Camera "Prosthuman" 2021 Germany Kraut Rock,Electonic Rock,Space Rock
With the band’s tenth anniversary in their viewfinder, CAMERA are all set to push the button on “Prosthuman”, their fifth studio album in February 2021. As befits an age in which realities can change in the blink of an eye, from one day to the next, the Berlin band never tire of changing themselves, their music or personnel. As Karlheinz Stockhausen noted: “New methods change the experience. New experiences change man.” Taking this as their lead, Michael Drummer (the drummer) and CAMERA surprise us once more on “Prosthuman” as they reinvent and reformulate their sound without sacrificing the project’s identity which has matured over the past decade. Less surprising is the fact that some record stores give CAMERA their own section, alongside Krautrock pioneers like NEU!, Can and La Düsseldorf....~ With the band's tenth anniversary in their viewfinder, CAMERA are all set to push the button on "Prosthuman", their fifth studio album in February 2021. As befits an age in which realities can change in the blink of an eye, from one day to the next, the Berlin band never tire of changing themselves, their music or personnel. As Karlheinz Stockhausen noted: "New methods change the experience. New experiences change man." Taking this as their lead, Michael Drummer (the drummer) and CAMERA surprise us once more on "Prosthuman" as they reinvent and reformulate their sound without sacrificing the project's identity which has matured over the past decade. Less surprising is the fact that some record stores give CAMERA their own section, alongside Krautrock pioneers like NEU!, Can and La Düsseldorf. "Emotional Detox", the predecessor to this album, was distinguished by the presence of two keyboard virtuosos (Steffen Kahles and CAMERA founder member Timm Brockmann). Finding replacements for "Prosthuman" was, as Michael Drummer stresses, "a difficult process." The two keyboardists had – in different creative periods – formed the backbone of a band structure otherwise prone to fluctuations. Decisive input came from an unlikely source: Tim Schroeder, who first teamed up with CAMERA as a performance and video artist on their six-week tour of the USA in 2017. Over the course of various jams and recording sessions, he was able to offer ample proof of his synthesizers skills. Alex Kozmidi, a musician and composer with a flair for experimentation, completed the triumvirate on guitar, with Michael Drummer adding his own guitar riffs here and there. Change and friction can be useful allies in pursuit of creativity, something to which Drummer has grown accustomed as the only ever-present member of CAMERA. The pleasures and pain of isolation – suddenly a mass phenomenon in pandemic times – are well known to the quasi frontman of the group. Over the years, he has spent many hours alone or with a shifting cast of co-musicians in the band's basement studio, beneath a former factory site in a less than hip southern district of Berlin. Virus-induced social distancing and quarantine measures that came into force during the recording process (June 2019 to June 2020) thus posed no great challenge. Finding the musical framework for "Prosthuman" required a great deal of commitment, enthusiasm and – clearly – plenty of time, Drummer admits. This is, in itself, an impressive achievement – in spite of shifts in instrumentation, the ten tracks comprising the album fall into place like a progressively unfolding narrative. There is no apparent beginning to the record, no obvious ending – rather more a sense of being right in the middle, with no immediate reference to any of the previous albums. At the same time, traces of the paths travelled on "Radiate!" (2012), "Remember I Was Carbone Dioxide" (2014), "Phantom Of Liberty" (2016) and "Emotional Detox" (2018) are discernible. Michael Drummer's approach to drumming is more than a constant reference point, emerging as the decisive element which pins everything together. From surgically precise aggression on the galloping album opener "Kartoffelstampf", Drummer is able to switch the tone to refreshing nonchalance on the record's most placatory pieces, "Freundschaft" and "Chords4 / Kurz Vor". Julian Cope compared the evolving Krautrock movement of the 1960s and 1970s to Doctor Who's time machine, a particularly apt analogy. "You pass through a narrow portal and arrive in a gigantic, dynamic space." In the early 2010s, CAMERA discovered this very portal which had generally been forgotten by German music history, presumed lost. Without asking for permission, they cleared away the rubble blocking the entrance and bravely made their way through. Thanks to DIY gigs in underground train tunnels and above ground on road junctions, they became known as the "Krautrock guerrillas". Franz Bargmann, founding member and guitarist of the band in those days, is now one half of the ambient duo Brockmann // Bargmann with Timm Brockmann and a member of the Michael Rother (NEU!, Harmonia) live band. Five albums later, it is clear that any attempt to label CAMERA as epigones falls well short of the mark. Michael Drummer's collective moves through the "gigantic, dynamic space" in thoroughly engrossing fashion, even though the portal in question has widened to admit wave after wave of transnational Krautrock-inspired projects. Once you have found the way in, there would seem to be space for everyone and everything......~
Krautrock-Guerilla: This label was given to Camera because the trio of that time spontaneously played everywhere in Berlin where they liked it. That could be backyards, subway platforms, but also the men's room during the echo award ceremony. In this way, with humor and anarchy, they earned many fans who can now hear the fifth album of the band, which has been constantly changing in almost ten years of band history. On "Prosthuman" the band shows again not only their love for word games, but also for transformation: Musically they inject new sounds into their herb, for example "Alar Alar" is surprisingly trippy and flirts with reggae. "Prosthuman / Apptime" then reminds us of the floating cosmic sounds of Tangerine Dreamto finally merge into a synth vortex with the chirping of birds. The band has changed personnel once again: If the previous album "Emotional Detox" was still dominated by two keyboardists, a replacement had to be found for "Prosthuman", whereby guitarist Alex Kozmidi and keyboardist Tim Schroeder bring new input into the fluid band structure. The only permanent member of the band, the drummer with the eloquent name Michael Drummer, remains a constant and catalyst by driving the band's sound image further. Cheers to that!..~
