EROC

A pretty good debut from the GROBSCHNITT drummer.This is nothing like the music that GROBSCHNITT plays, in fact it's more in the Electronic-Prog genre with that Krautrock vibe.I must admit that EROC to me is more about his recording studio "The Ranch" and his work in that area than as a musician.I guess that's from mentioning him often in many of my reviews over the years in that capacity. "Kleine Eva" is the longest track at almost 12 minutes and probably my least favourite too.Spacey sounds pulse as keys join in around 2 minutes then this sound which you would think was a child's keyboard or something also joins in.Loud synths before 5 1/2 minutes that are annoying to say the least. "Des Zauberers Traum" opens with sounds that hum and other electronics.The synths before 2 minutes get annoying after 2 1/2 minutes. "Toni Moff Mollo" is less than a minute of two people talking in German. "Die Musik Vom Olberg" is somewhat catchy with a beat and synths.Glass breaks to end it and the sound of someone running away. "Norderland" is my favourite and the first song i actually like.Organ floats in with spacey winds.A melody kicks in with guitar.Nice.An interesting track. "Horrorgoll" is pretty much voices and sounds that echo throughout.Not a fan. "Sternchen" is better with guitar melodies.A dead calm before 2 minutes then it builds again. This is good but when you consider it's 1975 he's a little late to the Krautrock party.I suppose that wouldn't be an issue if i really liked it though.

Eroc is best known of course as the percussionist and creative genius of Germany's Grobschnitt (as well as music engineer). This was Eroc's 3rd album and is an excellent and sometimes strange eclectic mix of songs and experiments. Fans of Grobschnitt will love this solo album which contains many allusions to songs of Grobschnitt including the great "Tontillon" (which also appears on the Repertoire remastered version of Rockpommel's Land. Perhaps the best known track off the album is "Wolkenreise" which in the remastered form sounds fresh and new. My personal favourite track is the 10 mins "Sunny Sunday's Sunset" which could have been on any Grobschnitt album and shows us how much Eroc meant to this band musically! Overall Eroc 3 is a great album and one that should be in your collection

Eroc 3 wasn't really a solo album but rather a retrospective of his works starting from 1968 and contained besides two new tracks mainly archived recordings done by him with Grobschnitt or the previous band called Crew Blues Session. Let's go roughly through the tracks presented here.

"Wutpickel" is a short bluesy piece originating from the time between disbandment of Crew Blues Session and formation of Grobschnitt when Joachim Ehrig played in a trio with the same name. "Tontillon" is an improvised instrumental track from the recording sessions for "Rockpommel's Land" and in a similar slightly melancholic vein as this album. "Fito Linte" and "Wolkenreise" are true solo works by Eroc and the latter one especially became quite well-known due to its highly memorable soaring melody. That one had been written as an introduction for Grobschnitt's 1978 live show. "Solar Plexus" is an excerpt of a live recording for "Solar Music" overdubbed with accordeon. "Euer Lied" is another one of Eroc's fun pieces, a rather simple drum solo starting with an invitation of the audience to accomplish it with their own music. "Falke Whips It Out" is a collage of recordings from 1968/69 featuring an improvisation over "Born To Be Wild", some screaming, some parodistic pompous organ solo and a phone talk of Eroc with Grobschnitt roadie Peter Falke railing about some famous Prog bands. "About My Town" is an early live recording by Grobschnitt from 1971 with second drummer Axel Harlos which never saw a release on any of their albums. "Sunny Sunday's Sunset" is a demo version of the recording session for Jumbo album sounding completely different from the final version. The final "He's Around Here" was the first recording of Crew Blues Session which never saw a release, the music is a rather simple beat and only the voice of Stefan Danielak reminds at Grobschnitt. "Crew Blues Session" is an excerpt of an improvisation of the band played during their farewell concert in October 1969. This was actually the very original version of "Solar Music", here still with scatting vocals by bass player Peter Klassen but one can hear already the typical spacey sound.

Recently all of Eroc's solo records got CD reissues finally with the addition of multiple bonus tracks. This one was actually the most interesting sounding one at least for me providing a quite nice and enjoyable historical overview. Nevertheless I don't see any reason why it should be of much interest for others than fans of this particular band. Thus to rate it higher than with 2 stars would be exaggerated!

