Agitation Free - At the cliffs of river Rhine

The band AGITATION FREE emerged in 1967 from the fusion of two Berlin rock groups. Towards the end of 1967 the quartet, which initially had mainly played coverversions before developing lengthy improvisations, experimented on stage with psychedelic novelty visuals similar to those of Californian underground bands of the same era like Jefferson Airplane or Iron Butterfly. Soon the band, which in the early days had Christopher Franke (later of Tangerine Dream-fame) drumming, was hailed as one of Berlins most interesting groups. After some Iine-up changes Agitation Free in 1970 performed on the "First German Progressive Popfestival" at the "Berliner Sportpalast". In April 1972 the band, now a quintet formed by Lutz Ulbrich, Michael Gunther, Jorg Schwenke, Michael Hoenig and Burghard Rausch, was invited by the Goethe-Institute to embark on a tour of Egypt, Lebanon, Cyprus and Greece. The varied impressions from that trip resulted in the first Iongplay ,,Malesch", a fascinating conglomerate comprised of exotic sound recordings from the Near East journey and a good deal of "Krautrock". 

Extensive concert activities made the band increasingly popular throughout Europe. In 1972 they appeared on the music festival of the summer Olympics in Munich. Early 1973 saw the group touring through France, before participating in the "German Rock Super Concert" in Frankfurt in May. During the same year they produced their next album "2 nd " and afterwards toured through Germany's bigger towns. Public stations SFB and WDR broadcasted portraits and concerts of AGITATION FREE. In 1974 symptoms of fatigue became obvious within the band, resulting in its split after a farewell concert. 

In retrospective it becomes clear that AGITATION FREE with its openness to constant experimentation was one of the most important groups of the so called "Berlin School" and also a career catalyst for many musicians. Christopher Franke helped Tangerine Dream to become globally respected. Michael Hoenig worked with Klaus Schulze and Tangerine Dream and recorded a solo album before establishing himself as a soundtrack composer in Hollywood. Axel Genrich joined Guru Guru, Burghard Rausch cofounded BeI Ami. Gust Lutjens toured with Shirley Bassey and later attracted a huge following with his New Age act Living Mirrors in the US. Lutz ,,Luul" Ulbrich joined Ashra, worked with former Velvet Underground-singer Nico, produced soloalbums as well as music for theatre productions and is nowadays successfull with his group 17 Hippies. 

In 1998, almost 25 years after their split, the former AGITATION FREE members Ubrich, Lutjens, Gunther and Rausch met at the birthday bash of founding member Lutz "LuuI" Ulbrich and spontaneously decided to revive AGITATION FREE. In early summer of 1999 the new AGITATION FREE album "River Of Return", produced by former SpIiff-guitarist Potsch Potschka, was released by BSC Music. The new music connects smoothly with the experimental earlier sound of the group, often flowing in meditative moods just to explode surprisingly in powerful rock. In the near future AGITATION FREE will play live at some festivals and some selcted gigs in winter 1999 together with keyboarder Michael Hoenig. Thus the story of one of Germanys most interesting rockbands continues in a contemporary manner. 

May 1999

{From official website}

This CD:

This live album finds the band in good form, playing mostly selections from their second LP. The first song is not featured anywhere else. The Garden of Delights release includes an extensive booklet as well.

The sound is decent and the inclusion of the first song makes this worthwhile. A great release from one of my favourite krautrock bands.