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A changeable line-up of musicians led by mystic and keyboard player Florian Fricke (1944-2001), Krautrock icons Popol Vuh were one of the great innovators of European ambient and world music in the 1970's and 80's. Known very unfairly in some quarters as purveyors of sitar-heavy "raga rock", the band's sonic trademarks are far more diverse: abstract electronica, devotional music, progressive rock, eclectic vocal blends and pioneering ethno-ambient fusions. Fricke was a brilliant, intuitive musician and one of the first Westerners to seamlessly blend Eastern and Western sounds, in both a traditional rock band context and in a more ethereal and meditative vein. The contributions of guitarist and drummer Daniel Fichelscher to the band were also outstanding. He was a supple, melodic guitar player who brought a rock-like accessibility to the sound and without whom a large portion of the band's music would have been a very different thing. You may have already heard the band's music without realising it: German director Werner Herzog has used it to mesmerising effect in some of his films, most notably Aguirre Wrath Of God and also his extraordinary remake of the 1922 vampire classic Nosferatu. At the time of Fricke's death more than two dozen original albums and film soundtracks of varying quality had been released and many more compilations as well. Wading through them can be a maddening experience. There is a tendency to repeat or re-record tracks on successive albums for no apparent reason, not to mention a lot of doubling up on the film soundtracks. The less-than-hi-fidelity sound of some productions also takes a little getting used to. Until very recently the band's back catalogue was a shambles: some put that down to Fricke's personal quirks and aversion to the music business, while Fricke himself on at least one occasion (in a rare 1996 interview) blamed the record companies. So where does all this leave newcomers to Popol Vuh? Today, in a much better place that they might have been. To its credit North American label Celestial Harmonies has kept a small, carefully compiled collection of the bands music available on CD for several decades now. More significantly in 2004 a series of careful re-issues of the original albums was instigated by German label SPV Recordings. A full re-appraisal of the band's albums is now at last possible. Popol Vuh's earliest music dates from the late 1960's and early 70's and is fairly typical of the exploratory, abstract electronica in vogue among German bands at the time. The second album In The Gardens Of Pharao is a classic nonetheless; an intense, eerie melding of electronic tones from the Moog synthesiser and organ with cymbals, vocal tones and half-submerged tribal instruments. That it recalls early period Tangerine Dream is not surprising when you consider it was Fricke who introduced that very band to the Moog synth as a guest player on their album Zeit (1972). But Pharao is a more deeply sacred music than TD, reflecting his keen interest at the time in Mayan Indian culture and his lifelong spiritual leanings in general. There's several versions of Pharao available, best of them being the Celestial Harmonies release which bookends the CD with two other tracks. One is the 20-minute "Spirit Of Peace", a deeply personal creation for solo piano. The other is the stunning main theme from Werner Herzog's film Aguirre (forget the patchy soundtrack album released 1974). Here Fricke reaches the apogee of his work with electronic synthesis. It's breathtakingly, jaw-droppingly beautiful: a six minute sepulchral drone that blends angelic vocal samples played on a Melotron-like keyboard with deeply trance-inducing colours and pulses from the synthesiser. A milestone in ambient sound, "Aguirre" (also known as "Lacrime Di Re") also marks the end of Fricke's short love affair with electronics. A certain vocal sound he'd been attempting to find with electronics unexpectedly turned up in the form of a Korean vocalist named Djon Yon, who features prominently on Popol Vuh's next album Hosianna Mantra. Almost an antithesis to what came before, Hosianna Mantra favours mostly acoustic music that's devotional but doesn't sit within any single religious tradition. It's a timeless, beatless neo-classical blend of Yon's ritual-like vocal improvisations blended with Fricke's piano, silky electric guitar by one Connie Veit (with lots of sustain and echo), sweet oboe by Robert Eliscu of Between, and subtle touches of droning tamboura. Meeting guitarist Daniel Fichelscher around this time