Max Goldt always knew how to take the rope off the German neck by using our language in a light and ironical way. However, before he became a national celebrity for his poetic satirical writings, he had produced a vast amount of home recording pieces whose quirky complexity and uber-earthly beauty has hardly been recorgnized and appreciated until today. After some years of silence, Mr Goldt - who never gives any interviews – has handed out a bunch of audio tape tracks to the soul scratchers of Gagarin Records. The compilation of tracks represented on this record came to existence „in splendid isolation“ at his old flat in Berlin during the years 1981-83. Back then, he invented what he called „rubbermind music“:

„I didn't use any electronics because I didn't like the synthesizers I could have afforded at that time. I basically used an acoustic guitar and a zither which I prepared with wooden and metallic objects, papers and textiles. Instead of plucking the chords I hammered on them.“ (Goldt)

Out-of-tune chords and occasionally appearing Glockenspiel melodies generate a musical universe of minimal rhythm and metallic beauty. Like big city noise echoing on reverberating piano strings.

Already in these early recordings one can hear Max Goldt's huge talent for lyrics and strange moods: the blond Nadine and the black Carola drink Rum with Coca Cola and wait for their war veterans („Soldaten“), a pair of male hands stroke a globe („Bei elektrischem Licht“) and grapefruit hearts are squeazed in the dark („Upside Downtown“). Until today Max Goldt is one of the few heroes in German underground music who is able to give his sounds and lyrics an aura of melancholy, weirdness and glamour at the same time.

Max Goldt always knew how to take the rope off the German neck by using our language in a light and ironical way. However, before he became a national celebrity for his poetic satirical writings, he had produced a vast amount of home recording pieces whose quirky complexity and uber-earthly beauty has hardly been recorgnized and appreciated until today. After some years of silence, Mr Goldt - who never gives any interviews – has handed out a bunch of audio tape tracks to the soul scratchers of Gagarin Records. The compilation of tracks represented on this record came to existence „in splendid isolation“ at his old flat in Berlin during the years 1981-83. Back then, he invented what he called „rubbermind music“:

„I didn't use any electronics because I didn't like the synthesizers I could have afforded at that time. I basically used an acoustic guitar and a zither which I prepared with wooden and metallic objects, papers and textiles. Instead of plucking the chords I hammered on them.“ (Goldt)

Out-of-tune chords and occasionally appearing Glockenspiel melodies generate a musical universe of minimal rhythm and metallic beauty. Like big city noise echoing on reverberating piano strings.

Already in these early recordings one can hear Max Goldt's huge talent for lyrics and strange moods: the blond Nadine and the black Carola drink Rum with Coca Cola and wait for their war veterans („Soldaten“), a pair of male hands stroke a globe („Bei elektrischem Licht“) and grapefruit hearts are squeazed in the dark („Upside Downtown“). Until today Max Goldt is one of the few heroes in German underground music who is able to give his sounds and lyrics an aura of melancholy, weirdness and glamour at the same time.