Monks - The Transatlantic Feedback

Today's show was opened by

the Monks with the original

"Boys are boys and girls are

choice". A few days ago they

released their first record with an

unusual, new and surprising sound.

Germany, July 1966

In retrospect I don't see

a difference between

James Last and the Beatles.

Not to mention the

unutterable Rolling Stones.

It was a shock to see them play

among the other harmless bands.

The vitality and the minimalism,

back then I didn't know

you could call it minimalism.

That fascinated me, and the

hardness. Their style was hard.

There wasn't anything like it.

"The beat is dead,

long live the hop"!

"Monks" want to

outstrip the Beatles

Learnt beat music

in the army

Trench

Kennedy publishes pictures

of soviet missile installations

on Cuba and reveals soviet intent

to turn Castro's sugar island

into a military base.

The fear of a war terrified

the world for an entire week.

After their turbulent American tour

the Beatles come back to England.

The following should be considered

as an observation,

a study on a manifestation, which

hardly can be described as

excitement, ecstasy, or hysteria.

It is phenomenon, something

for psychologists,

sociologists, and cultural critics.

Youth organizing "leisure time".

Not in Liverpool but in Hamburg.

A genre picture, which

was recorded during

the nomination of Germany's

best "beatle band".

Folkwang School of Design

Basic Course

"Gestalt" is a fantastic term that

suggest no gradation between

cause and effect.

"The art of advertising"

Ulm School of Design

"Also tomorrow no experiments"

It sounded different. I thought

you have to do this band.

I liked that Remy and Niemann

were so much behind it.

The music fascinated me

because it was archaic,

some sort of industrial music.

The lyrics indicated something that

wasn't the typical love song.

Then we started working.

And both told me they would

work even more on the lyrics.

"The inappropriate war"

Trespassing for underaged

not allowed

The "Top Ten", formerly the

Hypodrome, rebuilt,

Hamburg's 1st beat joint, in 60/61

monthly gigs of the Beatles,

now renovated, compared to

the "Star-Club" more refined.

3 important events connect the

Beatles to the "Top Ten":

1. Here they had their first

loyal fan base

2. Here they were discovered

for their first recordings.

3. Here their trademark was

created; the haircut.

Noise, noise and no melody

The Monks:
Fight against soft

style of the Beatles

"The beat is dead,

long live the hop"!

It was so loud that I left the club.

I couldn't bear it. My ears

were blown off.

I said to myself "get out and

listen to it from the outside".

There it filtered differently

and I thought, "that's it".

"This sound is unmistakable".

"If we can preserve it

on tape this way

then we are talking about a

turning point in rock history".

You see, back then the term

didn't exist. I realized later,

that this was an early

form of heavy metal.

Whereas with other bands there is

a guitarist, a bassist, a drummer

and each of them had its qualities

and somehow they got a sound.

With the Monks you had a

concentrated elemental force,

the single instrument wasn't

important anymore.

It was the total sound as a group.

For me it was a huge challenge to

capture that wall of sound on tape.

We didn't want to lose any of it.

The main microphone was

the ambient one,

which reflected the entire band.

For support of each individual

instrument we used single mikes

to get the distorted guitar,

the electrified banjo

or the shrieking organ. That's

what we wanted to transmit.

In 2 days we recorded

an entire LP.

There was no time for fooling

around. It had to be ready.

Beat-Club, July 1966

From the first beat on

I was electrified.

The vitality they transmitted.

Other bands just stood at the

microphone, often times blas

imitating the English, like the

Lord of Kensington for example.

You could feel

a certain arrogance.

If you watch Beat-Club you see how

stiff and neat people went there,

somehow still very bourgeois.

Beat music's origin stems from an

old fashioned aesthetic order,

indulging in Bach, the tonic,

subdominant and dominant

as the superstructure.

The Monks negated all that.

Okay, it was fun too,

what the Monks did.

But it was a bit more

than just fun.

In my eyes the Monks were

calling upon people for Liberation.

We could have had the

'68 revolution 2 years earlier

if people just had understood.

"Chancellor Erhard"

It wasn't good business

for the boys.

It was too difficult to

make the big buck.

Brutal "Monks"

There were two different tracks.

The big concerts in large halls

and then there were the clubs.

For example in Hamburg the

"Star-Club" or the "Top Ten".

But that wasn't everything.

Especially in the small towns there

were guesthouses with ballrooms

and on Sundays and Saturdays

they organized a teenage dance.

For very little money young

people could go and dance.

Most of the times when the

Monks started playing

for the first two songs nobody

would join the dance floor.

That enervated the Monks

and the club owner.

He would ask me, "hey, what is

that? People don't like that music".

The US-Beatles with the sun roofs

Their trademark:
Neat bald heads

Complication

Complication

Complication

Complication

People cry

People die for you.

People kill

People will for you.

People run

Ain't it fun for you?

People go

To their deaths for you.

After the explosion 4 years ago

this sports car was named

"White Orchid".

A work by the pop artist Arman.

In Dsseldorf at Corneliusstrasse

15 the sculpture is an ornamental

piece among other pop attractions

for a "creative workshop".

The owner of the workshop paid

$3.000 for the "White Orchid".

Charles Wilp, pop fanatic and star

of the German ad photographers.

Since my early days I am into

space travel, so I knew about

physical weightlessness.

It started in '63 with the

launching of the first Apollo.

And I connected that with

my idea of the Monks.

If I may complete, which art

status the Monks had,

then for me it was the first

moment of a weightless group,

not only mentally weightless

but also physically

by smashing to pieces everything.

Corneliusstrasse was thrown

into turmoil and the young kids

surrounded them because they

had the feeling for this music.

They came into the

right atmosphere.

I didn't have to change

their "world".

The fact that they wore tonsures

meant to be blasphemous

like me with my nuns.

It happened through Remy and

Niemann. Both saw in me

the right person to promote the

Monks, which I couldn't.

But I could help by getting them to

perform my advertising music

and trying to cause an

overnight success.

That's how I met with the

artificial creation "Monks".

Musically they stood on

a very high platform.

You couldn't categorize them.

It was hard rock -

if you could call

it rock at all.

They made vibrations, high

frequency rhythms,

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