Amon Duul Reviews Part Fourteen: Amon Duul II’s “Vortex”

Vortex Album Cover.

1) Vortex; 2) Holy West; 3) Die 7 Fetten Jahre; 4) Wings Of The Wind; 5) Mona; 6) We Are Machine; 7) Das Ges­tern Ist Das Heute Von Morgen; 8) Vibes In The Air.

6 out of 10

A relative rebound. Kind of. Three years after the shattered, tattered remains of the once mighty “Amon Duul II” were promptly buried, never to be unearthed, the original band rose again, one year to each day, resurrected to conquer the world again and to prove that Love really does conquer all.

Or not. Look, that last paragraph may have been needlessly poetic but I want the reader to understand how neat this album could and should have been. Most of the original band members make appearances, including Renate, original organist Falk Rogner (who I’ve always neglected to mention, shame considering his keyboard work helped create a lot of great atmosphere) with John Weinzierl playing a little guitar and Lothar Meid back on a “little” bit of bass.

So with the original band (kind of, at points) back together, it was time to cut the shit. All attempts to streamline and “sell out” have been removed from the band’s vocabulary. No more bland shit like “Only Human” or “Almost Alive” to ruin the band’s reputation. Nope, the band was ready to get back to a denser sound with a more atmospheric feel. Darkness should over take the listener, much like they are being sucked up by the slightly-ridiculous-yet-still-ominious image on the front cover.

But the band more or less blows it: sure, it’s an improvement over the last two records, but it’s basically of the same quality as “Pyragony X.” It is noble that the band would try to come back and regain some of their lost ground. But it’s really their own fault that the album really doesn’t work.

One problem is that most of the major band members really only make guest appearances. Weinzierl and Meid really only guest briefly throughout the album. Jorg Evers plays guitar and he simply doesn’t have the same skill or inventiveness of Weinzierl. Meid does almost no songwriting, simply sticking to bass. This is a major problem, as it was his clever song-writing ideas that kept the band afloat for the three years after they abandoned complete jamming.

Another major problem is the “instrumentation situation.” The album is an official “80’s Album” as it features drum machines, synthesizers and other machines of that ilk. However, the inclusion of these instruments wasn’t necessarily a bad thing in the early 80’s. Remember, it was the era of “Peter Gabriel III” and other creepy, crawlie creative synth albums. Even Genesis’s “Abacab,” while ostensibly pop, had great tones and many creative ideas.

Put it this way: the album sounds more like “Peter Gabriel III” and less like “No Jacket Required.” The band is definitely working their asses off to create an oppressive atmosphere that can crush the listener. They really want to make a heavy return to creative darkness. As a result, the synthesizers croak out unpleasant tones that are not generic. The drum machine stutter and strut, much like Gabriel’s classic programming.

But the album still gets a pretty low rating. Honestly, it’s no better than and sometimes worse than “Pyragony X.” It’s close to being better because the general sound is a bit more interesting than the completely pedestrian and nearly generic sound of “Pyragony X.” It’s closer to being worse because the band fails at their goals here worse than on that unfortunate album.

Basically, the band is trying to be scary and oppressive but they really don’t succeed at achieving that goal. Yes, the songs are dense, heavily arranged and gloomy. But instead of being impressive, they simply stand there and brood. For all the band’s hard work, they are simply doing another make-up job on a rotting corpse of a sow.

It may be worse than “Pyragony X” because at least that album had actual songs. Sure, they were pretty unmemorable and unengaging but they had structure, melodies and diverse arrangements. Here, everything mulls together into a lump with no real melodic strength. Honestly, it feels like the band is trying to make the arrangements into songs themselves. This is an approach which never truly works: it may fool the band’s desperate fans into thinking “they’re back!” but it leaves an album that a) won’t appeal to casual fans and b) won’t even hold up for fans, unless they’re completely self deceiving.

I haven’t even described the tracks yet have I? Well, “Holy West” certainly sounds impressive at first with its wave of synthesizer atmosphere. However, the melody of the song is painfully simple. It also hits no real emotion or meaning. It’s simply there. And the band never develops the melody or the atmosphere they have created. It simply broods there, glowering at you immovably,

Fans of “Kraftwerk” may be excited (or pissed) to see a song called “We Are Machine.” Don’t worry: “Kraftwerk “has nothing to worry about. Why the band tried this approach is beyond me. They were never good at repetitive music ideas. Whereas “Kraftwerk” succeeds by making their repetitive ideas catchy and by adding slight variations, “Amon Duul II” simply pounds a simple idea, throws in simplistic “machine” lyrics and calls it a day.

Going into detail here isn’t exactly necessary. So, why does this album get such a (relatively) high rating when compared to the previous two albums? In spite of the fact that it fails, it shows a band that is trying to do something creative and new. They’re obviously working hard to be new and exciting. They are trying to integrate New Wave ideas and are at least integrating them semi-intelligently.

Simply put: the band is trying to be good. They’re failing, but at least they’re trying. The last two albums featured a band trying but they were trying to sell albums without having the ability to write music that a mainstream audience would want to buy.

Plus, if you’ve never heard much of this style of music, it might be effective. Or if you buy into the mood and atmosphere the band is trying to set (I don’t) it could probably be much more effective. No more than a six worth of effectiveness but much better than the 5 I wanted to give the album.

The band must have seen the writing on the wall though. They split again, this time to stay away for 14 years. However, they’d come back with a strong album, their best in 20 year and which shows a band more successfully navigating unknown waters. Stay tuned.