Limbus 3
New-Atlantis "Cosmic Music Experience"

LA RECENSIONE

The Berlin-based Limbus, better known for their four-member lineup responsible for the second Ohr release: "Mandalas", started as a trio in 1968, performing live a completely spontaneous music that, by the musicians' own admission, borrowed improvisation from free jazz using mainly string instruments, and from "free music" (the most evident influences come from the collaborative works of Donald Rafael Garrett and Zusaan Fasteau) a passion for ethnic instruments like oriental winds, valiha, tabla, tsikadraha, totalophone, and African percussion.

Odysseus Artner, Gerd Kraus, and Matthias Knieper also took turns using Western instruments like piano, acoustic and electric bass, acoustic and electric guitars; within a few minutes of starting their performances, half the audience would run for the doors, while those who stayed tended to contribute to the band's "noise-making" with any object at hand. The more intellectual attendees spoke of avant-garde music; in reality, the musical concept of the three Limbus was based on a cacophonous sound in unison creating crystalline entities that served as a meditative catalyst. They were the first in Germany to discuss "cosmic music," as subtitled on their first 1969 LP: New Atlantis "Cosmic Music Experience," a good three years before Rolf-Ulrich Kaiser compiled the successful collection titled "Kosmische Musik." If one were to equate "cosmic music experience" with that of Tangerine Dream, Klaus Schulze, and company, they would still be mistaken, as Limbus 3 didn't use electronic tricks to make acoustic sounds ethereal and spatial. Instead, theirs is a music made of noises with vaguely exotic echoes with atonalities of all kinds and shrill deliriums coexist spasmodically alongside eccentric dissonances that provoke mental discomfort and auditory disturbance. I emphasize: the stylistic premises should be traced exclusively to the Garretts’ suites and not the Berlin artistic-musical scene of the time.

"New-Atlantis" was released by an independent label, CPM, a kind of musical cooperative wanted by people revolving around a few communes in West Berlin and musicians from the groups Missus Beastly, Embryo, and Checkpoint Charlie; the self-production experience was short-lived but ultimately produced this record, which I personally consider an absolute masterpiece, a cult object, and conversely, given its limited pressing, a true museum piece traceable to the prehistory of "krautrock". The cover immediately fascinates, printed on paper like a kind of foldable poster with Gerd Kraus's notes aligning the Limbus philosophy with the eponymous utopian text (New Atlantis "1623") by Sir Francis Bacon, some explanations of the strange and tribal instruments used, and photos of the trio, strictly in black and white, very austere. One image shows the youthful trio as a droplet about to fall from a stylized flying saucer drawn in black ink with an eye in the center, the voyeur of the moment; the other two depict the group in a cavernous hideaway and out among the woods of Heidelberg in "indios-camperos" outfits, complete with strange flutes slung over their shoulders. As soon as the record starts spinning, the needle captures the groove's atmosphere of a free jam session (Oneway-Trip) featuring crashing cymbals, a vigorously violated cello, and strange muted strings vibrating under hands more concerned with expression driven by improvisation than creating a composed pattern; the suite proceeds in a tribal manner with drums and percussion while the violin creates an offensive, violent, and distorted front which tends to coalesce into an intermezzo adding dissonance to dissonance, remaining anchored to a captivating rhythm. In the finale, everything becomes incredibly deformed, brushing the impossible, pure anarchy anticipating the short "Valiha" for indigenous harp and poor sounds akin to the early Anima Sound, just to have a comparison with another German "free music" formation. The second side opens with a short piece performed with various types of flutes and continues with the suite "New-Atlantis (Island Near Utopia)", the absolute masterpiece of Limbus. The second long jam, while not shying away from the dictates of free improvisation, recreates though acoustic instrumentation and without post-recording adjustments a more tranquil and meditative environmental situation, less hermetic and more spatial. The timbres are now fused one to another, impossible to identify the instruments involved; everything moves first slowly, then more quickly, like a huge monolith full of energy that will be released gradually during the unstoppable destructive ascent of this ancient mass of splashes and audio-thunder flashes.

An original album although difficult at first listen, recommended for the more intransigent and radical "krautrock" enthusiasts.