If I don't really like "Tago Mago", which Can album will I like?

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Today i managed to pick up the SACD re-issue of Can's "Tago Mago" for £3.99 in a clearance sale at a certain Megastore. I picked it up because i was curious about Can and it seemed as good a place as any to start, but i've found it starts of OK and starts to grate about halfway through.

If i can't get into this Can record, should i persevere? Is there a Can record out there for me? Bear in mind my only previous contact with their music is the Holgar Czukay (spelling?) track on the Morvern Callar soundtrack - "Cool In The Pool" - which i liked.

― Michael Lambert (Michael Lambert), Monday, 10 April 2006 18:33 (twenty years ago)

Haha, I recognize myself in almost every part of this post, right down to "Cool in the Pool." So: I just bought Future Days recently and really like it. The rest of that Holger Czukay album (Movies) is pretty good, too.

― jaymc (jaymc), Monday, 10 April 2006 18:37 (twenty years ago)

>>If i can't get into this Can record, should i persevere?

No.

― Chris Bergen (Cee Bee), Monday, 10 April 2006 18:54 (twenty years ago)

yeah, if you don't like tago mago you don't like can.

― Cameron Octigan (Cameron Octigan), Monday, 10 April 2006 18:55 (twenty years ago)

I think it's worth giving Ege Bamyasi a shot -- much more compact and accessible IMO.

― Mark (MarkR), Monday, 10 April 2006 18:56 (twenty years ago)

Try Future Days. It's much mellower and spacier. Or try Monster Movie if the vocals on Tago Mago are what bugs you. Or give up.

― Alex in SF (Alex in SF), Monday, 10 April 2006 18:57 (twenty years ago)

What about the other Can song that pops up in Morvern Callar -- "Spoon." It's on Ege Bamyasi, which is sorta like a shorter version of Tago Mago without the tape-splicing excursions.

xpost

― Renard (Renard), Monday, 10 April 2006 18:58 (twenty years ago)

if u r not moved by "halleluwah" then u have no soul.

― strongo hulkington is a guy with a belly button piercing (dubplatestyle), Monday, 10 April 2006 18:59 (twenty years ago)

I third the Ege Bamyasi recommendation.

― Kay Queue (Kay Queue), Monday, 10 April 2006 19:02 (twenty years ago)

Another vote for "Future Days", followed by a few more listens to "Halleluwah" (it's one of the funkiest songs ever, you *have* to like it), followed by giving up.

― NoTimeBeforeTime (Barry Bruner), Monday, 10 April 2006 19:04 (twenty years ago)

yeah if you listen to Tago Mago and don't get into "Halleluwah" or "Paperhouse" I'd say you will never like any Can record.

― Renard (Renard), Monday, 10 April 2006 19:06 (twenty years ago)

I had the exact same experience, years ago, and never tried again.

― morris pavilion (samjeff), Monday, 10 April 2006 19:07 (twenty years ago)

Seconded. If you don't like Tago Mago, then you don't like Can. If you can't see the genius of Oh Yeah, then give up. It's not like there's not plenty of other great music out there to get into.

― Mistress Quickly, Monday, 10 April 2006 19:07 (twenty years ago)

Tago Mago is not the place to start -- those extendo whacked-out jammos are better suited to chaos freaks and the well-initiated. Any of their other early LPs should be better recieved on whole.

I usually suggest starting at the begining (Monster Movie) but instead i'll suggest the oft-overlooked "Soon Over Babaluma".

― christoff (christoff), Monday, 10 April 2006 19:16 (twenty years ago)

Monster Movie - it's not as ethereal, it actually, uh, rocks.

― Edward III (edward iii), Monday, 10 April 2006 19:22 (twenty years ago)

Tago Mago is not the place to start

Yes classic mistake, just go for Future Days or Soon Over Babaluma...their best albums IMHO.

― Omar (Omar), Monday, 10 April 2006 19:29 (twenty years ago)

I'd agree with that. Then once you realise they are genius, back to Tago Mago.

― dr lulu (dr lulu), Monday, 10 April 2006 19:48 (twenty years ago)

If you like "Cool in the Pool," maybe try the self-titled album (which has "Aspectacle" and "Can Can" and is generally way better than anyone gives it credit for)?

― Douglas (Douglas), Monday, 10 April 2006 20:10 (twenty years ago)

Thanks for everyone's answers. I had previously thought about getting Ege Bamyasi anyway, so will try that and Future Days at some point.

In its favour, Tago Mago does IMHO have the best sleeve art of any of their records - as i look at it it's becomming an all time favourite!

