AUSLAND
The sand of the Sahara in the eternal glacier ice
CD & DVD Tip / Hubert von Goisern on the "Journey to Timbuktu and beyond..."
Hubert von Goisern knows, "you find the sand of the Sahara in the Dachstein glacier too" and he probably has it in front of him on those days when the sky above the mountains of the Salzkammergut is coloured yellow from the desert dust - and that exactly suits the most recent digipack, the CD Ausland and the DVD Warten auf Timbuktu. The latter is good for a further surprise as it contains Hubert's first self-produced and edited travel film.
In it, he has processed the sometimes dichotomous experiences at and with the Festival au Desert in Mali. His own appearance in the middle of the desert, for example, which the Tuaregs liked and which only left discontent within him. Or the view of the stars: "It is the same sky as at home. It is the same world, just another continent. The question of what I'm doing here doesn't come up at all. I am there. That's the way it is. That's the way it should be. That's that!"
Africa is like a great love, which is, however, often not reciprocated, continues Hubert, who already knows the black continent from many journeys. And Mali?
"The end of the world, so it is said, is in Timbuktu" – but is the end not also always a new beginning? He doesn't yet know when and under which circumstances, but a return is programmed, because "that can't have been it".
"A perfect time..."
The excursion to West Africa was at the same time also the end to the hitherto most successful tour with more than 100 concerts - and at the same time the answer to the oft-posed question of whether there would also be a Trad III after Trad I & II. "Now, in a certain way you could say: here it is", Hubert points out on the new live CD Ausland.
He just gave this a different name, because after all, the recordings come from various concerts in Germany and Vienna ("no less abroad for this music").
It probably does not have to be emphasised that Hubert von Goisern and his musicians, Monika Drasch, Bernd Bechtloff, Max Lässer, and Arnulf Lindner don't give two figs about an often dusty folk music.
They know how the sand of the Sahara has got into the eternal ice of the Dachstein glacier. And that it often needs only a few drops of water to make the desert bloom.
Hubert von Goisern: Ausland
For the Germans who live north of the Danube, or in one of the south German cities at least, there is something about hugely exotic about classical alpine folk music, which, thanks to a dangerous smattering of knowledge, also often leads to all sorts of twee defence mechanisms, which mostly question the reason for being of the whole genre. Those who have come from the Allgau, or Oberland have at least witnessed it on the outskirts. But Hubert von Goisern's music has something fascinating about it for such people too. He mixes the archaic, the traditionally not so melodious element that constitutes the genre, with modern sounds of various origins. After a good many excursions into world music, the two Trad albums were once more close to the original. Ausland is effectively the document of the live realisation of these CDs, but thanks to an included DVD, it is much more.
Goisern himself calls Ausland "Trad III", as a consequential continuation of the two previous albums. That's right in a way, but here it is more about the transplantation of traditional music from the Salzkammergut into the big, wide world. Or rather, into towns like Freiburg, Oldenburg, Trier or Soest - which, according to Goisern, are "overseas" for these songs, hitherto limited in their spread. Naturally, the room for interpretation is great. Goisern and his band expand and stretch the original material, giving it new accents, exposing individual places, in order to neglect others.
So they create a kind of basic atmosphere, which seems meditative and well-balanced, which leaves itself all the time in the world to unfold. That has, as suggested above, just very little to do with what one generally calls folk music, with the Musikantenstadls of this world. The yodel is not folksiness here, but rather primal cry. It's always the best when the influences from pop and rock remain in the background - for example at the beginning of the six minute long Kohler, or in the brilliant In's Birig, with its cowbell background.
And then there's the film. Three quarters of an hour about the real "Ausland". Impressions of a concert trip to Mali. Lots of disappointments, many difficult moments. And yet at the end the magic of music. The proof that it is all a universal language, which is however understood at the latest at the show. A great thing, we look forward to the next studio album.
Excellent.
