Deutsch-Amerikanische Freundschaft — “Ein Produkt der Deutsch-Amerikanische Freundschaft”

Warning Records WR 01, recorded and released 1979.

No titles.

OK…think about “Cluster II” for a sec. Got that? OK…good. Now, take that mental sonic image and graft it onto some raucous, sub-garage band’s racket.

You’re close. But not…quite…in the ballpark of what this sounds like.

Total trouble abounds on this chunk of Düsseldorf-bred bad-n-madness. It’s RACKET. It’s GREAT. It has no track titles, and quite often no actual sense to it. At one point, it’ll just lurch off into Stooges-land for no reason…then fade out…then come back in with another sub-mental crash…and on and on. It really is what you would get if you crosswired kosmische with punk. 100% on.

“B…but I thought DAF was some techno-pop industrial disco thing…???” Well…eventually it was. But this is NOT THAT DAF. This is the first incarnation, an unholy mess of fuck-you trash noise and electro-squawp that HATES YOU. And so, of course, you LOVE IT. No “Kebab Traume” etc etc here, just lo-fi thudding and bashing and brainlessly clawhammered instrumental attacks, interspersed with random fade-outs, aimlessly-inserted silences, Luddite-grade thumping overlain with who-cares-style synth playing, and of course the aforementioned lack of titles. Some ‘songs’ last only seconds, while others just go on and on until you feel like the ‘victim’ in a mid-50s Anacin advert. The recording method aids in this, too…as the whole thing sounds like it was recorded in some cinderblock autobahn roadside restroom on one very overtaxed microphone by accident.

Personally, I love it. I love it for the sheer madness of it, the Teutonic piss-off-ness of it, and the fact that the few people it doesn’t clear out of a room are invariably going to be quite cool. As I type this, one cut has just smashed out of the speakers for a grand total of 25 seconds that consists only of feedback, synth yowling, and random drum smashing. And that just randomly faded into something else equally difficult with more screeches, thud-crash-wham drums, one-note bass, deranged vocal whoops, etc etc.

And on and on it goes…just like that.

So what’s the deal here, you ask? Why isn’t this like the techno-pop industrial disco DAF? Well, that’s because at this point, DAF consisted of a couple of factions, which were in the course of splitting up by the time we got to their Mute debut “Die Kleinen und die Bösen”. One side became DAF. And the other…if I read this right…became the beginnings of the electro-punk-pranksters Der Plan. But at this point, on “Ein Produkt der…”, everything’s under one very structurally-damaged roof. And what a raum-ful of havoc it is!

Like a lot of stuff I love dearly, the difficulty level on this thing is pretty high, so it’s not for everyone. But if the description above gets you curious about getting into a listener’s wrasslin’ match with it, then I’d say go right ahead…but don’t be surprised if it wins!