content:

1.          thee industrial records story excerpt, by Genesis P-Orridge))
2.          Aims / Views / Conception (by R. Schönauer from P16.D4)
3.           religion
4.           half dark room
5.           M.T. and the path to power
6.           and someone wrote about marilyn monroe's fate (in english)
7.           it crawled into my hand, honest (in english, liner notes by the FUGS)
8.           press release of the organizers of the Berlin ATONAL festival 1983
9.           reichstag lange nicht gebrannt
10.         song of the kokopera (in the kokoperas' language and in english)
11.         Thomas Pargmann et al.: Non Toxique Lost
12. terre et argent (liner notes)
13. hic rhodos hic salta
 
 
are you able to speak/read german? then click here...for more theory

---------------------------------------------------thee industrial records story---------------------------------------
copyright Genesis-P-Orridge (excerpt, taken from "TG CD1", 1986)

...It's an investigation. We wanted to investigate to what extent you could mutate and collage sound,
present complex non entertaining noises to a popular culture situation and convince and convert.
We wanted to re-invest Rock music with content, motivation and risk. Our records are documents
of attitudes and experiences and observations by us and other determinedly individual outsiders.
Fashion is an enemy, style irrelevant. We want to also investigate music as a business phenomenon
and propose models for entirely new and innovative modes of commercial operation. A parody and
an improvement....We want to make music and records more effective and relevant to our Industrial
society, and we want to make business more efficient and creative as well....big records companies
produce records like cars; we are connected to a contemporary social situation, not a blues orientated
past style; we work hard for what we want, we are industrious; we parody and challenge large industrial
companies and their debasing ethics and depersonalisation; we work in an old factory; industrial labour
is slavery, destructive, a redundant institutione ... our records are a combination of files on our
relationship with the world and a newspaper without censorship ...
INDUSTRIAL MUSIC FOR INDUSTRIAL PEOPLE. You get what you deserve. Or do you?
Well, from the people with a vested interest in controlling and guiding society to follow their
recommendations as to what attitudes you should have, what motivations should govern your
behaviour and what goals you should be satisfied with, you DO NOT get what you deserve.
You get what you are given, and what you are given is primarily conditioning that pushes you
towards blind acceptance, wasted labour, frustrated relationships and a vast sense of  hopelessness.
We are trained to feel we are not  responsible or in control of our society and world so that we
will continue to let "Leaders" look after us like parents with retarded children. Leaders are not
essential, we are TAUGHT to believe we need them, that we are not able to assume responsibility
for ourselves. Lies created leaders, lies perpetuate leaders, lies destroy joy and creativity and hope.
There are NO LIES on this record, no one here is a leader. We assume full responsibility for ourselves.
We will not be deflected from our destiny. OUR LIFE. There is currently a trend back towards total
control and safety in the record and music industry. Groups are styled, hyped and successful before
they even release a record. Old outlaws and thinkers are opting for security, comfortable records
that apply radical discoveries to banal musical ends. Show business and its inherited goals and
justifications are triumphant again. The public is seduced and cheated by emptiness packaged
alluringly in cheap tinsel. Fear is the Government once more. On this record are people who
were not afraid to think, did not avoid risks. People of all ages are here, from 16 years old to
70 years old. Truth and hope have no boundaries, no set style, they are implicit most clearly
in the way you choose to live. The title of the last record issued by industrial tells the rest.
"Nothing here now but the recordings." Or perhaps there is...
---------------------------------------------------thee industrial records story---------------------------------------
 

monotonous
           industry of cultures
      fight   folgt uns
distrust
             tout a remettre
le jeu
kontakt
 
 

