Newsgroup: it.arti.musica.rock.progressive
Titolo: Cerco info gruppo rock jazz tedesco

Salve,  spero proprio che qualcuno mi possa aiutare!!
Sto cercando informazioni su un gruppo rock, anche se la definizione
e' un po' vaga, di origine tedesca degli anni 70-80 che si chiama
Guru-Guru. Io posseggo ancora una vecchisima cassetta di un live
bellissimo!!
Vi prego aiutatemi!! Erano ganzissimi e io ci ho passato ore e ore a
sentirli!!
Un sincero grazie a chi mi vorra' aiutare
Sauro

GURU GURU
Personnel:
"	MANI NEUMEIER d,v 
"	(ULI TREPTE b) A-C 
"	(HANS SACHS v) A 
"	(JIM KENNEDY g) B 
"	(AX GENRICH g) C-E 
"	(BRUNO SCHAAB b) D 
"	(HANS HARTMANN b) E 
"	(HOUSCHANG NEJADEPOUR g) F 
"	(CONNY VEIT g) G 
"	SEPP JANDRISITS g H 
"	JARGEN 'JOGI' KARPENKIEL b H 
"	ROLAND SCHAEFFER sax, g, v H 
ALBUMS (up to '76): 
1.	(C)"UFO" (Ohr OMM 56 005) 1971 
2.	(C)"Hinten" (Ohr OMM 556 017) 1971 
3.	(C)"Kan Guru" (Brain 1007) 1972 
4.	(D)same (Brain 1025) 1973 
5.	(E)"Don't Call Us, We'll Call You" (Atlantic 50022) 1973 
6.	(F)"Dance Of The Flames" (Atlantic K50044) 1974 
7.	(-)"Mani Und Seine Freunde" (Atlantic K50157) 1975 
8.	(H)"Tango Fango" (Brain 1089) 1976 
NB: There is a LP Hot On Spot/Inbetween credited to Guru Guru/U.
Trepte (TTE 002) (CD only, 1988). The 1st part was recorded live in
1972, the 2nd part was sessions with R. Bunka, Ch. Burchard, C. Bohn,
W. Pape & Rosi Rosi (?) recorded July 1974.
One of the earliest and most legendary of German groups was Guru Guru,
led by the outstanding, colourful Mani Neumeier, who was born on 31
December 1940 in Munich. Up to 1967 Neumeier and Uli Trepte were
members of the free jazz combo Irene Schweitzer Trio. The Guru Guru
Groove came to life in 1968 with Neumeier, Trepte and Hans Sachs,
debuting at the 'Holy Hill Festival', Heidelberg, in August. On 29
September they performed at the Internationale Song Tage in Essen.
This must have been something completely outrageous: Neumeier and
Trepte performing improvised free jazz against which Sachs read texts.
In the Spring of 1969 Sachs left and the name was shortened to Guru
Guru. Several guitarists joined and quit (the longest lasting was Jim
Kennedy) before Ax Genrich became a permanent member in April 1970. He
had previously played with the Berlin group Agitation Free. In June
this trio recorded UFO with Julius Schittenhelm. This utterly tripped
out album featured notorious titles such as "Stone In" and "Der LSD
Marsch", hinting at some possible sources of their inspiration. The
music was thunderous, heavy psychedelic space rock, often bordering on
pure mayhem. As in the case of early Ash Ra Tempel, this was a power
trio dedicated to endless, improvised space excursions, like a
continuation of Pink Floyd's "Interstellar Overdrive" or Hendrix'
"ESP" As you'll guess, this was pretty powerful stuff that could had
been a soundtrack celebrating the arrival of UFOs! 
Their next work, Hinten (recorded in July 1971 at Star Studios with
Konrad Plank), was basically more of the same kind, though calmer and
with some signs of structure evident. This time Neumeier also sang
some nonsensical lyrics for our general pleasure. The opening track
"Electric Junk" is a typical example of Guru Guru's early music: it
started as a loud Hendrix rocker, continued with spoken lyrics to a
backing of percussion and noises, then a Cream-styled instrumental
part, followed by a floating space rock passage with strange mumbling
and ending in a Hendrix-esque frenzy. Kan Guru (1972) was a further
development on their freaky jamming style, with the shortest back