Hubert von Goisern - Ausland
Ausland is a live recording of the Trad II tour in 2004. On this tour, Hubert von Goisern, the recording artist in all things true Austrian folk music, presented his album Trad II recorded in 2003. An album, which he set far from the lederhosen-blessed and beer-bellied atmosphere of a Musikantenstadl. Recorded high above the Hallstatt Lake, in the Krippenstein hotel, Hubert shows his understanding of genuine folk music and thus inspired people all over Europe. Ausland is released as a digipack. Apart from the CD, there is an extraordinary DVD with the title Warten auf Timbuktu. A film about his adventurous concert trip to Mali, to the Festival au Desert 2005, with an overwhelming finale, where Hubert performs Hiatamadl with his band and the African singer Bil Aka Kora on a brightly lit stage in the middle of the desert. Well worth seeing!
In the Salzkammergut, there you can well...
Hubert von Goisern - Ausland
The human rights activist, multi-instrumentalist, composer, singer, lyricist, musical self-made-man and world traveller Hubert von Goisern (actually Hubert Achleitner from Bad Goisern, Austria) has a life story to show that is no less bright than a figure in a novel. But you can't invent such a biography. Just look at the artist's internet site. His personal development, his band stories, his journeys, successes and projects are meticulously recorded there.
The youngest of these projects has just been finished and has been available for a couple of days now in beautiful presentation: Ausland - a double album with CD (live recording of the TRAD tour 2004) and a DVD with impressive recordings of the guest spot journey to Mali and its legendary historic city of Timbuktu. The musical offering is as sumptuous as the packaging of the double digipack, with almost 72 minutes of numbers recorded at high quality on the tour through Germany, Austria and Switzerland - the whole lot of newly arranged and instrumented folk songs from the Inner Salzkammergut.
But by no means does any stuffy or kitsch "contemplative" parlour music atmosphere develop, because with his sophisticated arrangements of the traditional material, Hubert von Goisern manages a tightrope walk, where he cherishes the tradition just the same as he translates it into a powerful, exhilarating, rocky world music. The success bears out the well-established experiment. The hearty yodel becomes a race-uniting element (see the Mali concert on the DVD) and even Big Ben filters through at one point in the rocky Goassbeitlbauern. But despite drive and contemporary adaptation, Hubert von Goisern's music also remains a treasure for fans of folk music, because he takes special care not to contradict the beautiful music, but rather take the best from the good stuff.
Stadltür is such a wonderfully poetic piece, Meraner, like Iawaramoi, clearly brings kindred country elements on board, Da Schwoarze and Rote Wand prove themselves, like many other pieces, to be absolutely danceable and In's Birig, like Schönberger, shows genuine and deeply felt love of the homeland. One can confidently listen to Ausland more often and discover it anew again and again. The fact that the genre of folk music thus experiences a contemporary revaluation is certainly the effect Hubert von Goisern wanted.
Hubert von Goisern – Ausland
Wonderful digital document of folk music
Ausland comes along as a digipack and CD + DVD, a kind of continuation of Trad II according to Hubert von Goisern, so quasi Trad III. In 2004 Trad II brought him on a small tour; believe it or not, 30 concerts soon became 100 shows.
This feeling, this atmosphere of the time back then is to be experienced with Ausland, often felt. The CD contains a recording of the Trad II tour in Germany, Switzerland and Austria. As is usual with Hubert von Goisern, in almost daunting perfection: sound, tone, music, arrangements, band, musicians. All are of the finest. And at the same time undramatic.
There is also the second CD, or rather DVD, Warten auf Timbuktu. In 45 minutes, the film wittily, closely and without varnish documents the life of the band on tour, who only want to go to Timbuktu, but more than one obstacle will get them. It's all very amusing, nice and genuine.
Brilliant production.
Hubert von Goisern in double pack on CD and DVD: Ausland!
With the new album Ausland, a musical double pack, something very special now awaits us...:
"Heast as net - wie die Zeit vergeht". This line made Hubert von Goisern famous far beyond Bavaria's borders in 1993. It was the time when folksy music rid itself of its conservative chains and began to go against the flow, opening itself up to elements from rock, jazz and solid songwriting. Since then, there is barely any style that hasn't been combined with folk music, from salsa to electric guitar.
