The cover art for ‘While the Recording Engineer Sleeps’ would have looked spectacularly out of time even on its initial release in 1985. It’s extremely fitting, of course: the audio the album contains was also out of step with fashion. The band was composed of luminaries of the German music scene of the 60s, 70s and 80s and this, their first release, sounded like the kind of vintage the cover art suggests, albeit through a post-punk gauze.
Of course, what goes around comes around, and the post-punk renaissance has bled into the psychedelic revival and explosion of all things Krautrock, meaning that ‘While the Recording Engineer Sleeps’ sounds more current now than any point in history.
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The album starts with ‘Ventilators Change into Airplanes’, which sneers and snarls, hints of The Fall echo through the clanging guitars and wild organ playing. Jazzy hues wash around many of the tracks, including the strolling ‘Bag Lady’, and if the album at times feels like a bit of a mixed bag, that’s part of its appeal: this is the sound of good old-fashioned experimentalism, with a deeply psychedelic hue.
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