--------------------------------------------Aims/Views/Conception------------------------------------
SELEKTION - P16.D4
I. Aims/Views/Conception
From historical point of view we don't live anymore in a pure physical world, we're now (in highly
developed countries) surrounded by signals, symbols: we live in a symbolic world.
Processes of differentiation have lead to a highly complex world with an individually incomprehensible
quantity of such signals and symbols (and finally information), where reduction of complexity is the
instrument to survive. This concentration and channelization on a special level is controlled mostly via media.
P16.D4 tries to counter-act these processes, while aiming to get such signal/symbols
as a status of processed perception, which are pushed aside by the information and communication pools.
So P16.D4 works in a field emphasizing just other structures of selectivity, X-raying the routines
of perception, leaving the security of the usual paths and is highly interested in unexpected events.
From this point of view it seems more sensible for us to explore the possibilities of noise and other
"non-musical" material with "non-musical" techniques than carrying on the banner of "music".
This doesn't mean to exclude the enormous possibilities rock/jazz/classical music gives
as elements of others, of course...
(all words by kindly permission of R. Schönauer (P16.D4), on the construction of the DISTRUCT-lp)
 
 
 

---------------------------------------------religion----------------------------------------------------
                    A CONTRIBUTION TO THE CRITIQUE OF
                       HEGEL'S PHILOSOPHY OF RIGHT
                               Introduction
                               by Karl Marx
                    Deutsch-Franzosische Jahrbucher
                              February, 1844
...
Religion is, indeed, the self-consciousness and self-esteem of man who
has either not yet won through to himself, or has already lost himself
again.  But, man  is no abstract being squatting outside the world.
Man is the world of man -- state, society.  This state and this
society produce religion, which is an inverted consciousness of the
world, because they are an inverted world.  Religion is the general
theory of this world, its encyclopaedic compendium, its logic in popular
form, its spiritual point d'honneur, its enthusiasm, its moral sanction,
its solemn complement, and its universal basis of consolation and
justification.  It is the fantastic realization of the human essence
since the human essence has not acquired any true reality.  The struggle
against religion is, therefore, indirectly the struggle against that
world whose spiritual aroma is religion.

Religious suffering is, at one and the same time, the expression of real
suffering and a protest against real suffering.  Religion is the sigh of
the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of
soulless conditions.  It is the opium of the people.

The abolition of religion as the illusory happiness of the people is
the demand for their real happiness.  To call on them to give up their
illusions about their condition is to call on them to give up a
condition that requires illusions. The criticism of religion is,
therefore, in embryo, the criticism of that vale of tears of which
religion is the halo. ...
---------------------------------------------religion----------------------------------------------------
 
 

-------------------------------------------------------half dark room------------------------------------------------------------------
translation by B.G.

the personal perception

as charles entered the half-dark room he forgot about the endless waiting queues.
a round empty table in a contourless room. 19 characters seated in front of it.
thin wires from above wound their way into the headphones.on the heads of the figures.
he assumed his (still vacant) place. he placed the phones on and experienced the sounds.
Meanwhile Mr. Wanton forced his machines its utmost extrication.
the room was deathly still. only the patter of his feet reminded him of his world.
countless photographs on the horizon indicate that the models were not to be fed.
he stared at their slim tender fingers. the noise reverberated in his ears.
his hands clapped to the beat of the future. Supplement:  place and time are unknown.
Tapes and synthesizer produce tones. Is it music?

the idea behind the perception

"half dark room" is another concept for NTL's live performances. thereby, we think
of a room, which keeps its connection to the world by only ONE entrance, exactly. in
the room, the members of NTL work, while 19 puppets sit still on their chairs.
connected to a central mixer, a great number of headphones is fed up with sounds.
some of them are placed on the puppets' heads. others wound their wires from above
somewhere into the room. meanwhile, NTL play their music into the mixer, directly
and plugged. there is no accustic amplification. at any moment, there is only one
person in the audience. he's free to move, to check the phones, to talk to the
musicians, and so on. so, the participants have the chance to interact. only if this
person leaves the room, the next one will be allowed to enter. "half dark room" is an
attack against the principles of  crowd-reception, unplugged nostalgia and
commercial rock business, in general to (re)define interaction and curiosity.
-------------------------------------------------------half dark room------------------------------------------------------------------
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