― Michael Lambert (Michael Lambert), Monday, 10 April 2006 20:14 (twenty years ago)

Ege Bamyasi and Future Days are the two for me, with Monster, Tago and Babaluma all reasonably close behind.

― Sick Mouthy (Nick Southall), Monday, 10 April 2006 20:51 (twenty years ago)

Try Ege Bamyasi, but it's pretty similar to Tago Mago. If you don't like that, try Future Days.

― Harpal (harpal), Monday, 10 April 2006 20:52 (twenty years ago)

First and third post -- OTM.

I actually prefer Future Days to Tago Mago. I think they're both great, but Tago Mago does start to grate a little mid-way through. Future Days is a lot less offensive though, it's an easier to indulge in jam. Whether that's a good thing or not is up to you.

― Mickey (modestmickey), Monday, 10 April 2006 21:09 (twenty years ago)

just go for Future Days or Soon Over Babaluma...their best albums IMHO.

-- Omar

I fully agree with this. in fact I hardly ever listen to tago mago but I listen to those two all the time.

― kyle (akmonday), Monday, 10 April 2006 21:44 (twenty years ago)

Buy Future Days.... listen to it and love it, then in about 3 months give Tago Mago another try.

TM is maybe a bit too can-ny to begin with.

that said it would be my desert island can album. ( despite future days sounding like a desert island)

sometimes you need the freakout.

are there more Can reissues in this megastore clearance?
is it everywhere or just where you live...?
London?

― Danny boy, Monday, 10 April 2006 22:21 (twenty years ago)

Ege BamYSI?

― latebloomer: filled with vanilla pudding power! (latebloomer), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 05:03 (twenty years ago)

Ege BamYSI?

LOL.

Tago Mago sure gained a lot in the reissue process. The sleeve looks much better and it almost sounds like another album compared to the original cd. Suddenly I could picture Suzuki on 'Aumgn' like a hippie wizard stirring a cauldron of soundsoup.

― Omar (Omar), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 07:06 (twenty years ago)

Seconded. If you don't like Tago Mago, then you don't like Can.

Bollocks.

― Dadaismus (Dada), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 08:24 (twenty years ago)

I don't like the "fuck you newbie" undertone of this thread either. I would say start where they started, i.e. with Monster Movie and Delay, and then see how they moved on from there.

― Marcello Carlin (nostudium), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 08:43 (twenty years ago)

i cant get into Future Days or Ege the way i'm into Tago Mago, i guess i'm a phreak!

xpost

― rizzx (Rizz), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 08:47 (twenty years ago)

Oh don't get me started on "Future Days"! If you like "Cool in the Pool" by Holger Czukay you're probably better off listening to "Landed" than "Tago Mago"... or even "Saw Delight"

― Dadaismus (Dada), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 08:48 (twenty years ago)

If you liked Movies, then you'll like My Life In The Bush Of Ghosts ahem.

― Marcello Carlin (nostudium), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 08:56 (twenty years ago)

10 IF NOT CAN
20 GO TO FAUST

― name (eman), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 11:55 (twenty years ago)

The poster who said you wouldn't like Can if you don't like Tago Mago is probably correct. I don't see why someone should waste their money when they're going to find the same stuff, plus TM is probably their best IMO.

― yarn, Tuesday, 11 April 2006 17:21 (twenty years ago)

Tago Mago sure gained a lot in the reissue process. The sleeve looks much better and it almost sounds like another album compared to the original cd. Suddenly I could picture Suzuki on 'Aumgn' like a hippie wizard stirring a cauldron of soundsoup.

-- Omar

and where was this on sale at £3.99??

is it one of those dualdisc/hybrid SACDs (compatible with regular CD players)?

― fandango (fandango), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 17:35 (twenty years ago)

>>I don't like the "fuck you newbie" undertone of this thread either.

...not sure who this is directed at, but I'd like to note that my original response ("No") wasn't meant to be taken so seriously!

That being said, Tago Mago and Ege Bamyasi are the best Can albums, and they're both fairly similar in style. I agree that if you "can't really get into" TM, then chances are you're not gonna grow up to be a huge Can fan.

― Chris Bergen (Cee Bee), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 17:49 (twenty years ago)

and where was this on sale at £3.99??

is it one of those dualdisc/hybrid SACDs (compatible with regular CD players)?

Ahem...Amsterdam last year, I got Soundtracks too. Now they're full-price again. :( Soundtracks works fine on my cd-player, Tago Mago doesn't.

These days I go by the shops like a vulture waiting to strike when they're ready to dump Future Days etc.

