ENTWEDERUNDODER

EntwederUndOder

More rock and more loose tongues than before:
EntwederUndOder is the new record from Austrian world musician Hubert von Goisern.

It's good, in these times when the word "crook" is bandied about so readily and apparently half the bankers are criminals swarming about, to meet a real rogue. For example, the shrewd jester and word turner Hubert von Goisern. The Austrian singer-songwriter and world musician has the suitable song down pat for the events of the day: "Everyone knows that money doesn't grow on trees, and you can't eat it either, but it burns well." The accordion lashes, the drum whirls, the electric guitar strains and whines, the speech song tumbles into a yodel and the laconic question follows, "why are all these people here, who lie, who bend the truth?"

Entwederundoder is von Goisern's most recent album in wordplay style. One is quite surprised that the globetrotter, who has previously served up his musical parades with a big scoop has this time worked with the attraction of tavern-suitable reduction. Some of the pieces seem to be based on the most rudimentary, rawest Americana. In the surf ska of the second songs - a tongue-in-cheek homage to the Indians - cheery cow bells suddenly sound. The zz-top-like blues rock of I versteh di nit is given a chapel litany of the saints. And the yodel is almost omnipresent, even in the thoughtful melodies of the second half of the album, for example in the bluesy piano ballad Lebwohl. Hubert von Goisern has saved one of the most beautiful songs for the end, the Lou Reed-esque Neama bang, which ends with the lines: "I don't need to understand everything, but a little would be good." This should hold true, for the concert too.

Entwederundoder

What BAP is for the people of Cologne, Hubert von Goisern is for the Austrians. To put it another way, both mean: the rest of us understand - nothing. Or at least, not much. But those of you who like the dialect of the Salzkammergut have the right man with Hubert von Goisern. Because the lyrics are important. And the music? It's difficult to say what is predominant: blues, rock, folk music from the Alps - that in particular - Balkan pop, funk and sounds from far, far away. A bold mix, bold just like the guy.

[...] The instrumentation of the new record consists as always of his Styrian accordion, from which he from time to time elicits the highest strange squeaking sounds - a style for which he is famous, the purest cat ear frequencies that flash through the ear to the mind to the roots of your hair, making it stand on end. Drums, bass, guitar, piano are also part of the comparatively reduced lineup and yes, as one expects with von Goisern: there are cow bells and a Jews' harp too.

So his accordion plays a comfortable Rhineland country dance. Another time it goes through the Indian jungle with a tempo and moan hounded forward like the plot of an action film. When singing the 58-year-old also jumps at times high into yodelling falsetto - an attraction for which von Goisern cannot be cheered enough. And where he must, he cries out, a cry to the echo of the mountains. Or else he introduces the ethereal floating like no instrument other than the accordion is able (in the instrumental Über-Unter-Ober-Österreicher) - the basses and drums always providing rhythm so that nobody loses their way - and contrasts it with the bass guitar. And if anyone is reading this and thinking that this combination is tantamount to kitsch, they are mistaken.

The record offers eleven songs with often unexpectedly simple lyrics. "I versteh' di net, dafür bin i zu bled" ("I don't understand you, I'm probably too stupid") - but no, this rhyme doesn't sound at all laughable, the moment of an exciting relationship between a couple being told in this song is put best this way. "Heidi, halt mi ..., Heidi g'freu di" ("Heidi, hold me …, Heidi, be happy"), well, that's flirting with the alpine. Love ballads, beautiful and good, loud, quiet, large and small. But of course: on Entwederundoder you hear quite clearly again that Hubert von Goisern - albeit otherwise mostly tender and poetic in his expression - is a crystal clear politically-minded person. Not for nothing was the opening song chosen as such, denouncing the craziness of producing energy from maize and wheat: that is to say money "burns well". "It doesn't grow on trees and you can't eat it either, but it burns well and if we keep on burning, it'll all go to hell".

Brenna tuat's guat, taken from the record, set itself quickly at the top of the Austrian charts. Hubert von Goisern can be seen live at 100 concerts in 2012 (on 12th March in Berlin).

Hubert von Goisern: Entwederundoder

After diverse musical expeditions often enough unsettling to his fans, with his new album the Austrian has returned to his roots as a so-called alpine rocker. And here he is at home, that's the meter in which he is best and where he comes across best. Accompanied by his accordion and a trio of guitar, bass and drums, von Goisern has pared down musically and proves the old adage "less is more" to be true in impressive ways. The focus lies on earthy rock and blues with alpine ingredients, the mentioned accordion and the profound lyrics for which he is known, presented in the broadest Austrian dialect. The connection between rock and Austrian folk works wonderfully again, spreading happy to wild sentiment. Entweder Und Oder will satisfy old von Goisern fans, win back defectors and definitely win new fans.

Culture review: on fire

With "Brenna tuats guat" Hubert von Goisern provided the soundtrack for the financial crisis and rose to the top of the charts for the first time - thanks in part to Ö3 changing its spots.

We are accustomed to pop goddesses such as Madonna, or more recently, Lady Gaga reigning over the Mount Olympus of the charts. We have resigned ourselves to dancefloor oddities like Bring Me Edelweiß (1988) taking weeks to fade when even they top the charts. And the Austrian audience always spares a number 1 for a lederhosen-wearing Styrian like Andreas Gabalier, who sells his kind of schlager as folk rock 'n' roll..

So it's no wonder that Hubert von Goisern himself spoke of a "miracle", when Brenna tuats guat settled down for five weeks at the top of the single charts in the autumn - a success that not even Hiatamadl achieved nearly twenty years ago.