-----------------------------------------------------------------------M.T. and the "PATH TO POWER"-------------------------------------------------
 "...In 1936 when I was 11, I was given a special edition of Bibby's Annual,
a religious magazine which was an odd combination of character building, homespun philosophy and religion.
I t taught me some verses which I still use in off-the-cuff speeches, because they came to embody for me so
much of what I was brought up to feel. One ship drives east, another drives west, by the self same gale that
blows. is the set of the sail and not the gale, that determines the way she goes? Or again; The heights by
great men reached and kept, were not attained by sudden flight, but they, while their companions slept,
were toiling upward in the night. Whether it was that early exposure to Bibby's Annual or just a natural bent ,
I was soon fascinated by poetry."
-----------------------------------------------------------------------M.T. and the "PATH TO POWER"-------------------------------------------------
 

----------------------------------------------------------------------Marilyn Monroe-------------------------------------------------------
and someone wrote about Marilyn Monroe's fate:

"One of her biggest roles was in How to Marry a Millionaire, but when Marilyn Monroe
died she had just $3.50 in her apartment.Her image now generates millions of dollars
in licensing fees and advertising revenue annually. Monroe's voice and
likeness are used to sell Chanel fashions, Mercedes cars, Gateway Computers,
Mikimoto pearls and Levis jeans, while her
picture adorns some 2,000 slot machines in LasVegas."
----------------------------------------------------------------------Marilyn Monroe-------------------------------------------------------
 
 

------------------------------------------------------The Fugs------------------------------------------------------------------------------
  "It Crawled Into My Hand, Honest"
                                                           the FUGS
                                                           LP Reprise RS-6305
                                                           (Liner Notes)

                                                               ONWARD EARTHLINGS (by the FUGS)

We wax weary of the tadpole smegma served to us as the primal data
of the nations on Earth.  In the face of a world let by a command
generation of savage Honko-Cossack marauder pirates poisoning our air,
murdering ouryouth and defiling our ethics, we declare our continuing commitment
to the possibility of a benign civilization and the absolute
right of each an on earth to
1) a guaranteed grope,
 2) land and money,
3) longevity,
4) happiness,
5) freedom,
6) supplies for his art,
7) sheep.
We wave the banners of these god-lit principles even now while
Dom Dom Doom marches in waving a carrot and in the dreams of
war lords mutant fruit flies devour syrup-coated telephone poles.
Somehow great slurgul-slurguls of glee, humor, horniness and peacecraft
can still escape our lips, for you, for us, for the love that can spurt and flow
from the surfaces of song and poetry.  The benevolent city of ivory colored
grope spires is our vision.  And all of us, all lovers and drooling minstrels
aboard the Chariots of the Abyss, bend back into the terror, take knowledge
of the City of Love we wish to create, flash in the fig fist, and spew onward,
attempting radiance, into the skush. Onward!  Grope for peace.  Love the earth.
We have escaped the crone drivel. Up against the wall motherfucker!
------------------------------------------------------The Fugs------------------------------------------------------------------------------
 
 

------------------------------------------press release of the organizers of the "ATONAL 2" festival in Berlin (1983)---------------------------
"ATONAL is an independent event of the non-conformists, an atonal opportunity
for creative musicians, painters, film producers and female hairdressers.
the stinking attempts of conceited cynics and phonies working in the mass-media
and behind the scenes every attempt at alternative action with business methods
will be overcome. they will not be allowed to force upon ATONAL their unorientated
"bla bla". this is confronted with the serious motivated musical and artificial
cooperations. ATONAL means to listen for yourself.
the freedom to develop thoughts and opinions of your own and not to
enter into this miserable, prefabricated system of these idiots.
listening and watching. ATONAL is what we need to understand what we are doing.
ATONAL is not a comfortable fiction and not a regulated agreement.
there will be a new way to listen and to see..." (adi atonal) / translation: B. Goleh
------------------------------------------press release of the organizers of the "ATONAL 2" festival in Berlin (1983)---------------------------
 

-----------------------------"Reichstag" lange nicht gebrannt----------------------------------------
"Reichstag" lange nicht gebrannt"
which translates to: "It took some more years until the "Reichstag" was set on fire"
story by Sea Wanton, 20.1.2006, Berlin
 