Hubert von Goisern was the pioneer of this movement and still plays a central role in the alternative alpine music scene today. Nobody else is as keen to experiment as he is, having rocked the halls with the Styrian for more than twenty years. With the new album Ausland, a musical double pack, something very special now awaits us: firstly, a live album with the repertoire of the previous Trad CDs, which was mainly recorded on Hubert von Goisern's last tour in the Austrian mountain country. Secondly, a DVD with the recordings from the international festival in Timbuktu, a detailed travel report (also with the difficulties of the journey there), many musical friends and an example for real, delightful fusion of the cultures!
Ausland - Hubert von Goisern
Atmospheric live document of his Trad era
With this record, Hubert von Goisern brings to an end his successful era of contemporary treatment of traditional songs with a recording of the Trad Tour 2004, which earned him nonstop euphoric concerts, especially in Germany. The two studio albums in this series were rather quiet and solemn, so this recording is shaped by a higher dynamic and contagious joy for life and playing. The band play in a multifaceted way and play the folk music of today perfectly, without losing themselves in ingenuity. This album is rounded off with a very pleasant DVD, which supports the title of the album at the same time. Here the concert trip to Mali, which formed the end of the tour in January 2005, is reported. The primitive stage in the desert is especially impressive. Apropos of the subject "Ausland" (Overseas), great attention should also be paid to the website made by the English woman Sarah Marchant, which is highly interesting and rich in content.
Ausland - Hubert von Goisern
When the exceptional Austrian Hubert von Goisern does something, you can assume that it will be something special. It happened that way with his Trad II album, which he recorded at the beginning of 2003 at 2100 metres above sea level on the Dachstein massif, high above Lake Hallstatt, in the Krippenstein Hotel. A CD full of folk music, as Hubert von Goisern calls his music, but which has absolutely nothing to do with the usual lederhosen-dirndl-souled folk music in the ordinary style. For who would have heard a folk musician play on the steel guitar, like the Swiss Max Lässer does. Since Hubert likes to bring his folk music to the people, he went on a "small" tour with Trad II in 2004. He intended 30 concerts, it became 100, before he struck up Wann i durchgeh for the very last time in Basel and sang the corresponding, melancholic yodel together with his enthusiastic audience. Hubert von Goisern gave folk music back its dignity, freed it from the suffocating cementation of the eternal stick-in-the-muds, and thus breathed into it a refreshing vitality once more, which makes it worth listening to for all ages and people all over the world.
This is to be seen and heard on his current digipack CD Ausland. The CD is a recording of the Trad II tour in 2004: "I was often asked whether there would be a continuation of this programme, that is, a Trad III, now in a certain way, one could say: here it is." The CD contains live recordings of his appearances in Germany, Switzerland and Austria. It has, as is customary with Goisern, turned out to be a perfect live CD, excellent in sound, in compilation, in presentation. It is a true delight to hear such a thing.
And in addition, there is Goisern in pictures. He has called the DVD of the digipack Warten auf Timbuktu. It is a 45 minute film about his concert trip to Mali to the Festival Au Desert 2005. The film shows the difficult journey there, which - as normal in Africa - consists mainly of waiting, waiting and waiting again. By boat, by light aircraft (a Kyrgyz machine with Russian crew), by bus, by lorry and by taxi, Hubert von Goisern and his band laboriously and agonisingly slowly work their way forward into the desert of Essakane, north west of Timbuktu. Everything is perfectly and very impressively documented, with occasionally very amusing commentary from his comrades-in-arms when they are hanging around in some clay-coloured little town, surrounded by snotty-nosed, curious children. There are also highly interesting and musically fruitful meetings with native musicians. And then the big evening: a brightly lit stage in the middle of the desert, the audience sits in the sand before it, whites, blacks, Tuaregs, men, women, children. And while cloaked Tuaregs move into the darkness with their white camels, Hubert von Goisern sings his Hiatamadl with his band and the African singer Bil Aka Kora! An almost overwhelming impression. And his brightly mixed audience is visibly keen on the strange but extraordinary mixture of Goisern's folk music and African sounds.
Conclusion: The current Goisern digipack CD is an absolute MUST for his fans. And everyone else should listen and hear how folk music can sound today, and see how it makes an impression even in deepest Africa. The CD as well as the DVD make a super production!