OUTPUT
NOTHING TO DECLARE
ABRAXAS
Wolfgang Dauner
Output
ECM : 1970
WD, piano, ring modulator, clavinet; Eberhard Weber, bass, cello, guitar; Fred Braceful, percussion, voice.
Wolfgang Dauner — not exactly a household name. So here are some fun facts about Mr. Dauner and his visionary 1970 electronic-jazz masterpiece Output.
#1: Hard to believe given its futuristic collision of aggresive electronic effects and heady jazz-rock instrumentation, but Output was one of the first releases on ECM [1006].
#2: Manfred Eicher served as producer, although this clearly predates the refinement of his trademark production sound – that crystalline and sometimes airless quality that has come to define the label. Perhaps, as some rumors allege, Eicher merely licensed this album from Dauner and added his credit after the fact. Or perhaps he played a key role in birthing in this forward-looking music. Anyone know for sure?
#3: Like many of the early 1000 series of ECM releases – many of the label’s most interesting recordings – Output has never been issued on CD.
#4: The album found little traction among jazz fans upon release. The electronic treatments were too strange, the compositions too off-kilter. There’s the pinched compression, the spacey melodica sounds in “Nothing to Declare” that seem lifted from a reggae song years later, the Arabic tonalities in ‘Abraxas.” Not rock, not jazz, not even really fusion. The music was generally ignored.
#5: Dauner’s electronic-jazz combination predates Dr. Patrick Gleeson’s radical use of electronics on 1973’s Sextant. Two pioneers whose work was snubbed by most jazz cognoscenti.
#6: Dauner’s work was partially rediscovered and rechampioned thanks to those outside the jazz community. The primary movers were industrial pioneers Nurse With Wound. Dauner was included on the arcane but massively influential Nurse With Wound list, a grouping of sympatico artists that influenced the early sound and approach of NWW. Many of the musicians were virtually unknown at the time and their music has become quite influential. A few remain anonymous stars in that vast mysto-musical cosmology.
#7: Although the NWW list only includes artist names, Output is NWW mainstay Steve Stapleton’s favorite Wolfgang Dauner album.
#8: Output is also a favorite of Jim O’Rourke’s — varied solo artist, former Gatr Del Sol and Sonic Youth member, producer for Faust, Melt Banana, and Wilco, improviser with Evan Parker, Derek Bailey, and Red Krayola, experimental filmmaker, author of an incredibly informative essay about Japanese New Wave cinema, et cetera.
#9: Though Abraxas, the Santana album, was released in September 1970, just as Output was being recorded, it is highly likely that Dauner was drawing on an entirely different tradition.
#10: Eberhard Weber: “I developed a kind of playing which only a handful of musicians accepted. I met an older German piano player named Wolfgang Dauner and he accepted my playing. We pretty quickly developed a German Bill Evans-style trio — similar to the one with Scott LaFaro and Paul Motian, without playing that well of course. [laughs] This was very different to what the other people who played in Germany were doing.”
#11: Since the early 1980s, Weber has regularly collaborated with British siren Kate Bush, playing on four of her last five studio albums (The Dreaming, 1982; Hounds of Love, 1985; The Sensual World, 1989; Aerial, 2005).
#12: Dauner later went on to stage multi-media theatrical events as part of his music.
#13: Is it just us, or does that cover art look exactly like it should be gracing the album of a New Wave band circa 1983?
#14: Dauner is not above a pun.
floodwatch // Mar 20, 2007 at 7:15 am
I’ve always wished more of those earlier ECM records were transferred to CD and still in print.
This is fantastic stuff, guys – keep up the great work.
centrifuge // Mar 20, 2007 at 2:37 pm
hmmm… not sure about this. i can see why nww would have namechecked him – and i can also see why ecm haven’t rushed to reissue that one! it is definitely pretty out there for the time though, gotta admit that…
cherise // Mar 20, 2007 at 4:43 pm
i am feeling this. downloaded it and took a few spins to soak it up proper, but now, wow. hot shitt. “nothing to declare” seems to me the most outright jazz to me, the interaction and all. but i like how each track cross the line into uknown territory at some point, colonizing genres yet to be fully codified or explored. industrial, electro, whatever. think these trax hint at some sonic territory that’s still waiting for someone to take it even furthur…
anybody know: is other dauner from this time the same sound mold? or nearly as interesting?
doug w // Mar 20, 2007 at 11:45 pm
Dauner’s incorporation of avant-electronics was never so extreme as on OUTPUT. Though y’all should check out Robin Kenyatta’s GIRL FROM MARTINIQUE, another oop title from the early days of ECM, which sonically-speaking ain’t so far removed from Dauner’s disc.
Other Dauner titles from this era:
THE OIMELS (1969) catches much praise from various camps (including Steve Stapleton– I was of the impression that this was his choice album, rather than OUTPUT. Certainly his “Cooloorta Moon” takes a sizeable bite from Dauner’s “My Man’s Gone Now”.) Me, I tend to skip over it, as I’ve never much grown to its quaint late-60s oddball lounge vibe.
MUSIC ZOUNDS (1970) is a relatively straight acoustic trio album.
RISCHKA’S SOUL (1971) is a sort of return to the off-kilter R&B loungecore of the OIMELS. My copy is a Brain reissue, retitled THIS IS WOLFGANG DAUNER.
Dauner then formed– or moreso transformed his existing band into– Et Cetera, a psychedelic jazz group. Three wonderful albums, including the self-titled debut, KNIRSCH, and the double LIVE. I’d recommend all of ‘em to those who find favour with OUTPUT.
To comment on the original D:O post, I’m thinking we need more love for the other half of the rhythm section, American drummer Fred Braceful (dr). After Et Cetera, he co-founded the Exmagma trio, whose first record would also sit well next to OUTPUT.
On the subject of anomalous albums, check the first release on ECM sister label, Japo. Mal Waldron’s THE CALL again features Weber/Braceful, as well as Jimmy Jackson on organ, offering two sidelong slices of cosmic jazz and expanding on Waldron’s tenure with Embryo. Did Japo ever again travel those spaceways?
ledrew // Mar 21, 2007 at 1:06 am
That’s killer, doug. Thanks for the recap on Dauner, and for giving the drummer some.
Colin // Mar 22, 2007 at 3:39 pm
Dauner released some albums on the now sadly defunct Mood Records out of Munich. Their cover designs were reminiscent of this one black and white and arty. Dauner deserves much more attention than he’s generally received outside Germany. Thanks for this.
centrifuge // Mar 23, 2007 at 4:49 am
it does go down more smoothly second time around i must admit…
ursula // Mar 23, 2007 at 6:57 am
Dauner’s quite entrancing thing, I must admit. Always search the web for cool music ipod music download is a site where one can compile perfect playlists. A cushy spot for a music addict!