Tired, his eyes scan the skyline. There, either motions nor a glimmer of light is to be noticed.
Only the flickering of the candles burns into the glass of the window. In the distance - NOTHING moves.
After the last wick is gone out, he drives away. He uses the build-in "long-distance-dial-service".
He must talk to her. Nobody there. He decides to improve his mood in the nearest "dance-palace".
Some fine, thrilling drink, smashing music with some swing and danceable rhythm. Afterwards,
he rushes back into the unsmart appartment. Only one call arrived. The call-box flatters his ears
with a cool "see you later". Perhaps...Surprise (negative): a furious hit on the back of his head.
He looses his consciousness. Woke up. The clouds flow by his airoplane compartment. Below,
the contures of the arabian peninsula. His head buried between the shoulders of his guardians.
A nice young man talks to him. In German, laptop, suit by "Armanie", an unobtrusive after-shave
lotion. Asks him for origin, intentions, ideas, opinions.Without recognizable dialect and without
mentioning his personal data. Off and on the questions are accompanied by painful ellbow-check
of the left sitting guardin. When finally the (eye-shade)??? is taken off, he looks at the endless
sand in front of him. His companions wave from a distance,  but they let have him two water-cans.
The road to the skyline seems to be the target, is lined with skeletons, death's-heads. Estimated  30000
(in words: thirty thousands). Somewhere stands a weather-beaten cross at the road's border.
Carved in: 1904. But only in 1933 a fire would destroy a little part of the german "Reichstag".
In the evening he arrives at the best bar of the city. Satelites broadcast the reality on the
"over-dimensional" sized monitores. At the moment, a big, handsome, yes, charmant man sings a
song,  wearing a "folkish Loden"-outfit...And she smiles at him, funnily wagging her chaste
"Dirndl"-costume. All stare, hungry for love, on Marianne's decollete. Unintentional, he has
touched the remote control. The channel switches and shows an image of "Carl von Ossietzki"
(in the KZ (concentration-camp) "Oranienburg"). A known image. An ancient image. A forgotten image.
He asks himself, who could be this SA-man, who pushes the fear of death into the face of his victim.
He decides to answer this question when he's "back". His view escapes the boredom. Red stools,
red bottles, red windows - all in RED ! "The colour of danger" a warning flashes through his brain
. But "lucky lips...(red lips) you should kiss" the huge loudspeakers buzz in the corner of the bar.
Slowly he unties his fingers from the glass of water. It rushes down and breaks to pieces on the
dirty floor of the bar. From the left, a shapeless spider approaches and refreshes at the cold draught.
Her web flutters spiritless between the mirror of the bar and empty whisky-bottles. The service asks him.
What he wants. He answers: money, power and love. You can't get  it here - short reply and he's alone,
again. He steps out into the night. The view is conducted to the moon-disk, which hangs above the
dreaming city. He's sad, that's certain. And he is also tired. Many nights before, nightmares had
robbed him the sleep. Inmidst, he had all seen, all felt but not found any solution. Searched in the
past, planned for the future. A slight pain in the left lungwing causes some sorrows. His insurance
police will come to an end at the end of the year. A nail drills itself through his sole, distributing a
stebbing ache. The smooth stream of the wind becomes entangled in his ears. Creeps into the
windings of his brain. Invitation to leave the jungle. It's time to find the thread, to return. The first
part of the way is still done. The end of the world ist reached - once again. Another skyline. High
waves pile up in front of it. On them little fishing-boats stagger like moths in the light. How many
young girls will wait in vain for a kiss, this evening? 1?2?3?4? Someone grasps him by his sleeve,
covers his head with a perspired steel helmet. Laces the belt of grenades around the hips, presses
the antitank grenade launcher in his right fist. If the tank has then turned for a thousand times
over his command post: would he be found like this? He decides to switch the "camp", the party.
Gets rid of all, of (his) utensils. Pulls some "fresh" cash out of the the next ??? cash-machine.
Gets himself dress-shoes, scarf and wrist watch. Plus a chic (swell?) smoking. Then, he makes
the children fight and kill (for him?).
-----------------------------"Reichstag" lange nicht gebrannt----------------------------------------
 
 
 