radically changed Fricke's musical world yet again. In the next few years there appeared a series of forward-thinking albums made by what superficially appears to be rock line-up but which doesn't sound quite like any other rock music of the 1970's. Seligpreisung is the greatest of these, a masterpiece of ambient rock jamming, jazz-style improvising and lovely duets for oboe and piano. The changing time signatures within many tracks are brilliantly handled, the flow uninterrupted. It marks the first appearance of Popol Vuh's trademark jangling guitar and piano combination, a luminous ambient sound that came to define the band's very soul. Fricke's own vocals here - usually not part of the PV sound - seem to anticipate the visionary style of Stephan Micus a decade later, being all about sound rather than lyrics. Seligpreisung also displays the band's mysterious brilliance for being able to sound non-Western with little actual reliance on exotic instruments. Three other albums recorded in this quasi-rock style in the mid 1970's also rate essential listening and two of them feature the welcome return of Djon Yon's vocals. Das Hohelied Salomos echoes the sound of Hosianna Mantra but with drums and more intensely layered rhythm and lead guitars, giving the album a more rocking feel. Some impressive group vocal chants start to appear at this point, a direction which would come to full flower in the next decade. For the first time Indian sitar sits upfront on several tracks but it doesn't radically alter the groups sound - proof of their mastery of Indian and Mid Eastern modes before they ever relayed on the actual instruments. Letzte Tag Letzte Nachte is similar, if even more intense at times in its psychedelic rock gestures, and some of Yon's most powerful singing can be heard here. Finally, the film soundtrack Coeur De Verre/Herz Aus Glass is completely instrumental, allowing Fichelscher to really let fly with some his most celestial, probing guitar playing. Having explored the possibilities of what a full-time rock combo could sound like, the band moved on once again and by the late 70's was charting increasingly subtle and contemplative waters. The music recorded for Werner Herzog's deeply hypnotic vampire film Nosferatu is actually spread across two different albums released in the same year: the official soundtrack album Nosferatu plus Bruder Des Schattens Sohne Des Lichts (1978). The recent re-issue of the soundtrack album by SPV Recordings compiles all music from both recordings and is the one album to own. Here the band downplays its penchant for progressive rock jamming to include beatless mood pieces and atmospheric ethno-ambient stylings. Some moments date back to the sessions that produced the eerie electronica of Pharao; some pieces exist within the classic Popol Vuh blend of piano and guitar; others manage the not inconsiderable feat of making Indian sitar and tambour drones sound rather tense. Towering above them all is Nosferatu's main theme "Brothers Of Darkness Sons Of Light", an example of Fricke's growing sophistication in use of vocals. It opens with dark male vocal chants that seem to blend Tantric, Buddhist and Christian traditions, building slowly with sad oboe and crashing Tibetan cymbals before spilling over into a slow instrumental jam as openly loving and joyous as anything you'll hear from the band. Consistent with the feel of Nosferatu is the magnificent album Tantric Songs which - just to keep things confusing - currently exists in two different versions on CD. Here you will find some of the moodiest and most ambient of Popol Vuh's music: Fricke's shadowy gothic piano figures, Fichelscher's glittering acoustic and electric guitars, some lovely oboe and touches of Indian instrumentation. It's music unanchored to any particular time period and awash with religious atmosphere, carried by subtle shifts of light and shade. Tantric Songs demonstrates the band's extraordinary gift for tapping a deep, mystical, intangible power and turning it into music without pomp or pretension. The original version of the album (on SPV Recordings) emphasises a slightly wider range global exotica than the Celestial Harmonies release, the latter being more of a late 70's "best-of" collection which deletes a handful of tracks to make room for the 18-minute classic "Brothers Of Darkness". Although output of new material slowed in the 1980's the decade is significant for Fricke's exhilarating distillation of vocal sounds from different ages and cultures. The film soundtrack Sei Still Wisse Ich Bin is an "oratorio" that finds the band working with