To talk about Manuel Göttsching is to talk about a kind of a very personal and unique electronic music inside the outlook of "School of Berlin" of ever. We can't compare him with Klaus Schulze; we can't compare him with Tangerine Dream; we only can compare him with Manuel Göttsching.
He was one of the founders of Ash Ra Tempel in 1970 and nowadays he keeps leading the band now under the name of Ashra.

In this interview he talks about all of this and much more. Ride on the time machine!

  lee esta entrevista en español.

-At the beginning of the '70 you founded with Klaus Schulze the legendary band Ash Ra Tempel. How was this band born?

-The beginnings of the band go back to the mid 60ies, when my class mate Hartmut Enke and me founded a band being 14 years old. We played blues and started to improvise already then, influenced by Cream. While we stayed together from 1966 on, the other members changed. In summer 1970 Klaus Schulze joined us after he had left Tangerine Dream, and we re-named the band from Steeple Chase Bluesband into ASH RA TEMPEL. After our first album Klaus left for his solo career. And we had to find a new drummer again...

-Once Klaus Schulze left the band you were the leader. Was this a big responsability for you?

-Klaus was our drummer, certainly a very good one, but nothing more or less. And there was never any leader within ASH RA TEMPEL.
When he left Hartmut and me continued with our former drummer from the Steeple Chase Bluesband, and later we invited more and more guests for our further record productions. So we did with Klaus again in December 72 to "join in" for the album 'Join Inn'. But the band was always Hartmut and me until Hartmut left music for good. This was during a concert in Cologne, 1973. Since then ASH RA TEMPEL was only me and, that's why the albums beginning with 'Inventions for Electric Guitar' were solo albums, even if they were released under the name of ASH RA TEMPEL.

-In that time bands like Ash Ra Tempel had very good response by the listeners all around the world. What do you think it could be the reason for this success? Why this kind of music is enjoyed only for a few people nowadays?

-We had success because the music was new and attractive to people who were fed up with anglo-saxon rock. Today our music is history, because new musicians come and with them new developments, styles, genres. And those of us who still play the old way are today considered oldfashioned [smile]. This is how history goes.

-Why this change in the name into Ashra in mid '70?

-Because I reformed the band with Lutz Ulbrich on guitar and with Harald Grosskopf on drums, and I wanted to make a distinction to the old Ash Ra Tempel which had always been connected with Hartmut on bass.
Since Hartmut left there was no bass player anymore in my band.

-It is said that your album 'Seven Up' (1973) was recorded without your authoritation. They say you were entered into the studio for playing and then they recorded you.

-Who says such a nonsense! It was Hartmut who initially went to Switzerland to meet Timothy Leary and to work out a concept for an album with him. We then invited some new musicians for the project, amongst them was Steve Schroyder, who also played with Tangerine Dream before, and Klaus D. Müller joined us as our road manager. (He later became Klaus Schulze's manager and is now his publisher). After three months of rehearsals in Berlin we finally went with our "Bigband" to Switzerland for the recordings in summer '72.

-Another band you were in was Cosmic Jokers. Tell us something about it.

-This was not a band but sessions of many musicians of the late OHR label, gathered in the studio, just having a party and some fun.

-At the beginning of 2000 there was a rising of Ash Ra Tempel although only you and Klaus Schulze were there. Why this new reunion?

-Who told you this? The reality is a bit different: I was invited by Julian Cope to perform at London's Royal Festival Hall. And because it was the year 2000 I remembered that it was 30 years since ASH RA TEMPEL was founded, so I asked Klaus whether he wanted to join me and we decided to make the concert as a onetime re-union. Well, that's how this re-union concert happen. But it was never planned to be more.

-As Manuel Göttsching your more interesting album is without doubt 'E2-E4' (1981). It is a vey hypnontic album. Did you write it as a way to the trance?

-No, this is actually not true, because 'Inventions for Electric Guitar', 'New Age of Earth', 'Blackouts' -all solo albums- are not less famous than 'E2-E4' (by the way, it is a recording from 1981 which I released 1984), but they attract a different public than 'E2-E4' which is a kind of anthem for the techno generation. Beside, 'E2-E4' is not composed but an 1h-improvisation without a break or mixing afterwards. The other albums are more based on compositions and concepts.

'E2-E4' was improvised completely off-the-cuff, while Inventions was recorded during three months of hard work. The structure of Inventions was worked out as a predetermined sequence.
Inventions is from 1974, and was based on my earlier experiments on guitar. You can hear some elements on side two of the first Ash Ra Tempel LP from 1971, but that was completely improvised, not in a composed form. 'E2-E4' came out of my later improvisations with electronic instruments, the guitar playing a very important and solo function.

-In the seventies specially many bands used drugs to compose their music. What does it help now a musician when he is writing a song?

-I don't use any drugs, so I can't tell you. Drugs have nothing to do with music. People take drugs for various reasons, mostly for fun. If you think it helps you to make music, it is your own choice to find out about it. And that was the same in the seventies. (I speak of the common drugs, not the ones for medical purposes).

