will hear that romantic era Genesis flavor ala the best instrumentals passages of Wiind & Wuthering. Its a journey of the more contemplative side of progressive rock that at least for this reviewer made the experience all the more satisfying.

Ammerland is not your standard fair of progressive rock in fact I would call this a cross pollination of classical, electronica ala ambient music tho used diligently and some of the grandiose melodic bits of progressive rock.

The music is eloquently stated and the interplay of the guitar and keyboards is not over the top but rather as though two painters who could relate ideas upon an aural canvas converging for the final masterwork.

I am glad to see it was re-released just recently as I believe it to be not only a crucial release in progressive rocks vast catalog but a recording that had heart, soul and without the expected pomposity.

Sophmore release by this obscure german band from the mid 70´s. Sunburst shows the group leaning more towards jazz rock/fusion (plus some eletronic bits) than to symphonic prog. This time the trio is helped by a guest bass player and generally their compositions are a little more structured and focused than on their debut. And still they are not exactly very good. Again it´s obvious that they are excellent musicians (specially Schickés. brilliant drumming and Fühts nice keyboard work). It is a pity that those guys could not come up with a better repertoire of original songs.

After repeated listenings the result is the same: track after track you expect something to happen and it doesn´t. Not exactly boring, but neither exciting. Good production and absolute no highlights. It is easy to understand why they were never big. Even for 1977 there was plenty of better things to hear, prog or otherwise. A typical case fo good musicians lacking some strong songwriting skills and an identity. This CD is surely for collectors and hardcore fans.

It´s interesting of how many obscure symphonic prog bands there were in the 70´s. Sometimes you just can´t figure out why they remained little known (when they do release one or more very good albums). sometimes it´s easy to understand their actual position in the prog world (when what they produced is not that great). This german trio sits somewhere too near to the second option : their first album was out in 1976 and while it has some good moments, it is far from being essential or even excellent. Nothing wrong with their musicanship: it´s clear that they are skillful instrumentists. But unfortunatly they were not as good at the songwriting department.

SFF can´t seem to make up their minds on what they are aiming at: symphonic prog? Avant guard? Jazz rock? Eletronic? Space rock? You´ll find elements of all those in here, albeit in a ragged and incoherent way. They can´t come up with a sound of their own and the songs just go on pointlessly. The opener Tao is a good exemple of a good idea that was not well developed: fine guitar riff, good drumming, excellent keys on the first few bars, reminding me of early Camel. Then it never reachs a climax or a convincing progression. And that plagues the whole album. Even the 16 minute suite Pictures can´t be saved. it reminds me a bit of King Crimson, but unlike Crimson they never get anywhere and the epic ends as it started: a bunch of notes put together, some good, some bad, nothing holding any kind of concept or integrated ideas. Some years before I guess their sound would be considered a novelty of kinds or something like that, but by 1976 it was quite a late comer even in that field.

Considering the high ratings I saw here on PA, I was expecting a lot more. This is definitly for hardcore fans of the style. My advice is: listen carefully before buy it.

Due to the 42% (5 stars) added to the 38% (4 stars), I believe that it doesn't remain to smallest doubt than this first work of the German trio SCHICKE FUHRS & FROHLING "Symphonic Pictures" is an album that deserves figure in any progressive music collection . Particularly I consider one of the best works of symphonic prog originating from Bach's and Beethoven's land .. Their influences are several and they are not limited to the German prog scenery , because in spite of they be clear similarities with NOVALIS and TANGERINE DREAM, they are present also another of the English prog, as for instance PINK FLOYD, GREENSLADE and etc... The track 1 "Tao" begins with a superb climate created by the orchestration of the mellotron as "backgropund" for a of rare beauty musical piece that opens with a vigorous melody of electric guitar with sustained notes in a perfect harmony with the keyboards where stands out the acoustic piano, a theme that is just interrupted by other beautiful theme in the piano in that the guitar is absent and with the participation of the marimba in the percussion , then the theme returns the previous predominance and it finishes with a martial drums climate , that closes the track in an impeccable way! The track 2 is a meditative theme, almost new ager where the simplest to be outstanding is the delicate percussion for the glockenspíel. The track 3 "Solution" soon in the beginning e reminded me GRENNSLADE, however this is brief moment and soon after it is substituted by a "tense" theme that it evokes KING CRNMSOM and GENTLE GIANT!!! The track 4 "Sundrops" is a theme practically in TANGERINE DREAM 's style. And the track 5 "Pictures" with opening with mellotron simulating a choir, with the orchestral percussion "makes way" for a theme in the style E,L & PALMER meets GG an excepicional work of keyboards, that closes the disk with other superb climate, however, "more energetic" and less bucolic than the one of the first track My rate is 5 stars!!!

In this first albun without the drummer Eduard Schicke , the German couple Gerd Führs / keyboards & Heinz Fröhling / guitars presents a quite interesting work, based (in most of their 8 tracks) for the contrast among the classic guitar (with nylon strings) and the synthesizer, the one that does remember in some moments the albums from Italian guitarist' RICARDO ZAPPA (that also in the most of their music uses a classic guitar), associated the new age music in the molds of KITARO. That relationship is only broken in the two final tracks of the disk in that the twelve-strings guitar, takes the place of the classic guitar in the track 7 "Every Lands Tells Story" and in the track 8 "Ammernoon", where they appear in a "sovereign" way the keyboards. The result is a "meditative" symphonic-prog almost that a music of relaxation. The disk presents very beautiful melodies and although it is not a masterpiece is a very good work . My rate is 3,5 stars!!!