THE AWAKENING - NEKROPOLIS LIVE '79

The Awakening - Nekropolis live '79 has been recorded in Munich, Germany 1979. According to the official release dates of PETER FROHMADER's albums, this live has been recorded before the subsequent NEKROPOLIS studio albums. Also, the track titles in this album do not match with any of the track titles that appear in the studio releases, so I will assume that these are compositions recorded for the first time (?).

I can not recall how this album came to my collection but I have not paid attention to it for years. I am also not familiar with PETER FROHMADER's career but he seems to be a very interesting case of composer. Personally, I feel the tag progressive electronic does not entirely represent the music in this live (?) recording. I have to assume (again) that by LIVE, the composer means ''played live in studio'', as there is no sign of the existence of an audience throughout the 75 mins that this albums lasts.

The music in the album matches perfectly with the title NEKROPOLIS. In The Awakening, FROHMAEDER's band presents a dark, eclectic set of compositions. Contrary to the electronic and krautrock elements, the main influences in the album's sound come from different areas of progressive music (in general): strong jazz and fusion passages, eclectic use of instruments and rhythms and even elements from zeuhl. The band's rhythm section is the one that stands out and generally provides a solid background for the fair amounts of jamming and improvisation taking place in almost all compositions. Its other function is to create interesting tribal rhythms in several moments in the album.

Friends of progressive electronic will realise the krautrock background in tracks like Escape from Hell. Special mention needs to go to the bizarre instruments used in this album, which bring a strong touch of oriental and African music. Flutes, clarinets and gongs are used in a way to reflect the album's cover (i.e. Egypt, pyramids, pharaohs). As mentioned, jazz/fusion is dominant (Kadu, Jazz-trap) but the main thing that come in my mind when hearing this album is KING CRIMSON. I am not sure if FROHMADER is a fan of the band, but this whole dark and obscure musical approach heavily resembles to the eclectic prog created by KC.

Some compositions are quite long and include lots of improvisation that might bore the listener in certain moments. The overall length of the album is also an issue, with the music being almost constantly complex and ''difficult to comprehend''. However, this feature makes ''The Awakening'' a highly challenging piece of music that will find its admirers in progressive music. Although it is not exactly ''my cup of tea'', I think that jazz/fusion, krautrock and eclectic prog fans will find lots of interesting elements here...

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