Drone Records

SAND - His first Steps

Format: LP

Label & Cat.Number: Rotorelief ROTOR 0005

Release Year: 2016

Note: recorded 1972-1973 as a "forerunner" to GOLEM with early/different versions, just after the split up of P.O.T. (Part of Time); 5th in the series of SAND albums on Rotorelief, lim. 700 coloured vinyl, luxurius oversize cover

Price (incl. 19% VAT): €25.00

More Info

"The present album is a forerunner of GOLEM, the legendary album from the cosmic and psychedelic genius that is Sand. After the split of POT the early SAND submerged as a threesome in the basement of Claudiusstrasse and built up an alchemical assembling shop, where they resurrected the archetypical GOLEM. SAND considered themselves as an exile community in a fascinating area - full of distinctly bizarre energy.

There is something magical and inexplicable in creation, and Sand manifest absolutely these mysterious phenomena. Story-tellers, musicians, shamans, geniuses, Sand were known, at the end of the 60s, as P.O.T. (Part of Time). The music they created at that time has remained unreleased until now.

Two different approaches are evident within this band. The first—which is shown in the compositions of the trio Ludwig Papenberg, his brother Ullrich Papenberg and Johannes Vester—is avant-gardist, experimental and proto-industrial. The second, when this same trio is augmented with a few extra members, reveals a more emphatically “rock” side, somewhat in the vein of Pink Floyd’s The Piper at the Gates of Dawn, perhaps making it somewhat less personal than the visionary and experimental positions characteristic of Sand, a truly unique entity in the history of music.

At that time Klaus Schulze was developing, with engineer Manfred Schunke, a specialised recording process called “Artificial Head Stereo Sound”, which, like “Surround Sound”, created the illusion of the music coming from 360º around the listener. Schulze chose Sand to record in his studio one of a series of records to demonstrate this new technique. Sand’s album Golem was recorded and released on the Delta-Acustic label in 1974.

Sand acknowledge that Manfred Schunke and Klaus Schulze were Sand’s most important mentors.

Although classed as “Krautrock”, Sand are not really in the Krautrock style, despite being part of this movement of German cosmic/psychedelic bands. Instead they take us on a cerebral/cosmic/strange/dark trip all of their own, with a highly original subtlety, elegance and strength. Trapped in the trip, swallowed up by the quicksands, seduced by the unique and innovative combination of acoustic guitars, synthesisers, sound generators, short-wave radios, factory noises, hammers from the shipyards, agricultural machines, whirls of sand and eerie atmospheres, the listener discovers and lives the story of Sand and his Golem.

Julian Cope wrote of Golem in his HeadHeritage’s website’s “Album of the Month” column, “Dig this fucking weird Saxony sound and fill your heart”.

Rotorelief releases, in 2010, a series of unreleased albums by Sand as well as a reissue of Sand’s only album, the obscure and rare Golem, first released by Delta Acustic in 1974, along with related releases by Nurse with Wound and Current 93.

This series of albums from Sand is called “INXOM”, the series title having one letter for each album, explained by Johannes Vester as follows:

“Incoming, Inspiration, (...) In X is OM (Odem) which could mean ‘There is Om/Odem/Atman in the Unknown (X)’ ; this also corresponds to "shem" which is in XOM,—the meaning in the Golem Myth. Last, but not least, for me it sounds like the electronic attitude in symbiosis with Sand's spirit....”

And also called '' INXODEM '' with 5x Sand album (INXOM) from 70's + 1 album of Nurse With Wound (2013) and 1 45RMP twelve inch of Current 93 (1992) :

"His First Steps" (I) / is a previous, unreleased and variety album (1972 & 1973) of "Golem"
"Golem" (N) / legendary album composed in 1972 and 1973 (released in 1974)
"Desert Navigation" (X) / unreleased album, titles composed in 1973, 1975 and one track from 1982
"Sylph Ballet" (O) / unreleased album, titles composed in 1969, 1972, 1973, 1974, 1975 and 1976
"North Atlantic Raven" (M) / unreleased album, titles composed in 1973, 1975 & 1976

(+ bonus 1982)
"Chromanatron" (E), by Nurse With Wound composed in 2013 with sounds and extracts from Sand

"When the May Rain Comes" (D), 2 varieties of the reprise title "May Rain" of Sand by Current 93 in 1992

Today, 40 years later, here the cool sound jugglers, founders and new members, go again (Ludwig and Ulrich Papenberg, Johannes Vester, Christian von der Schulenburg and Richard Pappik) then Sand is active in a creative frenzy timeless...

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