Soundtrack to the financial crisis

"Hits only develop because they capture the emotions of many people at a certain point and probably also at a certain time", Bernhard Flieher wrote in his book Weit, weit weg. Die Welt des Hubert von Goisern, published in 2009. Brenna tuats guat landed right at a time when the most inflationary word is "crisis" and when the systems are running out of control.

And when Hubert von Goisern sings "the devil should catch these crooks", he's saying what is on the mind of many people, when rating agents, who play with thumbs up or down, collapsing financial institutions and a feeling of impotence and forsakenness make them feel like shouting.

The hit radio noncompliance

The song "touches on people's sensitivities," the 59-year-old estimates. And does so in a way that everyone understands: "Everyone knows / that money doesn't grow on trees / and you can't it either / but it burns well / but we stoke up the what / and the turnips and the maize / and if we keep on burning / it'll go to hell".

What you don't know won't make you hot, as the Austrian saying goes. For more than a decade man the general public, for are burning for Brenna tuats guat today, had lost sight of the Goiserer's creative tracks. Actually, they'd lost the audible trace, as the self-titled public hit radio steadfastly turned down the Upper Austrian's songs, because they didn't fit into the unspeakable invention of format radio. And had this song not found an open-hearted listener on the upper floors of Ö3, who warmed to the number and put it on air, the hit would have just flickered to itself in the faithful circle of Hubert-aficionados. The singer-songwriter's good fortune in 2011 also leads us to the bad luck of dependence on Ö3: anyone who isn't played on Austria's most wide-reaching station blooms at best in obscurity.

A hit like this also brings hardships with it. Once it's born, it's difficult to escape it. Power rotation is the name of this repeat of songs day and night. Then we hear a song so often that we can't listen to it any more - or even the singer doesn't want to sing it any more.

"Hiatamadl" with consequences

Hiatamadl, which conjured Hubert von Goisern and the Alpinkatzen onto the musical landscape in 1992 as mergers of rock and folk music, was just such a case. It moved besieged ski huts to an intoxication of fat or thin calves, gushed out of every loudspeaker and climbed to number 2 in the charts - with the consequences that he turned his back on the success for years and removed it from his stage repertoire, until he had made his peace with it again.

The fate of a song being laid aside can easily be avoided with the financial crisis soundtrack Brenna tuats guat. Ö3 should simply replace the single, awarded with a gold disc for sales of more than 15,000, with a fresh, strong song. The platinum album Entwederundoder contains a load of them. Because, as we know: a hit doesn't develop until it's played. And then it burns well.

Hubert von Goisern: New video online!

Only a few artists can look back on such a long and varied creative period as Hubert von Goisern: with Hiatamadl he became known more than 20 years ago as the founder of alpine rock. Since then he has always gone his own way, realising dreams, making films, initiating innovative musical projects, always with himself as the main thread of his ideas. He played concerts in 25 countries, using the synergies that developed to collaborate with artists from Africa, Asia and Eastern Europe, as well as greats such as Konstantin Wecker, Wolfgang Niedecken and Xavier Naidoo. Hubert's two-year Linz Europe Tour is legendary, the journey on a concert ship from Linz to the Black Sea (2007) and North Sea (2008). A mammoth project with unbelievable opulence and great musical encounters.

The new album EntwederundOder closes the circle: reduced, but not slowed down, Hubert's music is reduced to what is essential and installs itself directly in the head and belly of the listener. The first single Brenna tuats guat is song with content, perhaps at long last a true protest song, that touches the emotions of the people in times of financial crisis and global uncertainty. With this and EntwederundOder Hubert von Goisern reached higher in the charts than ever before - without doing anything differently from before. The time is right!

The album EntwederundOder was at number 2 for three weeks and was awarded gold. In Germany the album also achieved the hitherto highest chart placing for Hubert von Goisern at number 13. Brenna tuats guat was number one in the Austrian charts for five weeks!

The single has been available since 4th November, with not just the studio recording, but also a previously unreleased live version. The video to the song was also just released: Brenna tuats guat

Goisern congratulates Goisern

Hubert von Goisern: "Entweder und Oder" at the top of the charts!

Hubert von Goisern has skinned his music. After his opulently instrumented Danube tour and his epic most recent album S'Nix he is now telling of the basic connections of life in new songs bared to their bones. On Entweder und Oder Hubert has succeeded in producing radically reduced songs that one man can perform alone on the guitar if it comes down to it. But together with his band, consisting of just drums, bass and guitar, he recorded compellingly animated music that takes on the way bold turns on the way reconciliation. After great adventures and intensive explorations Hubert von Goisern now dares to connect with the very starting point of his music!

When Hubert von Goisern founded the Alpinkatzen a quarter of a century ago, the music from the mountains needed a radical adjustment: the world traveller, who had previously worked in South Africa as a chemistry laboratory assistant, in Canada a ski salesman and in Bad Ischl in the salt mine, cloaked it in contemporary pop music, as the eighties ran a little lost into the nineties. At the same time he drove out its hokiness Late the untiring cultural ambassador drew out the traditional sounds from Africa and Tibet in his productions, before he intensively inhaled his mountain homeland on his two Trad albums. Most recently Hubert von Goisern brought a concert ship to life, with which he sailed the Danube down to the Ukraine - loaded with Eastern European.