-----------------------------song of the "kokopera", words by ???, sung by Christopher Jeffrey----------------------------------------
pakawulu kotera winjandee yahe ee pulu kelem awanadee patekerija pa
keni keni kunda rima kunda rima keni yahe
kuti keni keni ii patewalke pinenke winjenke puluhee
kuti keni keni ii patewalke pinenke winjenke puluhee

eaglehawk two were facing each other (a man) was lying on his back
they both from the west were coming
clear sky high up they both fought they both fought high up
dive high up they both getting homesick
(?) took they both dive high up
they both getting homesick (?) took they both
-----------------------------song of the "kokopera", words by ???, sung by Christopher Jeffrey----------------------------------------
 

-----------------------------Non Toxique Lost----------------------------------------------------
Liner notes by T. Pargmann et al. (2006), translation by B.G.

In the beginning of the 80s, the band NON TOXIQUE LOST (short name: NTL) was founded in Mainz, Germany. The eponym for this project was taken from the term "mustard gas", a chemical weapon, which had been invented by the german scientists named "Lommel" and "Steinkopf" during World WarI under the acronym of "LOST" . Though the band's name refers to the "unperilous" character of this music, in the end NON TOXIQUE LOST also acted as a means for a fight, the very fight against the deadlocked patterns of  the culture of music of that time. Formed by members of some local "Punk"-bands, founded bei Sea Wanton and A. Wollscheid (aka S.B.O.T.H.I.). Later on, S. Schütze joined to play bass, violin and special (electronic) effects and P. Prieur, called "POGO", did the vocals. Although NTL often has been labelled as part of the "NDW" (= "Neue deutsche Welle") and sometimes even influences of "Jazz music"  have been (wrongly) mentioned, the band saw its position in the first instance in the context of an "industrial movement". When NTL was founded in 1982, its uncompromising musical approach was significantly inspired by pioneers of the "Industrial Music" like Throbbing Gristle, SPK and Whitehouse. Out of these influences, NON TOXIQUE LOST developed its sound as a trance-esque cocoon of clashing sounds of walls, pulsating synthethizers and angry vocals, which draws the listener into an emotional maelstrom, leading from fear, pain and desperation to rage and unlimited aggression. From time to time very static and pushed on by brute rhythms, NTL's music is uncompromisingly tough and this is exactly why it can be considered as an anomaly of that Germany of the early 80s. Similarities are seen more with bands like PACIFIC 231 (from France) or ESPLENDOR GEOMETRICO (from Spain). In essence, there are two important ideas crossing the band's whole oeuvre: the processing of the "everyday life" experience, interweaved with an explicit political attitude. A large impact came from J. Stender, who had been a member of P.D., then. His talent, to create german lyrics on "everday life" "on the run", conveying the "concrete" and "direct" contents, had been a adequate stylistic device to handle the facts of a "grey german reality" of those days. But in contrary to P.D. and P16.D4, NON TOXIQUE LOST objected to being classified into the "art" genre. Indeed, there were some references to the current "art"-movements, but the music was not to be "avantgarde", even if some external observers could get this impression. But NTL combined its conceptions about music with the idea to be creative using existing objects and to, aside from instruments, also use unconventional sound sources - this is another example for the realisation of the "concrete" and "everyday life". At the same time, the music has been the radical expression of an oppositional attitude. With NTL, Sea Wanton (the singer) realized his intention to found a band, which dealt with the social and political boredom of its reality in a challenging way. NTL did not only intend to distance itself from the reception of music, in general, but it provoked a concrete hassle with those crusted forms of understanding music and the culture of the youth. The band was permanently confronted by an environment which was deeply into the "Rock-music" culture of the 70s, public places like pubs  and youth-centres were dominated by the "Hippies" and "drug-abuse" cosiness. For a project like NON TOXIQUE LOST that meant a struggle for "free-spaces", not hostility, but also the neccessity to become accepted as something new. To a certain extent, as an idea of the "Punk"-movement, the philosophy of NTL aimed at provocation and the radical realisation of its own ideas. Accordingly, the turning away from the established mechanismn of the "music-business"  did not only affect the musical style, but also the production and merchandising of the sound storage medium. It was logic for NTL to select the compact-cassette as a medium for its music. This was "the" medium, which allowed the musicians as opposed to anything else, to keep in control over their musical and creative work and a direct merchandising, without being forced to take part in the profit-orientated "machinery" of the "music-business". In 1982, the first recordings were published on the "d.i.y."