In an era in which realities change in the blink of an eye, the Berliners Camera demonstrate that they have no fear in facing the transformations, adopting a famous maxim of the poet Karlheinz Stockhausen: "New methods change experience. New experiences change man ". For the fifth album, the band led by drummer / guitarist Michael Drummer had to endure the exit of the two virtuosos keyboardists Steffen Kahles and Timm Brockmann - historical backbone - opening a difficult process of internal mutation, bridged with the stable integration of Tim Schröeder, former collaborator of the visual parts of the group and unexpectedly revealed to be a skilled keyboard player, to which was then added the contribution of Alex Kozmidi, It is therefore understandable that even the sound matrix has undergone an important restyling led to reformulate the typical sound of the Camera, based on a classic kraut-rock possibly spiced with some psychedelic touches . New contaminations from new wave , space-rock, folk and even dub-reggae have entered with praiseworthy construction within structures that preserve the typical motorsport sequences . The album starts at a gallop with "Kartoffelstampf", shooting acid guitars and pulsating bass at point blank range: a meeting between Can and Loopset in the underworld. The rhythm becomes ghostly in "Alar Alar", in which the singular mix of reggae and cosmic music seduces, while the title track , coupled with the appendix "Apptime", opens to more synthetic sounds, exiling the guitars for a moment in favor of brilliant and clean electronics, and then suddenly recall them on the final. "Überall Teilchen / Teilchen Überall" is a free delirium kosmische musik , a jam laced by a vocal sample slowly engulfed in layers of livid electronic and bizarre psych nuggets à-la West Coast Pop Art Experimental Band. The new wave emerges in "Freundschaft" with its tangled melody that advances on a rational pop emotionality; a diamond in the rough that seems to come from the hidden grooves of the early New Order , until the enthralling "El Ley" shows up to explode all its kraut-rock propulsion. The situation gets complicated in "Schmwarf", a spasmodic and extravagant groove that clearly refers to the characteristic Berlin sound., dark, provocative, quirky and exciting. "A2" goes head-on down the same dirty alleys, focusing on a free lead guitar line, waiting for the gorgeous "Chords4 / Kurz Vor" to clean up the scenery with the plasticized purity of synthetic sounds, before letting it trace guitar I scribble more recalcitrant textures, to close with the adorable urban impulse of "Harmonite", loosened by sparkling synths and small touches of sax. "Prosthuman" is a dazzling diary that has neither a fixed beginning nor an end; a creative flow that does not want to drag with tricks, but tries to flow in the middle of the current in a well-defined direction. A stylistic change imposed by events or sought with firmness, demonstrating that variations and frictions can become useful allies in the search for a new and stimulating creativity....by Cristiano Orlando....la onda rock......~
Camera will celebrate its tenth anniversary in 2021. During this time the band has changed personnel again and again, with drummer Michael Drummer as the only constant. The staff fluctuation continues on the band's fifth album with the beautiful title Prosthuman , which will be released in February 2021 ; From the line-up of the predecessor Emotional Detox , only Michael Drummer is left, with Tim Schroeder on the synths and Alex Kozmidi on the guitar. After their electronically dominated predecessor, cameras on Prosthuman are again more guitar-heavy, of course without completely neglecting the electronics; individual pieces still have a strong electronic list. Accordingly, the inspirations can now be found less in Düsseldorf than in Cologne; because the spirit of Can seems to hover over large parts of the album. Pieces like the mashed potatoes and Schmwarf, dominated by the sawing guitar, or the Alar Alar , which is pervaded by a dub-like rhythm, are clearly in the tradition of the legendary Cologne formation. The guitar in particular always sounds like the blessed Michael Karoli, but the stoic rhythm of Jaki Liebezeit has also emergedProsthuman leave their mark. When the electronics - at least in phases - emerge more clearly, influences of the Berlin school ( El Ley ) as well as those of the Düsseldorf style ( A2 ) become apparent . The pieces are predominantly instrumental, only occasionally there are a few interspersed speech samples. Camera prove to be one of the most important representatives of contemporary Krautrock on Prosthuman . Always inspired by the spirit of the 70s, but with its own character. Each work of the band has so far had its own character, celebrating different varieties of Krautrock.....By: Jochen Rindfrey....babyblaue prog.....~ When a band line-up changes quickly, like a carousel, so to speak, then it's not just the audience that loses track of things. For Michael Drummer, meanwhile the only permanent member of Camera , the fact of the change is nothing negative. Certainly, the departure of the two keyboard players had to be coped with with “Prosthuman”, but the synthesizers still bubble and whine (“Prosthuman / Apptime”). Several melodies cooperate, plus a pleasant rhythm and limitless further development. The Krautrock from Camera is a snappy and versatile pleasure. At the beginning of “Prosthuman”, the ideas and experiments are still served individually, the songs enjoy the available space and the band uses repetitions for the evocation. Later on on the record, the songs are breathed new life into with chants and a condensation of possibilities. "Chords4 / Kurz Vor" uses strings and keys equally for a relaxed and groovy feeling, "El Ley" focuses on energy and speed à la Portishead. Recorded in the band's own studio in Berlin, Camera were not only able to tinker with their compositions for a year and thus create herbaceous, psychedelic and wondrous passages, but were also able to avoid the aggravating conditions of the pandemic a little. You don't feel much of the pressure and burden on “Prosthuman”, the album is a pleasurable look back without wanting to leave the present.....~ Line Up Band members: Michael Drummer Alex Kozmidi Tim Schroeder
Tracklisting: 1. Kartoffelstampf 2. Alar Alar 3. Prosthuman / Apptime 4. Überall Teilchen / Teilchen Überall 5. Freundschaft 6. El Ley 7. Schmwarf 8. A2 9. Chords4 / Kurz Vor 10. Harmonite