Monday 27 November 2017, 7.30pm
“The impact of Faust cannot be overstated... an amalgamation of electronics, rock, tape edits, acoustic guitars, musique concrete, and industrial angst. The level of imagination is staggering, the concept is totally unique and it's fun to listen to as well.
“Of all the bands lumped into the 'Krautrock' category, Faust were the most visionary and inventive.” – BBC
As Krautrockers, faUSt (as the name was written before they later reformed) had a worldwide career. On their first three albums in the early 1970s, they inhabited the vast field from improvisation to bricolage to rock'n'roll with the ease of rogues and the determination of declared sonic renegades. They were big in Britain before the notion of Krautrock had made the rounds in Germany. One can still feel the breathing of this music, the bubbling of this primal soup, in current faUSt pieces, in the stone-age thudding of "Fish", which faUSt anticipated in 1972 on "Mamie Is Blue". But you will also be able to distinguish the as-yet- unheard if you allow yourself enough audio time. The sound of a squeaky door from the house of Jean-Hervé Péron, for which the musician has the same kind of enthusiasm others might reserve for a brilliant guitar riff ("gripping, touching"); or the minute-long fadeout of "Fish", which Zappi Diermaier is so excited about. The only plan is for the band to take off without a plan. "We let the music play through us," says Jean-Hervé Péron. Everything else is up to the listener, to make his own film. Jean-Hervé Péron has a little tip for us: Listen to the fish.