LP
Discos Esplendor Geometrico • EG 003 • Spain 1986
CD
Die Stadt • DS 92 • Germany 2006
Part VIII of the Rerelease series
Tracklist
01 Mein erstes Erlebnis 1’29“
02 Zu viele dicke Kinder 7’31“
03 Merle 2’26“
04 Medienlandschaft 6 2’07“
05 Langer Anlauf 6’36“
06 Gliim 6’51“
07 Heroischer Reflex 3’07“
08 Zweites Maschinentraining 9’34“
09 Deutsches Kinderlied 1’18“
Annotations
03 Sound source (see below) also used on A 16:02 and by Einstürzende Neubauten on Merle – Die Elektrik (ZEICHNUNGEN DES PATIENTEN O.T., 1983).
04 See track index for other Medienlandschaften.
09 Traditional German children’s song (Hänschen klein).
The cover, showing a dried-up embryo from an abandoned medical collection, aroused the attention of the German police during the raid of a mail order; the charge, »promotion of abortion and violence«, was dropped.
Description
Many hard, machine- or siren-like pulses, distorted voices, very »industrial« and noisy. At the sleep factory, the dead come alive.
Source
Sythesizers, voices; the voice on 03 is a phone call by a mentally disturbed kidnapper that was made available by the police under a special phone number for identification in the early 1980s.
Die Stadt label info for the reissue:
A S M U S T I E T C H E N S ‚Geboren, um zu Dienen‘ CD (DS92)
8th part in the ongoing re-release series of all early Tietchens albums between 1980 -1991. Described by Tietchens himself as his ‚Industrial‘ album, ‚Geboren, um zu Dienen‘ was originally released on the spanish ESPLENDOR GEOMETRICO label in 1986. The CD version incl. three unreleased bonus tracks from the same period and comes with a full colour fold-out booklet incl. liner notes by Tietchens himself.
ASMUS TIETCHENS ‚Geboren, um zu Dienen‘ (Discos Esplendor Geometrico EG 003) 1986
1. Mein Erstes Erlebnis 1’29
2. Zu viele dicke Kinder 7’31
3. Merle 2’26
4. Medienlandschaft 6 2’07
5. Langer Anlauf 6’36
6. Gliim 6’51
7. Heroischer Reflex 3’07
8. Zweites Maschinentraining 9’43
9. Deutsches Kinderlied 1’18
Bonus tracks:
10. Startlandung 6’15
11. Unter Tage 6’26
12. Marathon 4’46
Total playing time: 58:35 min.
If I’d ever recorded an ‚Industrial‘ solo album, it must be ‚GEBOREN, UM ZU DIENEN‘. Although I obviously wasn’t one of the inventors of ‚Industrial Music‘, I clearly felt an affinity to it. So I tried to learn my lessons well adding my own musical aspects to the general apocalyptic noises of this genre. My main concern was to dive deep into the canonical topics of fear, hysteria, claustrophobia, machine and threat. The end was imminent as hundreds of Pershings and SS20 all pointed in the direction of the march up area called West Germany, the seals of the read buttons were already broken. Even the conventional alternative – a tank war between NATO and the Warsaw Pact – sounded like utter apocalypse. Would we really have welcomed our brothers from the east with open arms ? This particular background has to be seen as the main influence on GEBOREN, UM ZU DIENEN. I believe that many of my colleagues also recording ‚Industrial‘ albums felt the same at that time.
IF there would have been a ‚Bang‘ it – without doubt – would have been global. Fear, emptiness and the futility of the aesthetical, were not alien to me, but until then I moved inside a carefully tested zone which was defined by a spectrum of experimental forms. GEBOREN,UM ZU DIENEN was an experiment in itself which first fruits I set free immediately. As if I’d to work under a deadline I recorded the tracks hastily, not wasting much thoughts about dynamics, duration, precision and construction. In the same way I resolutely did rough mixes of the seperate tracks of the pieces: what sounded dirty stayed dirty. Essentially the raw and the unsculptured were a part of the dogma of ‚Industrial‘.
The original nine tracks plus five more (three which appear as Bonustracks on this CD) all developed in a very short period of time. The album was released on the spanish ‚Esplendor Geometrico‘ label, run by Andrés Noarbe, in the same year. Originally a tape only label EG released a series of radical albums during the mid 80’s, also albums by the ‚Industrial‘ group of the same name, many which are much sought after items today. Of course only 500 copies of the album were pressed, which still meant a considerable financial risk given the small circle of potentionally interested listeners.
But the enthusiasm and dedication of everyone involved lead to a self-evident ‚Nevertheless‘. Looking back at these years it has to be noted that I established a daring attitude then, which luckily developed positively and stayed with me until today. The fact that a german attorneys general confiscated a small number of the LP in 1990 deeming the cover as being immoral („A Call for abortion“), was registered with satisfaction. A case like this corresponds with the mark of quality granted by the ‚Stiftung Warentest‘. Go on Germany !
Asmus Tietchens, 2006
Editorial notes:
The original masters of all the pieces incl. the bonus tracks are in perfect condition and were used 1:1 for the transfer onto CD. Only the fade-out at the end of „Mein erstes Erlebnis“ was slightly corrected.