― Omar (Omar), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 17:53 (twenty years ago)

Ege Bamyasis is WAY easier to listen to because it has shorter, poppier songs, and Future Days is easier to listen to because it is SCHMOOOOVE - Tago Mago is very good, but Aumgn and Peking O are fucking difficult, and being all high-and-mighty "if you don't get the really horrible tunless indulgent bits then you don't deserve to enjoy the weirdy groovey alien pop bits either, loser" tone is, as Marcello suggests, unpleasant. Can are great fun and enjoyable, but some of their stuff is decidedly awkward.

― Sick Mouthy (Nick Southall), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 19:03 (twenty years ago)

aumng & peking o are like, less than half the album though. leaving you with over one LP of relatively accessible psych-prog-groove. and Ege Bamyasi has SOUP which is pretty unlistenable.

― the unbearable lightness of peeing (orion), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 19:05 (twenty years ago)

"if you don't get the really horrible tunless indulgent bits then you don't deserve to enjoy the weirdy groovey alien pop bits either, loser"

Fuck the tuneless indulgent bits, I could take'em or leave'em.
"Mushroom" is perhaps my favorite song of all time.

― Chris Bergen (Cee Bee), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 19:23 (twenty years ago)

the tuneless indulgent bits are actually really fucking fantastic. better than anything black dice or gang gang dance has released, anyway.

― the unbearable lightness of peeing (orion), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 19:25 (twenty years ago)

better than anything black dice or gang gang dance has released, anyway.

This is so true. Black Dice are mediocre.

― Chris Bergen (Cee Bee), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 19:26 (twenty years ago)

Only the second half of Soup is a chaotic fuck-off, the first half is some of the hardest rocking CAN shit since Monster Movie, I think.

― Tripmaker (SDWitzm), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 19:27 (twenty years ago)

Aye, Soup is great, especially that bit where they spiral roundandroundandround really fast until it breaks. Then it goes shit, but you can skip it!

Aumgn and Peking O may be less than half the record but they're still about half a fucking hour!

― Sick Mouthy (Nick Southall), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 19:41 (twenty years ago)

but they're great! listen harder!

― the unbearable lightness of peeing (orion), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 19:42 (twenty years ago)

May I just add for those who are unawares, the dvd is mighty. Worth buying just to check out Irmin's threads. (And The Old Grey Whistle stuff too.)

― dr lulu (dr lulu), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 19:44 (twenty years ago)

No! I listened loads over the course of about 8 years and I'd rather listen to Paperhouse now!

― Sick Mouthy (Nick Southall), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 19:44 (twenty years ago)

only about 40% of the DVD is awesome, though.. all the reunion garbage is totally skippable.

― the unbearable lightness of peeing (orion), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 19:45 (twenty years ago)

yeah, that shit from the press photo shoot is just terrible.

― Tripmaker (SDWitzm), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 19:47 (twenty years ago)

Agreed, but still worth getting.

― dr lulu (dr lulu), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 19:58 (twenty years ago)

I could see somebody liking Monster Movie (and "Mother Upduff") and nothing else, 'cause that's all I really liked at first. It was just a case of preferring Mooney to Suzuki. But even then I luvvved "Halleluwah", now that I think of it.

― Myonga Von Bontee (Myonga Von Bontee), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 20:26 (twenty years ago)

The DVD is good because way back when ( before youtube) it was the only way to see the mighty C in full flow.

and any young punks thinking that can is just proggy early 70s shit can check out the we dont give a f**k interview on the stairs.

― Danny boy, Tuesday, 11 April 2006 20:36 (twenty years ago)

Only heard Tago Mago and yeah, I'm in sort of in the same boat as original poster. To reference another recently revived thread or three, it feels a bit like starting exploration of The Fall with Hex Enduction Hour, which I totally love now, but only after Palace of Swords Reversed had, you know, mapped them out for me. So which is Can's Palace...? Probably doesn't exist, I guess?

― The Vintner's Lipogram (OleM), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 21:04 (twenty years ago)

To the earlier poster, it was the only Can CD i could find in the store i was in (Perth) but by all means have a look in London. It is one of those hybrid thingies.

I didn't assume anyone was trying to be "fuck off newbie" about it, and couldn't care less if they are. All the recommendations are helpful, i will report back once i have some findings, though i may restrict myself to getting them out the library this time.

― Michael Lambert (Michael Lambert), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 21:14 (twenty years ago)

Please do! I for one will follow this with interest.

