CRAWLING TO LHASA

It's not often you get two collaborators on here giving an album a 1 star review but this record is polarizing. The duo of Heinz and Claus out of Germany self released this one in 1972, both multi-instrumentalists they went with the Buddha theme from the band's name to the album and song titles. Ethnic instruments of course and I've seen this called Kraut-Folk but I'm glad they're in Raga here which is more fitting. I had to laugh that Heinz some 10 years later would be in a New Wave/ Electro Pop band looking a lot different. He would also resurrect this project but without Claus in 2002 and release "Peace", 30 years after "Crawling To Lhasa" with guests helping out.

My biggest complaint with the music here is that once they lock into that groove early in the song they stick with it. And I'm not big on this style of music as it is but I certainly agree with the critics that this can be boring. We do get vocals which are quite strange sounding but I must admit that the closer "Tante Olga" is where the vocals actually take the song to another level. And I'd call it that Krautrock level with one guy singing out of the one speaker while the other talks and laughs(clearly stoned) throughout the song. Again they get an idea and they won't vary from it but this is the song I appreciate out of the six.

A lot of acoustic instruments here but some bluesy guitar at times. Singing and speaking are in German. Worth the 3 stars but yes this one is lacking in my opinion.