-What do you remember of your early recordings like 'Inventions for Electric Guitar' in 1975?

-It was 1974, 'Inventions for Electric Guitar' was a minimalist experiment, but of a different nature. That composition had a structure and a clearly defined build-up. It wasn't recorded in one take like 'E2-E4', it was repeated for hours until it sounded the way I liked it. The only thing that is similar to 'E2-E4' is the repetitive form of both compositions.

'Inventions' builds upon the musical beginnings I made on guitar that were basically improvised and played live at concerts. The basic approaches of 'E2-E4' are already in evidence on Ash Ra Temple. By 'Inventions for Electric Guitar', I worked out a real structure, and there is a certain sequence.

-'Inventions' sounds electronic.

-I played guitar, my only instrument at that time, and tried to make it sound different than a guitar usually sounds, not like an electric guitar or traditional Blues guitar. That was rather awkward to do. Creating sounds you can only produce in the studio and not on stage was too difficult to reproduce in concert. That is why I only played a shortened version of Inventions live on stage: the most concise passages of it.

-Did you use any electronics on Inventions?

-No.On Inventions I only used guitars that were played in different ways. At concerts, I played the simpler version, which was reproduced without a big effort.

-That was a studio creation then?

-It was a studio recording. Effects that you hear are made as you record guitar and then play the tape at double speed. You cannot play a piece and then say "wait, I have to reverse the tape and now you hear how it as sounds being played backwards". You could not do that on stage.

-So it is being played backwards?

-Its played backwards, or alternatively at double or half speed.
After Inventions I had enough of playing guitar for a while and I wanted to do some other interesting things and started playing organ. That brought me to 'New Age of Earth'. For it, I composed things in a different way, on a keyboard instead of a guitar because of the playing technique which is different. You can combine tones in a different way on guitar. You can create other ideas musically due to the intervals and harmonies you do not get from a guitar. That sort of composing experimentation led me to 'New Age of Earth'.
'New Age of Earth' is not an electronic record. It was music that came about through exploring the possibilities of the keys on a keyboard or piano. It was however sold as electronic music because it was produced electronically.

-Does it have anything to do with New Age Music?

-No. That was only a coincidental title. I think New Age Music came later in the 80s. There was an esoteric movement in the 60s in the USA, but that had nothing to do with New Age Music as we know it today.
In addition, when you hear NEW AGE today, it sounds like MUSIC, but my record was meant as symbolizing a New Age of Earth, not more and not less. Moreover, at that time, New Age Music did not really exist.

-New Age was more composed than improvised?

-Yes. However, after that, I began working more with synthesizers and electronic instruments, then started my solo tour in 1976 to release the album in France. I began buying different kinds of instruments and developed my music in a more electronic direction. Those are the origins of 'E2-E4'. Later I started with fashion shows, where I improvised on electronic equipment.

-In 1996 it was released a box with 6 CD's with a lot of rarities of your music. How did you selected this material?

-This is some material from the seventies, concerts, recordings for the radio, studio sessions, compiled by Klaus D. Müller. I have a lot more stuff in my archives, and I will certainly release from time to time some selected material. But I don't like to release it as just another bunch of 10- or 20-CD-boxes, I would feel like having nothing more to say musically. So I better leave this for my "memoires".

-You has written music for films. How do you confront those works? Do you keep your common style or do you change your sound?

-I have written music to four films, 1975 to Philippe Garrel's 'Le Berceau de Cristal', starring the famale icons of the 70ies, like the Velvet Underground singer Nico, also Anita Pallenberg and Dominique Sanda.
For this film Philippe told me the mood, I did the music, without seeing the images, and Philippe put it where he thought it works -and it worked perfectly.
1999, I composed and accompanied a famous German actor on piano performing in Ilona Ziok's 'Kurt Gerron's KARUSSELL', I then produced the music and the soundtrack CD to the film.

2003, I composed for a silent movie from 1921 by famous German film director F.W. Murnau 'The Haunted Castle', there I did the music for strings, horns and electronics, exactly to the pictures. This is kind of mixed style.
And 2004, I did the music to Ilona Ziok's film 'The Count and the Comrade', for guitar and electronic. And here I had to be also exact with the pictures. The other composer involved was the famous Hans Eisler with songs composed during the Spanish War...

And this year I will do the music for Philippe Garrel's 'Le Revelateur' from 1968, a black & while silent movie, the most significant one of the French Zanzibar movement. Philippe wanted to have it without sound, but now he asked me to make the music as an experiment. And I will do it the way I already did his 'Le Berceau de Cristal'.

-How do you see nowadays the music of your friends Klaus Schulze and Tangerine Dream?

-To be honest I have no idea what they are doing...

-What is the future of the musician Manuel Göttsching?

-I am working to incorporate new technologies into my compostions and developping new forms of music as I did before with my solo works, I will compose for a symphonic orchestra, I will make the music for Phillippe's above mentioned film, I will perform with Julian Cope... Many many things to do!

-And the future of Ashra?

-May be a new program next year for Japan...

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Berlin, 2007 April 16

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