large scale choirs and group vocals. Anyone with a fondness for the soulful qualities of human voice should be suitably knocked out. Backed by flowing piano, guitars, tribal drums and shimmering percussion, the swelling chorales and chants are by turns mournful and joyous, dark and euphoric, dramatic and gentle. The vocal sources are varied - operatic, South American, Christian and Tibetan elements among them. This is profoundly emotional folk music, deeply human and divine at the same time, and its rough edges and looseness make it all the more appealing. With perfect understatement Celestial Harmonies boss Eckart Rahn once said of Fricke: "He knew something". Yes he did, and he managed to get it down on spellbinding records like this. Four more original releases from the same decade also rate highly. Agape Agape and Spirit Of Peace don't consistently scale the heights of Still Wisse Ich Bin but that's no big failing. Some of the layered vocal works like "Agape Agape" and "We Know About The Need" are extraordinarily beautiful, while the gentle group jam "Take The Tension High" casts a euphoric spell ever-so-gradually over its 18-minute running time. The film soundtrack Cobra Verde also contains several folksy, mantra-like vocal pieces. Much of the rest is beatless, string-laden landscapes - more traditionally filmic and not typical of the band but fantastic and darkly beautiful all the same. This album's lengthy closer restates the band's simple strengths with spacious piano, tamboura, glowing guitar strums and touches of sitar. The Best Of Popol Vuh: Werner Herzog (the 1989 version, later versions are shorter) is an excellent summery of the band's soundtrack music with an emphasis on the group's vocal work of the late 70's and 80's. The 90's proved to be creatively far leaner than previous decades, with only For You And Me proving an impressive work. Its clean, crisp production is something of a shock if you first waxed ears on the band's earlier material. Was the softer lo-fi sound of yore deliberate? Quite possibly. The effect now seems somehow less mystical but the album is still a lovely, engaging and mostly upbeat collection of world music fusions with just a touch of synth pop. The classic blend of ringing guitars and glowing piano still binds everything together and some of the small group choral arrangements are striking. The band's past resurfaces on the 4-part suite "Om Mane Padem Hum" on which Fricke cleverly reworks the brighter moments from his classic "Brothers Of Darkness Sons Of Light" into something new but equally as warm and optimistic. With City Raga (1995) and Shepherd's Symphony (1997) the band hopped on board the ambient dance bandwagon. At the time many fans were aghast but in retrospect neither of these are horrible records; they just seem unnecessary in light of better efforts by more dance-savvy acts like Mayko, Loop Guru, Deep Forest and Delerium. One can only guess that Daniel Fichelscher was unimpressed; he left the band soon after City Raga. The final album before Fricke's passing was an interesting but unexceptional mix of ambient drones and poetry for an art installation called Messa Di Orfeo (1999). It's significant only in that it suggests Fricke had come nearly full circle to once again embrace the abstract electronica of his earliest work. Popol Vuh compilation albums are problematic. Even the Herzog collection mentioned above doesn't capture the band in all its phases and some of these collections have poorer sound quality than usual due to non-existent remastering. Some also suffer from unwelcome edits and other tampering with the original music. If you're addicted to buying comps then Nicht Hoch Im Himmel is studded with great tracks and reasonably covers the first 15 or so years of the band's recording career and there isn't much overlap with the Herzog collection from Milan Records. One compilation to be avoided at all costs is Future Sound Experience (2002) which was released to much ballyhoo after Fricke's death. This alleged "remix" album sees either Fricke or someone else - it's not clear who - taking a selection of past tracks and overlaying and stitching them together will all the finesse of a 5-year old playing with a mixing console. Hearing the transcendent "Aguirre" butchered by overlaying it with out-of-key guitar strumming is enough to move devoted fans to tears - for all the wrong reasons. What's needed now that Fricke is gone is a definitive boxed set compilation, lovingly remastered and compiled. Quite a task, but what a treasure it would be.
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