― The Vintner's Lipogram (OleM), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 21:23 (twenty years ago)

I'm pretty sure the first I heard, and what hooked me, was 'Tago Mago'--I remember the beats alone to "Paperhouse" and "Mushroomhead" knocked me over, and all the rest just seemed so perfect. I don't know what prepared me for it--I'd given up on rock and roll a couple years prior and had been listening primarily to jazz (nothing farther out than Mingus or Davis, though) and late-60s/early-70s funk. But I wasn't familiar with things like Stockhausen, Reich, et al. So I guess I heard Can--even the more outre stuff--as "pop" music from the outset. They still don't strike me as having ever been particularly weird--just incredibly savvy, cooperative, and cool.

That said, 'Ege Bamyasi' is my perrenial favourite, these years later. I could see the thread-starter liking 'Can' (as it's the most closely related to the disco-funk that Czukay was doing around that time).

Weirdly, it was Faust that took me some years to finally "get"--and listening now, I can't possibly imagine why. I had the twofer of the first two albums from about age 16, and yet preferred 'IV' until about age 22, barely listening to the first. And I always considered them a far-lagging 2nd place to Can. Now I like them just as much, and I've found that young people whom I introduce to Can and Faust prefer Faust just as often as Can--the kids hear them as "pop" straight away, too. They are sillier and more fun, I guess.

― I.M. (I.M.), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 21:49 (twenty years ago)

(I.M., I have a serious question/thread I want to ask/start on ILM sometime except it's not quite ripe yet -- but I think you've just given me its title, viz "Stockhausen, Reich, et al" (yes, with quotes), which perfectly encapsulates what I'm going to waffle about. Once I get there, in context it may seem like a putdown, but I assure you that's not my point. Izzat ok w/you?)

― The Vintner's Lipogram (OleM), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 22:01 (twenty years ago)

(All I meant was that I wasn't familiar with oft-called "experimental" music of the first half of the 20th century, which ostensibly comprise part of the "necessary" ingredients for Can to occur in the late 60s. I didn't mean to imply a contrast between them and funk, motown, etc., slotting the former in "cerebral," un-pop music. My response to all music I enjoy is firstly (and possibly formostly) visceral--I don't really believe in "cerebral music". But it can be safely said that "Stockhausen, Reich, et al" are less popular in the purely quantitative sense--I was less likely at age 17 to have heard them than Miles Davis or James Brown, simply by odds of exposure. So, whatever it is you want to waffle on is just fine with me--not sure what I've said that could make me feel like the target of an insult. I assume that no one statement we make here regarding music/culture can be read through as an encapsulation of our thoughts; that we all share this assumption; and that simplifications are understood as a necessary evil not to be overanalysed. Though, I've never run a search for "rockism" on ILM, so it's possible my assumptions are unfounded. Anyway, I'm curious where you're headed.)

― I.M. (I.M.), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 22:43 (twenty years ago)

(Ah my future point is to do with the questionability of pairing those two in anything like the same universe at all (hence my fear of putting this like "ho ho that quote = stupid", not particularly their respective connection w/ahem "popular" forms (for which Stockhausen is the greatest red herring ever I think, notwithstanding "popular" form artists dropping his name etc)).

It is rather pleasant, is it not, to talk in parentheses?)

― The Vintner's Lipogram (OleM), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 23:04 (twenty years ago)

(They are alike only in that they are equally unlikely to be heard on popular radio, I'd venture. I meant no particular comparison/tying together of their method, purpose, sounds, etc. I feel I could draw connections of the styles of each to parts of the Can sound/approach, though.

Talking in parenthesis is almost like the opposite of using all caps.)

― I.M. (I.M.), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 23:10 (twenty years ago)

(Indeed. *looks around to questioning eyes from rest of party*)

AHEM WTF IS CAN'S PALACE OF SWORDS REVERSED PEOPLE?? *cough* smileyface

― The Vintner's Lipogram (OleM), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 23:24 (twenty years ago)

cannibalism I, maybe? maybe soundtracks...

― the unbearable lightness of peeing (orion), Tuesday, 11 April 2006 23:35 (twenty years ago)

Unlimited Edition?

― name (eman), Wednesday, 12 April 2006 02:26 (twenty years ago)

Get "Landed" or "Soon Over Babaluma" - I really like "Cutaway" on "Unlimited Edition" as well.

― So Ho La (So Ho La), Wednesday, 12 April 2006 03:30 (twenty years ago)

These days I go by the shops like a vulture waiting to strike when they're ready to dump Future Days etc.

how recognizable :-)

― willem -- (willem), Wednesday, 12 April 2006 08:34 (twenty years ago)

Wrong. Wrong, wrong IMO

― D.D. Disappointed Dadaismus (Dada), Thursday, 13 April 2006 16:12 (twenty years ago)

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