"The Danube tour was Mount Everest for me, so afterwards a reduction was necessary and logical", says Hubert. "And I was really appalled at what emerged while writing, what simple, sometimes almost naïve songs came knocking." The 58-year-old innovator of the Austrian music scene first had to persuade his young colleagues from the Danube ship, drummer Alex Pohn, bass player Helmut Schartlmüller and guitarist Severin Trogbacher, to stand by his very direct, straightforward new songs. With all their fury - as well as with all their delicacy of feeling - under the direction of producer and songwriter Hubert von Goisern they created the radically purged sound cosmos of a highly-concentrated singer album.

Because that is the next thing that amazes you when listening to Entweder und Oder: how clearly, how densely, how directly Hubert von Goisern recorded his whole album in three days - incidentally with an old AKG microphone that needed a long rest to cool down every hour. And not only the singer sings: the listener sings along - inside at first, but soon loudly, although the new, still unknown songs only slowly become comrades. It has nothing to do with idyll - on the contrary: the inevitable impulse to sing along is simply stirred by the fact that Hubert von Goisern has created songs of pure substance, which sound so familiar and natural, as if they must have existed all along.

It is the unbridled joy with which Hubert von Goisern has freed himself from all expectations on Entweder und Oder that leads the way with bold sweeps to musical reconciliation with what is close. Thus Entweder und Oder has become an exciting tightrope walk: the terrific view into the valley that Hubert von Goisern stages with as much relish on Entweder und Oder as he did at the beginning of his career - yodelling, crying out and powerfully calling upon those who are great than the mountains - precedes a daring ascent. Hubert von Goisern's accordion functions as a solid fixed rope climbing route on this expedition into the unheard familiar.

Right at the start of Entweder und Oder the accordion whirs around a radical lustful fantasy about burning money - and the spawn of the devil. But Brenna tuats guat has barely faded before a mercilessly driving drum scares off any certainty: the song Indianer challenges traditional manhood rituals with skinned Western country, while the coyote-like wailing guitar throws itself courageously against the blazing sun. Halt nit an is sparingly instrumented and for that reason striking songwriter pop that evokes the life of travelling.

And there it sounds again: the unendingly freeing and at the same time shockingly passionate cry of Hubert von Goisern that goes both into the valley and up to the heavens. Then there are boulders that seem insurmountable at first: in I versteh di nit powerfully distorted guitars provide the logical soundtrack for communication no longer possible. All the more amazing is the following alpine cry of desire: Heidi, actually a waltz, that dresses itself as a reggae in 3/4 time, celebrating the joyful intertwining of life by means of its most obvious finesse.

Hubert von Goisern turns very seriously to life itself in the emblematic big number of the album: in an unvarnished manner Es is wias is tells of the passing, the transient, of change and the eternal circle of the unalterable. The calmest piece on Entweder und Oder provides the room with tantalisingly drawn-out bar jazz for Hubert von Goisern's clarinet to wordlessly tell the story of eternal recurrence a second time (as well as of personal wear, humorously moored in the song) - but it is all anything but mute. It is not chance that Es is wias is stands at the centre of an album that dedicates itself both musically and lyrically to the most elemental aspects of being human: love. The melancholy memory that blazes its way to a terribly beautiful harmonica solo in Nit lang her, the farewell in the quiet piano ballad Lebwohl, the eternal misunderstanding in Suach da an andern, this ruggedly instrumented song with the wildly dancing Jew's harp. Straight afterwards in the purely instrumental Über-unter-ober-Österreicher mind-boggling serpentines of sound unfold, on which the resurrected accordion gives both strangulation marks and the tenderest caresses. Insight has seldom grooved as decidedly as on this album, which characteristically ends with a song in which Es is wias is is reflected in sunshine. This end point, bravely titled Neama bang (Never uneasy) tears open the sky and yet remains firmly grounded. Here it is, the reconciliation, yes, perhaps the salvation from being eternally split on this world. The eleven songs on the way to this end point called Neama Bang would have been enough to illustrate a moving musical rebirth. But Hubert von Goisern doesn't do things by halves: he takes us with him right to the top. He moves heaven and earth so that his listeners have the pleasure of perceiving the happiness that he time and again cries out or catapults from himself into the world with a yodel - exciting, passionate, fearless every time and completely intoxicated in precious moments of beauty. He wouldn't be anything less.

CD tip of the week: Hubert von Goisern - "Entwederundoder"

Hubert von Goisern sees every album as a new challenge and swears - if we are to believe what he says - time and again to stop producing CDs, because he doesn't want to inflict the stress on himself any more. But then when "everything works out", the pedigree musician from the Salzkammergut is at least as happy as his colleagues and fans. All the pressure, tension and trouble are forgotten.

One thing is certain: On Entwederundoder every sound, cry and juchitzer works, Hubert von Goisern has made another successful album.

The work on it began about a year ago, when he resolved to tell little, self-contained stories about life with his songs. On the condition that he could also perform all the songs alone, with piano, guitar or accordion accompaniment. "Reduction to the vital" became the motto of the new album and so his band only consists of drums, bass and guitar. The Austrian musician ably mixes different styles together: the bandwidth reaches from folk music, ska, pop and blues to rock. There is guaranteed to be something for every taste here.

For those who like things hot, they will be best served with Brenna tuats guat or Suach da an andern. Those who love ballads can look forward to I kenn oan or Neama bang.

This album has already won over many Hubert von Goisern fans. They are especially looking forward to the tour, which will run through Germany, Austria and Switzerland from January 2012.