(=do it yourself) founded "cassettes only" label called "CAN CAN", which were to be followed by ca. 30 further releases. Inspite of this high grade of productivity, encompassing mostly the studio- and "live" material of NTL, but also some cassette-compilations featuring some "international industrial" bands, NTL and "CAN CAN" remained a creative "action-area", which was not perceived as a "full time job" or even as the "meaning of life". For a first vinyl release, a strictly limited edition, you had to wait for some years. The songs on the lp-album, called "Wanton", released in 1986, a selection of material, which had been published earlier on compact-cassette, expresses something like a "subtile" toughness (on a long range), which drills slowly in your auditory canal and the band herself accurately characterises it as "industrial muzak". As opposed to the high output on sound-medium there were only rare chances to experience the band on stage. Only a few events like those in Mainz and Trier (Germany), at the "Recloose Festival" in London, in Amsterdam, at the "Geminox-Festival" in Frankfurt (Germany) or at the "Berlin Atonal 2 Festival" took place. Even though the performance at the "Berlin Atonal 2 Festival" got an especially good reputation and positive feedbacks with those "friends" of "abstract music", NTL remained true to itself and did not devise any ambitions to change its strategies of merchandising. The band was more interested in the construction of a national and international community of producers and listeners of "abstract" and "experimental" music. There was a little network(ing) in the Mainz, Wiesbaden and Franfurt - area (Germany), e.g., in the atmosphere of the "Selektion" label (with groups like P16.D4 and S.B.O.T.H.I.), resulting in friendly contacts and sometimes personal cooperations within the music processes (including some sessions and live-performances). More contacts were established with "Graf Haufen" (Berlin) and soon reached out to "cassettes only" labels, based in France, the U.K. and Italy. Besides his membership with NTL, Sea Wanton had started publishing a fanzine called "Handbook of  Fun" in 1983, which intended to be a medium for subversive communication. The fanzine had been a means to distribute words and artworks ("collages"), which pointed out the protest against the established structures of the societies and understanding of "art" or crusted "music-cultures", and thereby it can be interpreted as a printed form of  "the same", which was also articulated by NTL's music. Furthermore the "Handbook of Fun" constituted a forum for experimental music, distributing contact-addresses (with different "cassettes-only" labels or juicy record-shops), thus being part of an international network of the "industrial scene of the 80s". NTL came up against  those established patterns of  their environment with a  radical "musical" denial, even though expressed in a distinct (german) language, only very few could understand. You could say, that this pull-esque, rhythmical toughness of some tracks, which meanwhile is an essential part with numerous "industrial bands", appeared some years "too early". The fact, that this music caused more embarassing to irritating reactions by most listeners, plus the consequent policy of publications and the responsibility for the "subversive underground",  are (presumably) the cause for being known by the "in-crowd", until now. Even though or  exactly because the "hearing customs" have changed in these last decades, the music of NTL has kept hold of its attraction as a "pioneer" achievement of the so-called "rhythmical Industrial". Since some years, Sea Wanton, accompanied by new companions, is again active as NON TOXIQUE LOST. While now using contemporary sound sources like samplers and computers,  it is (as always) bound to the idea of electronic toughness and a political attitude and, thus, creating its own musical cosmos. Parallel to this, a selection of early tape-recordings has been re-released on vinyl and gives a fine overview on the complete works of the band. More information and a complete list of the publications can be found on the band's site: www.nontoxiquelost.de oder www.discogs.com

-----------------------------Non Toxique Lost----------------------------------------------------




---------------------------------------------------------------------terre et argent -------------------------------------