Second solo album by Eroc is the least attractive one for me from his first three I've to say. It's basically a rather quaint compilation of some nonsensical fun tracks (which I can only smirk about into parts, but not really laugh) and some nice and enjoyable songs like "Der Traum vom Wald". That one is actually a quite serious, melancholic, almost mawkish story told in spoken words about a lost childhood's dream backed up with some pleasant music played on accordeon. Thus it will be certainly of rather little interest for someone not knowing German language. Still the best tracks are "Nebelwelt" opening the album with some melancholic guitar chords and "Abendmeer" which is a quite impressing pile of Mellotron and accordeon tunes. "Ich bin ein Lachen" is another serious and surprisingly aggressive one. In between all those fairly good songs one can listen for example to some chats of the band members in typical Rhine area idiom having a couple of beers together, you can imagine how exciting this must be, even for someone like me who understands what they're talking about. One of the short spoken sections is actually a faked conversation of Eroc with his producer who blames him for not entertaining enough his audience with the music he's doing which is quite a good joke I've to say because in fact he's right in saying this. Anyway this record should be considered even more than his first one for Grobschnitt fans only as a fairly good supplement and demonstration of Joachim Ehrig's multiple talents!

Honestly I wouldn't consider any of the solo works by Grobschnitt drummer Joachim Ehrig aka Eroc an essential addition for a Prog collection, even not for one based on Krautrock I would say. Certainly there are some experimental parts included, mainly with electronic sound and tape recordings but on the other hand after taking out those few ones and some recorded smalltalk (which isn't even funny if you're a native German speaker) there's not much left over that's able to impress me. After subtraction of those experiments and supposed to be jokes we get to listen some nice and pleasant music played on guitar, synthesizer and accordeon which could easily do its job as some background acoustic irradiation, something that might be called Muzak. I mean, a track like the super-long (and much too long if you ask me) "Little Eva" could have entertained easily my grandma (born 1900) getting me to the point to question what that's supposed to do with progressive music. It might have to do with the fact that I'm really not into electronic music, usually I find it rather suckin' than fascinating. Don't get me wrong that's a lovely track, maybe just too lovely and gets boring after a while. Others like "Des Zauberers Traum", "Norderland" or "Horrorgoll" are sounding at least into parts slightly more interesting but only for 1 or 2 spins and quite dated on the other hand. The latter one in particular is clearly the most experimental track on here consisting exclusively of a collage of tape recordings (probably taken from tv/radio) with the addition of some echo effects. "Die Musik vom Ölberg" had been the introduction for a Grobschnitt live show and last one "Sternchen" sounds a bit like an excerpt of "Solar Music". Overall this record (like all of Eroc's solo catalogue) should be considered rather an interesting addition for Grobschnitt fans and seams vastly overrated here IMHO. This one might still be the best of his first three solo albums (the fourth one I don't know yet) but nonetheless I'm hesitating to rate it with 3 stars!

The first and best effort by Eroc (Grobschnitt) in solo. A magnificent and ambitious affair that directly leads Eroc to the pinnacle of German progressive synth eccentricities. Nothing is "cosmic" or "trip out" as in Klaus Schulze, Conrad Schnitzler and others but it remains surprisingly weird and accessible at the same time. The argument is organic, cerebral and humorous with lot of manipulations in studio (voice and other sounds). "kleine eva" is a synth dominated song with flowing and beautifully sweet melodies. "des tauberers traum" is a darker track, including "loopings" and repetitive organic fragments. "toni moff mollo" is one of these particular and satirical sketches we can find in later albums. "die musik vom ölberg" is an enthusiastic, funny synth composition with a more commercial and dated flavour. "norderland" is one of my favourite Eroc's compositions; a moment of rare introspection and desolation with plaintive electric guitar lines & glissando, drums and sound effects. Great!!

I've just seen that this one hasn't been reviewed yet. Let's say a few words about this third album by Eroc (drummer and original member of Grobschnitt). Contrary to his first solo effort Eroc clearly put the accentuation on solid progressive rock compositions, almost rejecting his convinced experimentations & demonstrations in electronica. "3" stays a good follow up to "Zwei". The positive aspect is the diversity of atmospheres created and the pleasure to play together. The opening track is a massive, heavy bluesy track with some aggressive drum parts. "Tontillon" is a floating rock composition featuring a nice melodic guitar line with some keyboards arrangements. "Fito linte" starts with a wonderful, dreamy acoustic guitar interlude accompanied by spacey electronic effects then carries on an other emotional dimension. "Wolkenreise" is a kind of Teutonic folk, popular music interpretation with accordion, synth and guitar. "Solar Plexus" is an original and fantasist musical piece starting with a theatrical narration in German. The track progressively goes into a dancing, animated folkish excursion. "Euer Lied" is a drum interlude by Axel Harlos. "Falke Whips It Out" is a grotesque, satiric speed rock song closed to Grobschnitt's material."About my town" is an imitation of boogie woogie. "Sunny Sunday's Sunset" is an other typical Grobschnitt's heroic and lyrical symphonic rock composition. It can be a nice surprise if you are into Grobshnitt sound.