Entwederundoder

Now to an album that came onto the market in September and which has already achieved gold in Austria: Entwederundoder from Hubert von Goisern. On it you will find the single Brenna tuats guat, which was released on CD on [04.11.] and which is also on its way up. It is being helped by the video to the song, which has been out since Monday. Hubert von Goisern is an artist who brings everything he tackles to a successful end. He began his career as the frontman of Hubert von Goisern and the Alpinkatzen. The hits from this band, Heast es ned or Koa Hiatamadl, remain remembered to this day. With his colleagues von Goisern succeeded in presenting traditional folk music with rock, jazz and blues in Austrian dialect, mixing it to something never before heard. Later he turned as a soloist towards world music and played together with African and Tibetan musicians. In recent years he sailed the Danube on a specially converted concert ship and moored in different towns, playing concerts before audiences of thousands. With his current CD he has returned to his starting point, but has, as Brenna tuats guat proves, become much rockier. From early next year Hubert von Goisern will be on tour through Germany, Austria and Switzerland. This includes a stop on 19th April, 8pm at the Rosengarten in Mannheim. Tickets are now available.

HUBERT VON GOISERN: Entwederundoder

Aside from Udo Jürgens, Hubert von Goisern is likely the best-known musician in Austria. Early in his life he was drawn from the Salzkammergut out into the world. He undertook a Danube expedition, has been to Tibet and Africa, even in exile according to an album title. Now he has come back home again. He has renounced exoticism and opulent instrumentation, but not content-rich, introspective lyrics, simply gone into his studio in Salzburg, taken a few musicians with him and possibly arrived at himself. That is to say: he still sings in dialect, still lets his long drawn out trademark cries and shouts be heard and plays the accordion, though rather restrained. But in the musical environment he has reduced himself to the rudimentary, to music with which he has been socialised. For a man of his age, that is of course folk music, jazz, blues and rock. So in the first songs an electric guitars cries out with rock and blues, then there is contemplative jazz accompaniment with the piano, then at the end returning to folk music again with Jews' harp and full lineup. A well-rounded work.

Hubert von Goisern: Entwederundoder

If after the first number Brenna tuats guat you think that Hubert von Goisern is back playing pure folk music again, you'll soon be disabused of that notion over the course of the new album ENTWEDERundODER. Of course Hubert often takes up the accordion and launches one yodel or another, but on his new CD variety unequivocally reigns. From the Pulp Fiction-like number with ska elements Indianer to the singer-songwriter piece Halt nit an and the blues rock I versteh di net Hubert gives free reign to his creativity. Then a little bar jazz, pop and folk dance and a homely, groovy and inspired Goisern record comes to a close.

Hubert von Goisern: Brenna tuats guat

Hubert von Goisern on the radio? Hello? What's going on here? The good man is nearly 60 years old and alpine rock is not exactly "in" - okay, Stefan Dettl is successful, but other than that?

Perhaps it's down to the fact that on the one hand Hubert von Goisern can write proper music. Not for nothing is he considered to be the figurehead of new folk music. On the other hand, the cause of the success of Brenna tuats guat could be that the musician has hit a nerve.

In the song he vents his spleen on debt summits, greed and money in general - in a time in which angry citizens are surrounding the banking district in Frankfurt and "Occupy Wall Street" sees crowds every day, it's not so irrelevant.

So, have a listen and let yourself be carried away.

ENTWEDERUNDODER storms the Austrian charts

New album from Hubert von Goisern 

[...] Von Goisern has now recorded a new studio album Entweder und oder and has stormed straight to number two in the Austrian albums charts. This wasn't enough though and his first single Brenna tuats guat then went straight to number one in the single charts.

After many years being on the road - often in remote places in far-off lands - right at the start of his new CD Hubert von Goisern shows us in powerful rock that the fire is still burning. In Brenna tuats guat he's the dashing outdoorsman that plays with the devil. The song also makes a unusually current political reference when he sings "but we're stoking up the wheat".

In 2012 Austria is to introduce a benzine that will be mixed with 10% alcohol from grain (ie bioethanol). In Germany this E10 is a hot topic. Drivers don't want it, because the vehicle guarantees are vague. What's even worse is that biofuel drives up the price of food while across the world a billion people are starving. Hubert von Goisern sings: "and if we keep on stoking, it'll all go to hell".

51 brilliant minutes with Hubert

The band reduced to a quartet - and once more melodies into which you can sink: Hubert von Goisern - Austria's one-off thinking outside the box - presents the superb album "EntwederUndOder".

"The dividing line between simple and fatuous is fluid", writes a certain Hubert Achleitner his notes for the new album, though he is better known in the alpine republic and beyond as Hubert von Goisern. But his concern is without foundation: if there's someone who knows how not to overstep this fine line, then it's HvG.

Back to old form

After the on balance slightly disappointing S'NIX - somehow melodies that really stuck were missing from the somewhat sprawling album and tour - HvG has knocked out a commanding, captivating a work. Twelve songs, stylistically diverse and yet seamless, not least thanks to the excellent band. Recorded in a classic quartet lineup (bass, guitar, drums), it is the master himself in particular who provides for different colours of sounds with accordion, Jews' harp, brass and wood instruments. In addition there is the beautiful harmony singing from all band members and a little guest piano on two numbers - and the fine mélange is complete.

The new, pleasantly simplified direction was clearly driven in on his "tavern tour" through Austrian and is even reminiscent of the legendary Alpinkatzen time. The maverick having dedicated himself in recent years to big projects such as his Linz Europe Tour along the Danube, Rhine and Main, it was time for something new, something - if you like - puristic. "I can't play folk songs ad nauseum", HvG pointed out. That all explains the sound on EntwederUndOder: more rock over all - but of course it also ranges across jazz, funk and the traditional. "After four years of opulence, broad sounds and big band of at most nine people, the wish was to push the pendulum in the other direction to give it new swing", says HvG.

