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IN STOCK
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ARTIST
TITLE
Next Dimension Transfer
FORMAT
5CD BOX
LABEL
CATALOG #
TR 405CD
TR 405CD
GENRE
RELEASE DATE
4/5/2019
The 39 Clocks are one of the most magnificent bands ever to have emerged from Germany; Diedrich Diederichsen, German pop boffin, considers them to be the nation's best band of the 1980s. The legendary duo from Hanover broke every rule in the music business, without exception. And -- above all -- with attitude. They are elusive, incapable of being categorized, unless the category is a little bit weird. Their real names have been eradicated ("never had one" -- Clocks), replaced by cryptic initials (CH-39, JG-39), less than randomly reminiscent of molecular chains like LSD-25. The weirdness is reflected in their music: sizzling irradiated, repetitive. The outrageous rumors surrounding the duo are the stuff of legend: strung-out live performances with vacuum cleaners instead of guitars, frequently facing a throng of concertgoers with a tendency to boo, flee the venue or threaten them with physical violence. The Clocks project really began to take shape in 1979 when they turned away from punk and created "psycho beat", positioning themselves as the antithesis of the emerging NDW/German New Wave movement. Their music is a futuristic, definitively urban, evolution of American garage punk from the 1960s. Their stylistic modus operandi: expressionless voice, English lyrics with an intentionally heavy German accent, dirty sound, cool monochrome image. Those lacking in imagination might identify touches of the Velvet Underground and stop right there, but many other influences were also at work: from Salvador Dali via the Troggs, Suicide, Peter Handke's Offending The Audience (1966), Antoine to Tiny Tim, Kurt Schwitters, Can, and NEU! The Clocks themselves spoke of "at least 123" sources of inspiration. In early 1980s Germany, the 39 Clocks were, at one and the same time, a panoply of discernible influences and a singular phenomenon with a clear, inimitable sonic identity. Time and again, the 39 Clocks succeeded in pushing back the borders of experimentation a little further: barely tolerable, protracted live improvisations, atonal passages, background noises, extreme lo-fi and a tinny beatbox test the listener's receptivity to the limit. And their sonic experiments popped up in various film soundtracks and on television series, like Halt and Catch Fire in the US. The Next Dimension Transfer box set, authorized by the band, provides the ultimate overview of the Clocks' output -- a phantom of the German music underground, enshrouded in myth.
Available as a five-CD box set or a five-LP box set. Includes two regular studio albums: Pain It Dark (1981) and Subnarcotic (1982); two collections of outtakes, leftovers, and rarities (one of them renamed, edited, and updated by The 39 Clocks exclusively for this box set), plus, a previously unreleased live LP from 1981. Also includes comprehensive deluxe booklet (titled "Revelations") featuring mind-blowing new trivia and secrets; Booklet included with five-CD box set is 44-pages.
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