Thomas Beck (2003)
I read about NON TOXIQUE LOST (NTL) for the first time in the German music magazine "SOUNDS". There, SEA WANTON (GEN 82) did reviews on compact cassette (d.i.y.) productions. This was a highlight for me, since I released own music on compact cassettes. Here you could find the creative in-crowd, because in the beginning of the 80s it was unbelievably expensive and very complicated to produce fine albums. The "industrial-music" scene had been mainly a "cassette-scene" too, because this media offered the possibility to determine the output in a spontaneous, direct and independent way (with a small financial risk !). NTL distributed on their own and sometimes contacts turned into friendship. Often, the cassettes had been packed like gifts for friends. NTL published some cassettes, and the rare long-play album "WANTON"; they acted like a typical "cassette-band": independent, taped in the rehearsal room, the songs found their way out of isolation. furthermore NTL played live (i.e. together with BOURBONESE QUALK - London, with P16.D4 - Amsterdam, with DER PLAN - Frankfurt, and together with PSYCHIC TV / ZOS KIA - Berlin), but those bands with electronic equipment were not used to it at that time, a MIDI had not yet been invented. GEN 82 even published a cassette-fanzine called "GUTE UNTERHALTUNG" (good entertainment) and the cassette-label "NEUER FRÜHLING" (=nouveaux printemps) published some authorized live takes from THROBBING GRISTLE, SPK , DAF, SUBURBAN PUNX, PD and other bands. What made NTL internationally important, was their political sophistication. The lyrics had often been very direct, which you couldn't find too often (at that time and today). Influenced by industrial music, punk and critical theory, they developed a popular energy, which lay beside those conceptional bands like P16.D4. NTL worked in Mainz (Germany), where Achim Wollscheid (nowadays in guidance of the SELEKTION label) was busy in some art projects. This was the time when most of these songs on the lp were born, and they are documents of a creative energy and the wish for independence. enjoy it !

Lorenz Schröter (LORENZ LORENZ) (2003)
<listen with pain>
On Sundays, there were eggs and toast and in the background BrahmsBeethovenBach was playing. At the age of fifteen I was interested in rock music and went to a record shop. I wasn't too hip and bought some Ella Fitzgerald, Cat Stevens and Bob Dylan. Later, having reached Chuck Berry, a classmate mentioned: you should listen to the Clash! Then everything went by fast, haircut, spitting at Blondie, punk manners at that time, hitchhiking to London, getting kicked out of school, making music. With everything which was available, guitars, saxophones, children’s toys. There was the one-two-three punk rock, the dadaistic pop and the row. They called it noise or industrial and it was the last exit. The realm of pains. It cleaned your ears out and drove everything away. Death as freedom. While rhythms and breaks existed in free jazz, everything was mercilessly clustered until a wall was built. A house of noise. Like a shell which is held near the ear, there was everything inside, Zen and the criticism of capitalism, but much more volume than the rush of one's own blood. This was a lot of fun, especially if you did it yourself. But in the end, it got on the audience's nerves.

Cem Oral (AIR LIQUIDE, JAMMIN' UNIT) (2003)
I think it was the first "electronic" gig of my music career. I was very excited. Normally, as a bass player, I had an easy job, and now side by side with SEA WANTON in front of so many strange people ?! The performance took place in Amsterdam (sponsored by STAALPLAAT, in 1985) This was even my first international stage performance. In any case, it was great! I collected huge amounts of compact cassettes with sounds, quotations and scapes taken from radio and TV, which I pushed through my KORG MS-20 synthesizer. Added some echoes and my personal psychedelic trip was perfect. Together with SEA and Heiko Wöhler we gave a really wicked performance. Despite the fact that, after the concert, the promoter promised that I, being such a strange German (I'm really half Turkish and half Finnish, hehehe), would guaranteed NEVER take part in any further events. I am quite certain that any future activities wouldn't have been as creative without this experience or that I otherwise wouldn't have developed such a healthy "laissez faire" attitude.

