Can
Soon Over Babaluma

Fundamentally, I wonder two things: how could a band like Can be so brilliant and sound so ahead of their time? And how come a fabulous album like "Soon Over Babaluma" isn't even granted a review on this site? To the first question, I honestly don't know how to respond (I might venture that Can were actually Martian creatures sent from the future to show posterity what new musical paths could be...), while to answer the second, I could say that after three fabulous albums like "Tago Mago", "Ege Bamyasi", and "Future Days", everything else might seem superfluous, considering the wealth of brilliant ideas and insights these three Masterpieces have left us. But Can were also more than that, and an album like "Soon Over Babaluma" is proof of it.

Firstly, this is the album that follows the departure of the group's wild vocalist Damo Suzuki, and Can re-engage by taking paths significantly different from the past. Vocals are alternated between Holger Czukay and Michael Karoli, but the vocal parts are put on the backburner compared to the past and almost represent just an ornament, while the aspect of rhythmic experimentation prevails, with the drummer Jaki Liebezeit highlighting his passion for "other" rhythms, markedly different from what he has played for us before.

A track like "Chain Reaction" is exemplary: eleven minutes of pure trance, wild and tribal, with an animalistic groove in which nothing seems out of place, transforming at regular intervals into something gaseous, almost dub, then relentlessly resuming its frontal assault with even more determination, leaving no escape. Truly disorienting is also the second track of the album, "Come Sta, La Luna", a sort of moon tango with a bizarre singing in macaronic Italian and dub openings made truly haunting by Michael Karoli's violin, which seems to come from another dimension. But throughout the album, a dark and menacing atmosphere is palpable, with notable cues, as in "Splash" where a Brazilian-like rhythm paired with Karoli’s superb work shows us that Brazil is not just sun and beaches but also unease and paranoia.

A fantastic album, highly recommended for careful listening to those who underrate it... in any case, maybe it wouldn't get a full 5, but considering that without some of the innovations and insights it introduced, albums like "Second Edition" by Public Image Ltd. would never have been born (or would have been different...), it deserves a solid 5.