Friday 17 July, 2009

S.Y.P.H. - PST! / S.Y.P.H. (1980/1981)


S.Y.P.H - A German band somewhere between Punk, Avantgarde and Neue Deutsche Welle. Founded in 1977 by Harry Rag (Peter Braatz), Uwe Jahnke and Thomas Schwebel in Solingen, Germany. Thomas Schwebel hit upon the idea of naming the band "SYPH" because it's a dirty name. Harry Rag added the periods to make it look like an acronym and confuse people. S.Y.P.H. was then translated into "Saufender Yankee Prügelt Homo" (Drinking yankee beats queer). After 1986 it stood for "Save Your Pretty Heart" 
When Schwebel said goodbye to play with Mittagspause, the band was joined by Uli Putsch and Jürgen Wolter. This new formation stayed - more or less - stable until 1981, but had many changing guest musicians, including Holger Czukay from Can. In return S.Y.P.H. played with Czukay on his LP On The Way To The Peak Of Normal. Uwe Jahnke also appears on the Wobble/Liebezeit/Czukay EP "How Much Are They?". 
The band paused in 2003 and is now active again. [discogs.com]

The word "krautrock" hardly means anything to me, and it seems to make as much sense as calling all rock made in France as "frogrock"; "outrock" is equally opaque to my ears, and I confess I'm frequently left without words to describe some forms of rock-based music. There is something undescribeable about S.Y.P.H. While they may at first sound like your regular NDW band with some strands of art-rock and a little more sophisticated noise input than usual, their incursions into abstract sonics and the occasional use of concrète-like tactics would draw them closer to so-called industrial scene. Czukay's familiar contributions on horns, bass and percussion will attract fans of Can, and also make this a more palatable experience for less abstract-inclined listeners; but behind his rhythmical acupuncture layers of uncanny and self-contained noise constantly emerge, drawing us into territories rarely covered by the kraut posse. S.Y.P.H are one of those bands that challenge all labels -- a headache for critics, maybe, but a treat for listeners. Steve Kanaly

PST! (1980)
1. Euroton (0:52)
2. Einsam In Wien (Lustlos) (5:32)
3. Moderne Romantik (3:01)
4. Lametta (3:50)
5. Modell (1:47)
6. Alpha & Vieta (1:35)
7. Nachbar (3:15)
8. Regentanz (8:43)
9. Stress (6:45)
10. Do The Fleischwurst (4:26)

Bass - Jürgen Wolter 
Drums - Uli Putsch 
Vocals, Guitar - Harry Rag 
Guitar - Uwe Jahnke 
Horn, Percussion, Bass, Harmonica - Holger Czukay 
S.Y.P.H. (1981)
11. Die Deep (1:18)
12. Haenschen Horror (1:11)
13. Laemmerschwanz (1:57)
14. Nachbar (Long Version) (13:39)
15. Satarasch (2:52)
16. Little Nemo (18:03)

Bass - Jürgen Wolter
Vocals, Guitar - Harry Rag , Uwe Jahnke 
Drums - Uli Putsch 
Horns, Percussion, Bass - Holger Czukay 

Both albums originally released on LP by Pure Freude. 
CD release in 1998 by Captain Trip

link@320

10 comments:

icastico said...

Krautrock is a problematic moniker, but not as bad as "post-punk" or the even worse "post-rock."

One includes everything recorded since, what, 1975 and the other everything since 1955?

Best to just listen and not label, methinks.

Anonymous said...

Thanks a lot for this. Totally new to me. Really enjoyed it, especially the hypnotic 'Little Nemo'. There's more S.Y.P.H. posted here, apparently.

Anonymous said...

merci, juju!

didn't got around listening to this band very much, although they're country mates of mine. first heard them on czukay's ode to the peak of normal lp, which i enjoy a lot. what i heard from their own output didn't knock me out, but i haven't heard the early stuff you present here.

salute! and thanks for the detailed information - always appreciated :)

Anonymous said...

p.s.: the out-of-print s.y.p.h. lp #3 has been posted by brotbeutel today.

Anonymous said...

p.p.s.: just found out that continuo tried to link to brotbeutel as well - he only added a slash at the end, which causes blogger to tell, that the side doesn't exist...

Anonymous said...

You see? You Lucky, me Pozzo.

Anonymous said...

On the other hand with regards to-

bravo juju said...

glad someone liked this. thanks for the notes and the links and the pozzo-links. may the second half of July grant you well-deserved prosperity.

BCR said...

thanx for sharing! this looks to be a tasty artifact!

Viagra said...

This album contains very good art style. I would like to buy this kind of works in order to have also the original art.