Reverend JIM GATES (THE AMERICAN FOLK MUSIC MAGAZINE) (1984)
I find it frustrating when presented with an album such as this. I'd love to be able to tell you what a great contribution NON TOXIQUE LOST have made to Man's strive towards musical enlightment. Unfortunately I'm resigned to meticulously and clinically dissecting this effort in order to find out what's lacking. Suffice to say it grates, from the cover and contents through to the press release. The whole thing recks of pretension, leaving a bitter taste in the mouth and a howl of derision from my speakers. Their calculated approach ensures any real emotion is soon filtered out, and sacrificed in the pursuit of a sound that is designed to be as bland as to please all of the people all of the time. The affected vocals sit awkwardly on a collection of 16 songs that lack inspiration, punch and soul. All in all it's very German.


Achim Wollscheid (Aug 16 03)
Guess that NTL was the first (and only) band I played with, that didn't require identification of sorts - neither with a name, nor a principle,
nor a style. What probably united those associated with that name was a shared unease within a cultural rule,
that after the political ossification of the 70s began to spread throughout art and music - the need to even design protest or subversion.
A reaction to this was NTL's 'non'- style - no rock, no punk, no experiments, no recycling and no improvisation...-
or bits of each, condensed in a thick amalgam, if needed.
Though most of NTL's pieces didn't entirely cross the borders of the 'song-principle',
the virus of disintegration was pretty much alive. Within, and sometimes even without...



SEA WANTON (1997)
<...lost signals ?>
some of them might be relevant others not. Sometimes it might appear quite the contrary depending on certain circumstances. We assume that some people need other stronger and more important information about their being. Some of them are looking for something aren’t they? We are offering an entrance into our world of thinking and freedom. At this moment communication starts. We do not intend to get your affirmation. We take the risk to select strange, weird, unpretty sounds. We refuse to fall back into comfortable indifference so highly rewarded by the industries of culture. The signals are born and pushed into the world of information. Finally you are free to determine the relevance of audiovisual information for your life. Where will the journey go – until the end of the world.

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http://berlin.wolf.ox.ac.uk/lists/quotations/quotations_by_ib.html Hic Rhodus, hic salta. The origin of this odd saying, whose currency is largely due to Hegel and Marx, takes a little explaining. Its original form is 'Hic Rhodus, hic saltus' ('Rhodes is here, here is the place for your jump'), a traditional Latin translation [see, e.g., Erasmus, Adagia 3. 3. 28] of a punchline from Aesop. In the fable 'The Braggart' an athlete boasts that he once performed a stupendous jump in Rhodes, and can produce witnesses: the punchline is the comment of a bystander, who means that there is no need of witnesses, since the athlete can demonstrate the jump here and now. The epigram is given by Hegel, rather out of the blue, first in Greek, then in Latin (in the form 'Hic Rhodus, hic saltus'), in the Preface to his Philosophy of Right. [Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Grundlinien der Philosophie des Rechts [Sämtliche Werke, ed. Hermann Glockner, vol. 7] (Stuttgart, 1928), p. 35.] He does not explain what the proverb meant in its original context (without which it can hardly be understood); indeed a comment he makes about jumping over Rhodes suggests that he may not have fully understood it himself. At any rate, he then offers an adapted German version with a different meaning, 'Hier ist die Rose, hier tanze' ('Here is the rose, dance here', an allusion to the rose in the cross of rosicrucianism, implying that fulfilment should not be postponed to some Utopian future), punning first on the Greek (Rhodos = Rhodes, rhodon = rose), then on the Latin (saltus = jump [noun], salta = dance [imperative]). Marx adopts the saying in the Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte [Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels, Werke (Berlin, 1956-83), vol. 8, p. 118.], where he first gives the Latin, in the form 'Hic Rhodus, hic salta!', a garbled mixture of Hegel's two versions, and then immediately adds 'Hier ist die Rose, hier tanze!', as if it were a translation, which it cannot be, since Greek Rhodos (despite what all the standard commentators say to the contrary), let alone Latin Rhodus, does not mean 'rose'. The confusion, both deliberate and inadvertent, does no credit to either Hegel or Marx as classical scholars, and the epigram loses much of its original power - as well as its original meaning - in their hands. They were evidently intent on turning it to other purposes, but it seems doubtful whether their attempts to improve on Aesop have been of much use to their readers. Special thanks to Terrell Carver for assistance with this account.

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