Can – Soundtracks
Liberty – LBS 83 437 I GERMANY 1970
Can did a lot of soundtrack work, for both film and television, so “Soundtracks” cherry picks the highlights and arranges them in a very intelligent tracklist.
However, the real killing blow for “Soundtracks” is how it all ends. “Mother Sky” recorded in July 1970 for the soundtrack of Jerzy Skolimowski's film Deep End is fourteen and a half minutes of utter devastation. Probably the most scorched, searching guitar work Karoli ever released. Here sounds like he is unpicking the skies with his fingers. Underneath that, Holger and Jaki fuse into an inhuman rhythm machine playing some secret, primal, snapping, tribal stomp. When Jaki begins unleashing drum rolls, it is physically impossible not to move in some way. The whole rhythm insinuates its way into your body and takes over in a manner that would be frightening if it wasn’t so pleasurable. Damo sings softly over the top finding exactly the right words to articulate what is going on, like some gentle shaman. Irmin, sneaks in
making his keyboards sound like electric shocks. It is a musical bomb.
The picture is from the original Liberty's promotional poster for Soundtracks,and was used at the back cover of the original record too. A German original copy is rare and sought after nowadays.