"Oxymoron" clocking in at almost 11 minutes. For many people, this
album was Guru Guru's finest achievement. As judged by "Bo Diddley" on
Hot On Spot (a 'split CD' where the other half was filled with
exciting tracks by Uli Trepte and friends), Guru Guru was a
fascinating, if somewhat undisciplined, live act. After this, Uli
Trepte left the group for solo sessions, Tomorrow's Gift, Faust,
Kickbit Information and at last his own group Spacebox. He was
replaced with Bruno Schaab, previously of the hard rock group Night
Sun. Guru Guru's fourth album (1973) proved to be their most patchy to
date. After three albums of brilliant space rock the time was ripe for
something new, but apparently the group didn't know exactly what!. One
side contained two short and commercial rock numbers (coupled as their
first single) followed by a lenghty rock'n'roll medley! The other side
had: "Der Elektrolurch", a silly number soon to be their favourite
live number, where Neumeier, jumped around in a frenzied war dance
dressed as a red Indian, and "The Story Of Life", a spacey and dreamy
track sung by Bruno Schaab and including a great instrumental fusion
sequence! In July 1973, Bruno Schaab was replaced with Hans Hartmann.
The next month the trio of Neumeier, Genrich and Hartmann recorded
their first album for Atlantic. Regrettably , none of the Atlantic
albums were up to the previous standard. Although Don't Call Us, We'll
Call You (1973) was a more consistent album than Guru Guru, it
contained fewer highlights. It was a more accessible attempt at
jazz-rock. At the end of the year Ax Genrich quit and was replaced by
Houschang Nejadepour, previously the guitarist of Eiliff. Dance Of The
Flames (1974) proved that this particular combination wasn't very
good, and Najadepour left again in July. For the rest of the year
Conny Veit played guitar, before Guru Guru split. From November 1974
to June 1975, Neumeier played various studio sessions in Conny's
studio together with Helmut Hattler (bass, from Kraan), Jan Fride
(drums, percussion, from Kraan), Dieter Moebius (synthesizer),
Hans-Joachim Roedelius (organ, both from Cluster & Harmonia), Ingo
Bischof (keyboards), Tommy Goldschmitt (percussion, both from
Karthago), Sepp Jandrisits (guitar), Jargen 'Jogi' Karpenkiel (bass,
ex-Kollektiv), Ax Genrich (guitar) and Gerd Dudeck (sax, flute). These
sessions resulted in several albums: the Highdelberg album, Harmonia's
De Luxe (recorded in Forst) and the new Guru Guru album: Mani Und
Seine Freunde. This brought further examples of Neumeier's peculiar
humour in "Chicken Rock" and "Woodpecker's Dream". As this album was a
collaboration between musicians from Karthago, Kraan and Guru Guru,
the music became a conglomerate of those jazz-rock styles. 
Mani Neumeier collaborated with his new friends frequently in the
future and managed to assemble a new, (reasonably) stable Guru Guru
live crew with Jandrisits, Karpenkiel and Roland Schaeffer
(ex-Brainstorm). This incarnation's first album Tango Fango (1976) was
full of bossa nova, tango, verbal silliness and instrumental jazz-rock
- actually the most consistent Guru Guru album for quite a while. 
M.
http://www.fromgenesis.net
http://gnosis2000.net/ratermatthias.htm
 

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 qualcosa su Winmx, ma non e' facilissimo.
Guarda che esistono ristampe sia in CD che in vinile di non impossibile
reperibilità.
--
LF
"You haven't heard keyboard-fronted progressive rock yet, if you haven't
heard this album"
(Dag Erik Asbjornsen a proposito di Inferno dei Metamorfosi in "Scented
gardens for the mind").