Tietchens, Asmus
Spat-europa
Asmus Tietchens is one of the best known German artists in the field of abstract music. Five of his early works, roughly definable as avant-garde synthesizer pop, are to be reissued progressively by Bureau B. "Spaet-Europa" was the second Tietchens release on Sky Records (Cluster, Rother, Roedelius, Moebius, Plank, Riechmann amongst others)What is new on Spaet-Europa is a greater concentration of form, concise and pointed in the sense of musical economy. Tietchens sought to accentuate this aspect even more acutely, but lacked the technical means to ensure that each of the "miniatures" lasted exactly two minutes. Nevertheless, he only missed his ideal target by a few seconds here and there. The concept of Spaet-Europa as an album of twenty tracks two minutes long recalls the Residents Commercial Album (1980) which contains forty tracks, each a minute in length-although these were designed to be played in groups of three in order to create a regular "pop song". Tietchens does not go that far, but he shares the musical, metatextual and humorous sensibilities of the American band, having "organized crusades" for their albums at this time. Traces of their influence may be discernible, but Tietchens has placed them in an entirely new context.