Brenna tuats guat is a number that still only the man from Bad Goisern can bring off, with Indianer he presents something like highly amusing alpine surf rock, Halt nit an is a wonderful declaration of love to freedom, with the potential to become a classic. Things then get a bit rougher with I versteh di nit and Suach da an andern. The second half of the album (who remembers that there used to be lovely longplayer records, which you actually had to turn over?) is then calmer with pieces like I kenn oan, Nit lang her, Neama bang and the deeply moving Lebwohl.

It's no use looking for lapses on the album. HvG is back at the peak of his creative strength. "I had to get used to things and find the courage to see that it's fine like this now and not to file away and arrange more complexly, but rather remain in this simplicity, sometimes naïvety", said Hubert for the record.

Concert visit recommended

Not all the lyrics are as deep as a crevasse, but that seems bearable. The music from the almost 60-year-old man is lyrical enough, offers enough true substance to really make up for it in every second. As is well-known, his music gets you especially well live - anyone wanting to go to a concert in Austria should get hold of tickets in good time though: only four dates are currently noted in the tour calender for 2012, instead there are lots of concerts in Germany, all the way up to the Baltic Sea.

God bless - and don't stop, Hubert.

Mikado - CD of the week

"Hubert von Goisern has skinned his music" writes his record label Blanko Musik about the newly released CD EntwederUndOder from the musician from the tranquil town of Bad Goisern in the Salzkammergut

It was a good 15 years ago that he struck out on his own to make a furore worldwide with his mix of alpine musical tradition and pop music. "Skinning" sounds drastic and symbolises something of the archaic that the mountain world and its inhabitants characterise.

To put it a little more delicately, you could also say that after his most recent opulent works Hubert von Goisern is daring to return to a smaller lineup, to the origin of every rock band: drums, guitar and bass. However none of the variety is lost, because of course Hubert himself takes up all the instruments he masters, be it diatonic accordion, harmonica, clarinet, or even tuned cow bells. And of course he sings too and again and again lets his trained yodelling sound. He works everything with the utmost care and with the drive for absolute perfection.

EntwederUndOder shows a Hubert von Goisern in top form, one who hasn't lost his sense of fun with music and who plays the part of the alpine rock, with which it all began.

12-17.09.11 / EntwederUndOder can be heard daily as the CD of the Week in hr2 Mikado, 6-9am

The Goiserer lets it rock

Apart from the squeezebox opening number (Brenna tuats guat) and two or three other songs, the Goiserer has made an almost honest-to-goodness rock album. Indianer flirts with Pulp Fiction sound, Hålt nit ån is pure pop rock, Lebwohl a piano ballad (though with a yodelled refrain), I versteh di nit and Suach der åndern are dry as a bone rock songs, Nit lång her has the blues and only the instrumental ÜOOÜ (Über-Unter-Ober-Österreicher) is based in Austrian folk music. Most of the melodies have a Pied Piper quality.

Tom Waits in lederhosen

You experience a lot when you pack your band onto a ship and sail up and down the Danube. A different country every day, other people, other musical world. But at some point even the longest jam session is over and life as a land rat calls you back.

Hubert von Goisern knew that it was time for a change again. First of all this meant compressing the big band down to the core lineup (guitar, bass, drums). Then he said goodbye to electronic worlds of sound and no guests came to the Salzburg studio either.

Real classical qualifications for a record withdrawn into itself, very reduced arrangements, almost an acoustic decompression of the recent wearing years. But then with an accordion in an off-beat Brenna Tuats Guat sways this picture straight out of your mind. Some power chords laid over the top and you're right in the middle of a rousing polka rock that earned the attribute "alpine rock" in the nineties.

Perhaps he's leading us astray with this opener? Letting us stumble across his roots? The answer follows in the form of ska with cow bells and a 60s western flair in Indianer, offering the proof for the unbroken courage of ideas even at 58 years old.

In this way Hubert von Goisern repeatedly pulls the rug from under us. As always variety was writ large on the studio wall, even though the classic rock band lineup dominates in the sound, at least at first glance. Here you meet halting blues rock (I Versteh Di Nid), Tom Morello riffs with the Jews' harp (Suach Da An Andern) or rediscovered courage for wailing guitar solos (Halt Di An, I Versteh Di Nid).

He has already handled the folksy tradition, African and eastern influences have long since flowed into his blood and no longer need to be ostensibly celebrated. However it is the western popular music and the defining variety of the blues to which increasingly Goisern dedicates himself on Entwederundoder.

From the halfway point of the album in particular comes a quartet of songs that wouldn't fit in anywhere better than a smoky jazz bar. After the initial release from all self-imposed guidelines for this album, he has now reached the most personal front. Now piano chords, subdued organ hues and sparing guitars dominate.

Not just musically, but also lyrically the spirit of the Tom Waits of the 70s echoes through more than once. While previously HvG courageously rhymed "Pfeil und Bogen" ("arrow and bow") with "riesige Hoden" ("enormous balls"), in Es Is Wias Is he indulges in winsome a-typical ski commentary. The dry humour lurks most at the end of each line, not being revealed until the last syllable.

