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‘So Far’, so far out. By 1972, Faust had already dismantled the concept of a rock album. With their self-titled debut, they tore through convention with tape edits, abstract structures, and a scathing collage of cultural detritus. Its successor, recorded just six months later, was not a retreat from that radicalism, but its evolution. Instead of challenging form through outright fragmentation, the band now disguised their subversion in structures that almost, almost, resemble songs. But don’t be fooled. This is still Faust: unpredictable, subversive, and unbound by convention.

The circumstances surrounding the album’s creation were no less unconventional than those of their debut. Faust were still ensconced in the converted schoolhouse in Wümme, Lower Saxony, and its improvised studio - a riddle of cabling, tape and custom electronics. By this point, the band had grown more cohesive as a unit but remained steadfastly anti-commercial, despite the pleas of their label.

“It’s A Rainy Day Sunshine Girl” sets the tone, sixteen bars of primal percussion exploding into a relentless rhythmic mantra, somewhere between a ritual and a rave-up. Sosna’s deadpan vocals and skeletal guitar, Diermaier’s thudding pulse, and Peron’s circular bassline create a mood both hypnotic and unsettling, on a track which feels as if it was beamed in from both the Velvet Underground’s New York loft and the outer edges of the Zodiak Free Arts Lab. The song’s descent into a howling maelstrom of Irmler’s droning organ and Wüsthoff’s screaming sax captures Faust’s unique balance of chaos and clarity. Through its taut two and a half minutes of folky finger picking and icy electronics, “On the Way to Abamäe” oscillates between pastoral prettiness and gloomy paranoia while “No Harm” sets a new standard for tone shift. Muted horns and swaying syncopation, gradua.......
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