Album artwork for The Lost Tapes by Can

CD - standard triple cd edition. not lost at all, but just forgotten about in can's cluttered studio until archived by the classic german psych-rock explorers' irmin schmidt recently, this three-disc dump of material is unfeasibly good considering it managed to avoid the light of day until almost half a decade ago. where to start with the 30 tracks therein? some might be familiar, including live versions of 'spoon' and 'mushroom' and the teasingly-titled 'on the way to mother sky', a less focused, more freaked-out version of one of their greatest songs. then there is a plethora of new and never-heard-before tracks: the hissing stammer of 'messers, scissors, fork and light'; the staggering rhythm 'n' spacerock exploration of 'midnight men'; the punishing, fuzzed-up guitar blues of 'bubble rap', and so many more besides. not just for completists, this is an essential entry in the canography.

LP+ - Can’s The Lost Tapes will be re-released as a limited edition 5 LP box set on 180g vinyl. The Lost Tapes was curated by Irmin Schmidt and Daniel Miller, compiled by Irmin Schmidt and Jono Podmore, and edited by Jono Podmore. The vinyl issue of The Lost Tapes will come with a 24” square poster and a 28 page booklet with sleeve notes by Irmin Schmidt and Ian Harrison. As is now known, when the legendary Can studio in Weilerswist was sold to the German Rock N Pop Museum, they bought everything, including the army mattresses that covered the walls for sound protection, and relocated it to Gronau. Whilst dismantling the studio, master tapes were found and stored in the Spoon archive. With barely legible labeling, no one was sure what was on these until Irmin Schmidt and long time collaborator Jono Podmore started to go through over 50 hours of music. What they found was years of archived material, not outtakes, but rather tracks which had been shelved for a variety of reasons – soundtracks to films that were never released and tracks that didn’t make it onto the final versions of albums due to space. The final cut of tracks, dating from 1968-1977, features studio material recorded at Schloss Nörvenich and Can Studio, Weilerswist with the Can line up of Holger Czukay on bass, Michael Karoli on guitars, Jaki Liebezeit on drums and Irmin Schmidt on keyboards, and on most tracks, vocals from Malcolm Mooney or Damo Suzuki. Can’s influence is well known and far-reaching and the impact they made on music is felt today as keenly as it ever has been. They themselves have always been impossible to classify and reflecting this, the scope of artists who in recent years have cited Can as a major influence is varied from John Lydon to Radiohead, The Fall to Portishead.

Can

The Lost Tapes

Mute
Album artwork for The Lost Tapes by Can
CDx3

$29.99

Released 10/09/2012Catalog Number

695432B

Learn more
Can

The Lost Tapes

Mute
Album artwork for The Lost Tapes by Can
CDx3

$29.99

Released 10/09/2012Catalog Number

695432B

Learn more

CD - standard triple cd edition. not lost at all, but just forgotten about in can's cluttered studio until archived by the classic german psych-rock explorers' irmin schmidt recently, this three-disc dump of material is unfeasibly good considering it managed to avoid the light of day until almost half a decade ago. where to start with the 30 tracks therein? some might be familiar, including live versions of 'spoon' and 'mushroom' and the teasingly-titled 'on the way to mother sky', a less focused, more freaked-out version of one of their greatest songs. then there is a plethora of new and never-heard-before tracks: the hissing stammer of 'messers, scissors, fork and light'; the staggering rhythm 'n' spacerock exploration of 'midnight men'; the punishing, fuzzed-up guitar blues of 'bubble rap', and so many more besides. not just for completists, this is an essential entry in the canography.

LP+ - Can’s The Lost Tapes will be re-released as a limited edition 5 LP box set on 180g vinyl. The Lost Tapes was curated by Irmin Schmidt and Daniel Miller, compiled by Irmin Schmidt and Jono Podmore, and edited by Jono Podmore. The vinyl issue of The Lost Tapes will come with a 24” square poster and a 28 page booklet with sleeve notes by Irmin Schmidt and Ian Harrison. As is now known, when the legendary Can studio in Weilerswist was sold to the German Rock N Pop Museum, they bought everything, including the army mattresses that covered the walls for sound protection, and relocated it to Gronau. Whilst dismantling the studio, master tapes were found and stored in the Spoon archive. With barely legible labeling, no one was sure what was on these until Irmin Schmidt and long time collaborator Jono Podmore started to go through over 50 hours of music. What they found was years of archived material, not outtakes, but rather tracks which had been shelved for a variety of reasons – soundtracks to films that were never released and tracks that didn’t make it onto the final versions of albums due to space. The final cut of tracks, dating from 1968-1977, features studio material recorded at Schloss Nörvenich and Can Studio, Weilerswist with the Can line up of Holger Czukay on bass, Michael Karoli on guitars, Jaki Liebezeit on drums and Irmin Schmidt on keyboards, and on most tracks, vocals from Malcolm Mooney or Damo Suzuki. Can’s influence is well known and far-reaching and the impact they made on music is felt today as keenly as it ever has been. They themselves have always been impossible to classify and reflecting this, the scope of artists who in recent years have cited Can as a major influence is varied from John Lydon to Radiohead, The Fall to Portishead.