As usual he draws on unlimited resources in terms of lyrics, the Goisern figurative speech availing itself of nature, the past, departure and existentialism, in particular in the second half of the album, strongly weighted with ballads. The sparing instrumentation leaves lots of room for the vocals and allows lyrics about dreams, farewells and change plenty of space for unrestricted appreciation - the piano ballad Lebwohl is exemplary. In contrast to that comes the instrumental ÜUOÖ, which unfolds its hypnotic effect with the eerie lethargy of the accordion sounds and allows the excellent band to step once more into the spotlight.

An album title has seldom better suited the artistic work than in this case. There's more rock in the house of Goisern, at the same time he returns to his blues and jazz roots stronger than ever before, ennobled still with the accordion. The red rag of established conventions is somewhat relaxed, the individuality remains.

Where the devil spawns his children

Rock: On "Entwederundoder"Hubert von Goisern simplifies his sound with sweeping effect

The title Entwederundoder can only be understood quite radically: Either - in a quite post-modern sense - everything goes. Or just the real McCoy. After diverse musical excesses Hubert von Goisern has gone for the latter, for a reduction of his band and the drastic simplification of sound.

The best result is the powerful opener Brenna tuats guat, about the place where "the devil gets his children and everything runs together". With the mythicising poetic means of the old blues, the Upper Austrian castigates the financial system headed towards crisis point, a critique that flows into a truly rousing refrain: "Jeder woass, dass a Geld nit auf da Wiesen wachst, und essen kann ma's a nit, aber brenna tat's guat" ("Everyone knows that money doesn't grow on trees, and you can't eat it either, but it burns well"). The furious yodel and the whipping, yes, virtually burning accordion fit splendidly into the stunning rock number - no wonder, as after all half of blues and rock comes from European folklore.

The general simplification shifts Goisern almost inevitably up close to classic US songwriter art - in particular with the classic piano ballad Lebwohl.

But it doesn't hinder the 58 year old in covering an astonishing spectrum of styles from blues (I versteh Di nit) and jazz (fantastically grooving: Es is wias is) to songs that must be declared to be Austropop in its best sense (Halt nit an sounds a little like Wolfgang Ambros in his glory days). Indianer plays wittily with surf and ska clichés - and cow bells. Even the Jews' harp wins rock-funk honours (Such Da An Anderen). In this case less is unequivocally more - with no either and or.

kulturWelt album of the week

It's a deeply Austrian attitude, says Hubert von Goisern, Entwederundoder is his - he doesn't know exactly how many any more- album. But it is one that is raw, honest and back to the roots. You trust him, because he's gone all the way to the sources by ship - along the Rhine and Danube - and now he's rocking again and it really burns well - as the first track says. So cast off!

Album of the week: Hubert von Goisern with "Entwederundoder"

It's here! The new album from Hubert von Goisern - Entwederundoder! The Goiserer has reduced his band and is now on the road with just Alexander Pohn (drums), Helmut Schartlmüller (bass) and Severin Trogbacher (guitar). (These guys have played with him since the Danube tour) The new album has also changed with this "reduction". The opulently instrumented songs have simplified, everything has become "smaller", but have all the more power. The new album is a little reminiscent of the Alpinkatzen era. There's a lot of rock, and a lot is surrendered to the blues of life. And - what sets Goisern apart - there's always a hefty portion of social critique included - well-hidden and formulated in such a way that listeners start to think.

Entwederundoder is the album of the week on radio7.at from Monday 5th September to Sunday 11th September, daily between 11am and 12 noon, 4-5pm and 8-9pm!

Hubert von Goisern - EntwederUndOder

Hubert von Goisern's hat is burning again. Anyone who thought that after his mammoth undertaking of river travel regeneration and idleness would be the order of the day, couldn't be more wrong. The man from the province of Salzburg has ants in his pants again. For a change this time he has cut back on the local colour a bit, even aside from the omnipresent dialect, a few rough yodels and his squeezebox, used here very sparingly. Mostly it's all about hearty alpine rock, combined with ska and punk attitudes, as well as a pinch of US surf sound and blues. A few rolling waves appear, as were only seldom offered by the Goiserer in their stringent uncomplicated style in the past. As often done before, he concentrates on stories that are written by daily life together. It's not anything new, but time and again Hubert von Goisern knows how to splendidly elegantly and enthrallingly work such subjects with his very own epic poetry. For example there is the song Heidi halt mi, which he packs rhythmically with a mixture of waltz and reggae. Not everyone can turn out such cunning devices so easily. And a lightfooted chilled out blues jazz like Es is wias is by no means loses its effect with the mastering of a set series. After a smooth middle part things really go to the full at the end: electric guitar, drums, alpine calls: Such da an andern. And then we change tack again, with a fantastic homage to the Alpinkatzen time: Über-Unter-Ober-Österreicher - the accordion has never sounded sweeter. Hubert as a melancholic. Thus the extroverted and introverted balance out very well. A consistent tour de force would have been too fierce.

Hit Tip of the Week: Entwederundoder

Hubert von Goisern is a nomad. He sailed the Danube, explored Tibet, played with musicians from all over the place. Now he has explored his own country. In Austria he discovered "the middle of nowhere" in neglected guesthouses on an unusual tavern tour.

In the halls of these taverns he premiered the songs of his new albums EntwederUndOder - an exciting mixture of blues, jazz, rap and alpine rock. At times it makes you laugh, at times it is full of serious contemplation.

Now he is off travelling again - he'll soon be setting off to Greenland to organise workshops with the Inuits.

The Krone hit tip is available from Friday.

