Reality Has Got to Die!

HAIRY CHAPTER - Can't Get Through (1971)

Y'know, I was listening to Raven's "Back to Ohio Blues" (search the blog; I'm sick of pinging back to myself) on shuffle the other day, and when this slab of Kraut depravity followed, I could barely tell 'em apart. The same kinda leaden, honky blues ya'd usually expect from dope-addled Yanks is here in abundance. And the lyrics? Kee-rist! We be talkin' bout some borderline lysergic psychosis, chillen! There's a certain brand of brain-damaged zeal that can't be ignored, at least not around this cyber-dump-- and Hairy Chapter exemplified it for a blissful few moments in 1971.

Originally bearing the unwieldy moniker Concentric Movement (as whom they recorded the über-obscure "Electric Music for Dancing" LP), Harry Titlbach (guitar), Harry Unte (guitar, vocals), Werner Faus (drums) and Rudolf Oldenburg (bass) had been kicking around since the mid-60's in one form or another in and around their home base of Bonn, Germany. They'd released "Eyes" in 1969, a relatively polite garage-punk offering for the minuscule Opp label, which, despite being mediocre at best, got 'em signed to Polygram and the services of legendary producer, Dieter Dirks (Scorpions, Accept, Cosmic Jokers etc.). We'll never know if it was his stellar knob-twistin' or some intangible force of cosmic sleazery that was making the air crackle around 'em-- but somehow the tentative steps towards debauched geetar slop and horny surrealism accelerated in the already fevered minds (and genitalia) of Hairy Chapter faster'n a mainlined MDMA/Viagra cocktail. Whatever that fleeting muse may've been, it must enter our orbit about as often as Hailey's Comet-- I've heard very few exercises in troglodyte thud quite like "Can't Get Through."

Harry Titlbach is an unheralded fretboard-molester I would rank somewhere in between Edgar Breau (Simply Saucer if ya don't know) and Randy Holden... yes, he's that fucking good. I have this picture of him in my mind's eye-- created solely on the merits of his six-string savagery, mind-- I've never actually seen a picture of 'im much bigger'n a postage stamp, that looks a bit like this:

Of course, y'all will hafta use yer imagination as I have no fucking time/desire to Photoshop an axe into his mitts. And not cuz I figger he dug wasting time copping Rock God poses; simply that he'd need to play with his face far away from the sparks generated by his barbaric flailing or risk scorchin' his damn head bald! Every hot lick sounds like it was squeezed out with sheer desperation; like he could hear the clock tickin' on his mortality. Doesn't matter if it's the Paul Kossoff-in-a-blender blues squeals of the title cut or the charmingly un-groove-vay stab at funkifying on the languid "There's a Kind of Nothing," there's an omnipresent urgency that'll make yer palms sweat if ya allow yourself to succumb to Thee Titlbach Squawk.

Geezus! Nearly 500 words and I haven't even gotten to the other Harry-- that being Mr. Unte, who was so horned up whilst penning the lyrics, he musta entered an agonizing psychological purgatory packed with fresh flesh that taunted/haunted him day and night. How else do you explain the transcendental groin thunder of album centerpiece "It Must Be An Officer's Daughter"??! This is where he drools to his paramour, "I wanna ball you all night long/I wanna hold your luscious breasts... and feel your 27 fingers explode inside my body!!" Holy shit, Harry! What kinda chicks were ya "balling"??! Believe me, you may laugh the first time ya hear such ruminations, but when you check it out a few more times, you'll realize that this motherfucker was serious-- verbiage like that doesn't tend to be used on top (snicker) of a lumbering Sabbariffic arrangement very often.

More Wisdom from Harry Unte, that in a perfect world, would be all over bumper stickers:

- The title of this post.
- "My education will never let me be free."
- "My parents tried to make a white person out of me."

Collect 'em all in the comments.