I love the great diversity of atmospheres delivered on this album, a bit like Eno did in a totally different genre for his album "An other green world". This recording contains short tracks, all of them feature "spacey" electronic effects, "noises" and collages + "moody" & "weird" guitar / piano, accordion sequences often accompanied by a certain dose of humour (closed to Grobschnitt's musical fantasy), notably in lyrics and recitation. Emotionally it clearly oscillates between sad, melancholic songs with haunting, "simplistic" melodies, in majority on this disc ("Nebelwelt", "Bemep Mope", "Kleine Freude", "Das Irrsinnslied"...) and "silly", tasteless songs with no meaning and a lot of "gags". Less interesting than his first self title album but a very nice "theatrical" recording, complementary to Grobschnitt's original symphonic rock.

The fourth solo album by the irrepressible drummer-comedian from GROBSCHNITT is the perfect candidate for a lukewarm two-star tribute. It would likely be a welcome (if not really essential) addition to the library of any diehard collector, but newcomers are better off elsewhere.

It's certainly not the most representative EROC album, at least among the three I'm familiar with. His trademark zany humor was drastically curtailed here in favor of several tepid, (mostly) mild-mannered instrumentals, home-produced and played on various keyboards, gently strummed guitars, and the usual percussive allsorts. Maybe he was acquiescing to a new decade of musical conservatism (1982 was not exactly the high water mark of freewheeling Prog creativity), or maybe the once-manic drummer simply fell victim to the rocker's bane of advancing age and maturity. But the end results, while pleasant enough in a toothless sort of way, are too often reminiscent of the sort of tranquil New Age musak you might hear in a (non-alcoholic) Bavarian beer hall.

Only on the closing number "Hagener Wellenreiter" do EROC's natural madcap idiosyncrasies finally kick in, and better late than never. The song is a cartoon march through a series of nonsense alliterations growled and shouted in silly German voices, recalling the sometimes irresistibly juvenile humor of his earlier "Eroc Zwei" LP. In three short minutes it totally squashes the rest of the album flatter than it already is, and offers a fun but frustrating glimpse of what the entire package could (and should) have been.

Anyone under the misguided impression that Germans don't have a sense of humor obviously hasn't been listening very closely. What's that you say? You don't recall the deadpan "Showroom Dummies" of KRAFTWERK? Or HOLGER CZUKAY's iconoclastic radio-wave cut-ups (turning even the late Pope John Paul II into an unwitting pop star)? And what about the Dada-Krautrock de-construction follies of FAUST?

Discriminating Progheads with long memories will at least have heard the name Joachim Ehrig, alias EROC, the multi-talented percussionist and resident madman behind the symphonic cabaret act known as GROBSCHNITT. The band was a popular concert attraction throughout the 1970s, famous for blending classic YES and PINK FLOYD influenced Prog Rock with elaborate vaudeville comedy skits, a tradition their pseudonymous drummer would carry into his own solo career as well.

Especially here, in his sophomore effort (or maybe it's only sophomoric?), in retrospect probably the wackiest thing of its kind since Monty Python's "Matching Tie and Hankerchief" album, which you'll remember had two parallel grooves on one side of the original LP, and good luck trying to guess which one the needle would follow.

Over the course of seventeen total tracks (lasting almost 50 minutes, and rivaling the side-long soundscapes of KLAUS SCHULZE for old-style vinyl generosity) EROC delivers a vocal performance that can only be called eccentric (to say the least). He whispers, screams, coughs up phlegm, emotes in high dramatic fashion, conducts a bogus interview, interrupts the music with idle chit-chat and commentary, sings background harmonies sounding not unlike a chorus of Sesame Street muppets, fakes an orgasm (or is it constipation?) and, in one memorable highlight, punctuates a formal poetry recital with a window-rattling belch of truly epic proportions (cue the maniacal laughter: always an EROC trademark).

And did I mention the sound effects? Traffic jams, toilets flushing, tolling bells, sawing wood, orchestral fanfares, machine-gun fire, and even samples of earlier GROBSCHNITTsongs are all part of the overstuffed sonic collage. With all that (and more besides) you'd think there wouldn't be any room left for legitimate music. But EROC backs up his theatrical conceits with a credible range of high-caliber tunes, playing all the instruments himself: keyboards, guitars, kazoos, accordions, warped Oktoberfest flugelhorns, and (of course) drums. There are even a few evocative, quasi- Krautrock interludes, scattered like life preservers throughout the otherwise relentless, broad-as-a-barn-door laff-riot.

Oddly enough, the best way to appreciate the album is without any understanding of German...although it's hard to miss the quotation from KRAFTWERK's "Autobahn", shouted during the song "Der Traum Vom Wald". I suspect a direct translation might be just too idiotic to support repeated listenings, but the language barrier keeps the silliness from becoming too stupid, even when EROC is burping his guts inside out. Some Prog Rockers (too few, on second thought) never did learn when to start sounding pretentious.