Hubert von Goisern: Entwederundoder

Back at the peak of modern alpine rock:
Entwederundoder is one of the best Hubert von Goisern albums

(tsch) After many years of collaborations with musicians around the globe - Egypt, Tibet, Africa - Hubert von Goisern was "in the mood for doing something with myself". In peace and quiet he composed and wrote lyrics alone. The result: Entwederundoder - a driving mixture of alpine rock, rap, blues and jazz, of contemplation, spite, wisdom and wit. A real highlight, full of quick hits - and with a great deal of truth.

A reminder: More than 20 years ago Hubert von Goisern began as the Alpinkatzen to revolutionise alpine folk music in grand style. And consequently landed at the top of the charts. His alpine ethno with rock guitar and Styrian button accordion, with rock, blues and yodels suited contemporary taste as well as Moik watchers and haters.

Right from the start Hubert von Goisern grooves straight into the marrow of dancing legs. Brenna tuats guat offers a burning hot mixture of rap, rock and alpenglow - in its literal sense - and really sounds like a hit - even if not for folk festivals, because the song is too fierce for them, too fast and bitter. The subject: the financial crisis ("everyone knows that money doesn't grow on trees, and you can't eat it either, but it burns well!").

You're then buffeted by crashing rock (Suach Da An Åndern), the cheerful disposition of witty lyrics such as in the Western song Indianer (musically somewhere between Bonanza, Pulp Fiction and Tombs of the Blind Dead) nestling you into relaxation. With Halt nit an Goisern offers a fluffy light sound - if the term wasn't so awful you could call it Austropop - with cool guitar licks and rolling groove. I Versteh Di Nit rolls the heat of the sun into southern blues. You can literally hear the Mississippi roaring and the shackles rattling. And the smokey clarinet and sexy gentile bass on the sixties bebop Es Is Wias Is leads the listener into a red-lit cellar bar. But then there are the primary songs such as Nit Lång Her, I kenn oan, Neama Bång and Lebwohl. They show Goisern as the melancholy man he also is, touching the heart with thoughtful, sad words about transience and the many facets of life.

The shower of emotions one receives here is intoxicating. The change between laughing and crying, jumping around and listening, laughing and crying - between stout half stocking knitting and sophisticated art, is as balanced as it is varied. Without a doubt one of Hubert von Goisern's best albums.

Verdict: Excellent

Almost as before

Album of the year

The formulation Entweder und oder (Either and or) is for Hubert von Goisern a symbol of life itself: only in the most seldom cases are things black or white, mostly there's a mixture of both.

Entweder und oder could also be an expression of the Austrian soul though, the new "yes-no" perhaps. Musically speaking we are certainly given the full Goisern palette, a dozen songs that couldn't be any more different from one another. Hubert starts with the fast zeitgeist song Brenna tuat's guat (It burns well), he's talking about money and it can soon be that "dann brennt da Huat" ("it'll all go to hell"). Another noticeable one is the pop song Halt nit an, a piece about going out into the world, about new things, that encourages you to sing along, sounds familiar. There's then the flirtatious song Heidi halt mi in 3/4 time, a witty idea. The second half of the album is then more thoughtful, more emotionally loaded, the bluesy, jazzy Es is wias is (That's the way it is), a song about the weather and the seasons, Nit lang her (Not long ago) about longing and dreams, and as highlight, the very sad song Lebwohl (Farewell) with beautiful piano and a yodel that gives you goosebumps, crying out with pain. An instrumental piece in the Goisern folk music pop mix is also on the CD, the Über-Unter-Oberösterreicher (Über Lower Upper Austrian). Following the tavern tour, on which Hubert was within touching distance of his audience, an indoor tour is planned for the coming winter, dates [in the Tourplan].

Hubert von Goisern: Entwederundoder

What does a pioneer do when he sees that his seed has grown? Hubert von Goisern may have been asking himself this ever more in recent times. Because his way of mixing alpine folk music with the sounds and grooves of rock music seems to have fallen on fertile ground with groups such as LaBrassBanda. On the other hand, von Goisern is not the kind of guy who thinks for too long, he just plays. Thus on Entweder und Oder a kind of music has developed that dares to go further into the rock genre than ever before, while in accordance with the album title, he doesn't shy away from the quiet side, blues and jazz. The accordion is always within reach too. At his side stood a small, young band with drums, guitar and bass, once more really inspiring the man from Upper Austria to an album full of high flying (which doesn't always have to end in the Alps).

Good: Hubert von Goisern

CD OF THE WEEK

Hubert von Goisern loves hiking and goes canoeing and from time to time he brings out an album. On Entwederundoder (Capriola) the spirit of refractoriness dances more rousingly than it has for a while with the Austrian recently artistically weighed down in widescreen world music. The spirit is dancing in lederhosen again too, the accordion gleefully snuffling a landler in Brenna tuats guat, but there is classic blues rock too (I versteh di nit), atmospheric bar jazz (Es is wias is) and country ska (Indianer), Springsteen-esque folk rock (Halt nit an) and a piano ballad like Nit lang her, as beautiful as Dylan's Make you feel my love. In Suach da an anderen the hard rock guitar bucks and shouts "Jimi!", a Jews' harp springs about like a funky Rumpelstiltskin. The songs handle self release and wanderlust, dusty love and new beginnings. And when Hubert then yodels, your chest fills with hollereidulljöh. Let's have more!

★★★★★

Entwederundoder

Hubert von Goisern is the great musical transformer, the accomplished cross-border commuter between rock, folk and world music. After the wide screen sound he celebrated on S'Nix, he now presents an extremely honed down, calm and withdrawn album. The twelve songs don't deny that country and blues are the force behind their composition, but nonetheless every song leave these genres behind them. For Goisern skilfully weaves and plays excitingly with melodies and vocals: I versteh di nit starts off as a bone-dry blues number, only to end in a juicy appeal to the saints. Do not miss this!

Verdict: Outstanding 5/5

Everything on, even more in

A small miracle: Hubert von Goisern's new album "EntwederUndOder"

Hubert von Goisern is essentially considered to be the great sound innovator, or, thinking of his entrance to the successful music business with the album Aufgeigen stått Niederschiassen released ten years ago, at least as a uniter of worlds. Here the groove of rock music, there the lightness of the country dance, in between the idiom of the village of Goisern at the foot of the Dachstein. Ten years and many discoveries and connections later, Hubert von Goisern is now releasing a work, EntwederUndOder (Capriola, Blanko Musik), which lives wholly on sounds and rhythms that were invented long ago when the master of alpine rock music of mankind put Hiatamadl in our ears.

Heavy, dry 80s drums, jaunty ska as drive, a guitar sound that comes from the sixties, rich blues, with complex return, and even a swinging slow foxtrot, all that gathered together under von Goisern's distinctive yodel and serving as a musical foil for lyrics that oscillate between silent simplicity and refined life wisdoms. Neither are the sadnesses of love.

There is scepticism on the first listening and there is the question whether this album, these songs, would have worked as well back then in 1991 in the Lustspielhaus as well as Heast as nit or Neu-Ausseer did. After the second listening though, you answer the question with a unequivocal yes. Because of course Hubert von Goisern, the perfectionist, has incorporated all his skills not just on the instruments, but in the studio too and the masterpiece ventures to form a symbiosis combining what is Hubert's not only with the traditional, but also with the unfamiliar. It requires simultaneously the greatest withdrawal and greatest engagement. The fact that the basic Goisern groove isn't lost along the way is - once more - a small miracle.

Servus-TV (Astra-Satellit) is showing Hubert von Goisern on his tavern tour (Thursday 25th August, 20.15-21.05 hrs) and "In Concert" (Tuesday 30th August, 21.05-22.30 hrs). The CD will be on the market at the beginning of September.

Ska with cow bell

The Upper Austrian Hubert von Goisern has displayed almost chameleon-like qualities during his long career. Alpine rocker, pensive traditionalist, Africa and Tibet researcher, captain on the Rhine and Danube, always in the service of music. On his new opus he again in the homeland from time to time and comes away with a few thrifty goods. A grunting accordion to dialect rap stands in line as the intro to Brenna tuats guat - it has almost punk qualities. And he celebrates the funky waltz Heidi halt mi with warped yodelling, concealing a cowbell ska behind Indians. But it's not all so wild on this record: beautiful, unkitschy ballads with harmonica and tenderly soaring slide guitar turn out well for Goisern with Nit lang her and in particular I kenn oan, he heads into bluesy climes with rock hard guitar riffs, at times close to jazz. Stylistically speaking it's all a little undecided, at which the album title Entweder und oder may hint. But it can also be seen as an attempt to serve both fans of alpine rock and songwriting.

The disc: Entwederundoder

Goisern has never wedged himself between "either or", but rather has always lived the "and". The new CD cracks, then comes across softly again while in the meantime there's exciting jazz and yodelling.

TV tip. Servus TV:Goisern auf Wirtshaustour 25th August, 8.15pm. Goisern in Concert 30th August, 9.05pm.

The one who plays with the devil

Hubert von Goisern: Entweder und oder

The Austrian Hubert von Goisern is a pioneer of world music. Even back in the 80s the globetrotter from the Salzkammergut rocked and yodelled.

He recently triggered a huge media echo when he sailed the Danube from Regensburg to the Black Sea with a converted cargo ship, giving concerts in small harbours. Von Goisern has now recorded the studio album Entweder und oder. It's not released until September, but he has already been on tour with the songs this summer. Hubert von Goisern is a traveller who has found an approach to people all over the world through playing music with them.

Cow bell blues from the Austrian globetrotter

After many years of being "on the road" - often to isolated places in distant lands - Hubert von Goisern shows right from the start in powerful and rocking ways that the fire is still burning. In Brenna tuats guat he's the dashing outdoorsman who plays with the devil. Just as stunning is a visit to the Indians. Southern guitars in the prairie mix with cow bells: a typical von Goisern mix. The almost 60-year-old guy has always been fascinated by the most varied and often exotic sounds of this world and has found his way back late to his homeland via many detours.

Back home via detours

He didn't learn to yodel and play the accordion until his late thirties and mixed alpine folklore together with foreign rhythms. On the new album there is an apparently unavoidable Heidi, but she moves in reggae rhythm. Von Goisern processes the impressions and experiences gathered on his world journeys in his unique way. From the serene Es is wias is he makes the alpine variant of the Buddhist zen and he packages the alpine ommmmm in a swing. Hubert von Goisern has his strongest moments when he thinks aloud and muses about life, as in Nit lång her. Here he dreams of a better world. In real life the Austrian is not just a dreamer. He actively gets involved in making dreams a reality, including with the Green party and with his engagement for Tibet and the Tibetans. And he makes sure that culture doesn't just take place in the big cities. After many months on a Danube ship he played his songs in old village tavern halls. The title of the new album is cleverly chosen, because it shows a great spectrum of music styles and emotions. There's not just this, there's also that. Not just "either/or." There is also "either and or".