Titus Trash Tatar
Studio-Album – Helga Pogatschar

TITUS TRASH TATAR is very unusual. I wish I knew the German language. The mixture of spoken word with sound is something I very much appreciate. The French (?) composer, Hector Zazou, created a wonderful "portrayal" of Arthur Rimbaud's poems on his CD (in English), "Sahara Blue". And there's a New York poet, Sekou Sundiata, with his CD, "The Blue Oneness of Dreams". Of course, TITUS TRASH TATAR is very different from Zazou's and Sundiata's work. It's frightening, sad, and tragic, with moments of sheer and utter beauty, moments of redemption. Much of it is "Borg" music (if you're familiar with "Star Trek", you will recognize the Borg as a species that has fully integrated the "machine" with biological beings) and, as such, reflects the soullessness of a humanity which has surrendered to the cold, mechanical unconsciousness of modern industry. The human is distorted and manipulated, molded into something callous and even monstrous. And yet...especially in songs 4, 11, and 12, something purely human bursts forth, the potential for beauty is realized and triumphant.

Wow, at last it actually happens! I'm surprised! When I first listened to this album I felt disoriented and lost in a chaos of sounds, voices, harmonies, disharmonies and strange effects. I've got to warn you, this is serious stuff, no mainstream-ish pop-music. The album is presented as a "listening movie", a musical version of "Tatar Titus", a poem or book, I don't really know, by author Albert Ostermaier. Who wants to buy this, then? If you love German and like to explore and really penetrate the possibilities of electronic music and voice manipulation, buy Titus Trash Tatar. It's quite futile to try to describe this album, you got to hear to understand what it's all about. A lot of different kinds of media is used, as I said. Voices, conventional electronic music, acoustc instruments and a whole lot of effects applied in strange and interesting ways. So, if you think this sounds way to serious, you are propably right. Many of you would propably regard Titus... as a pretentious bundle of noise, but I disagree. There is a treasure to be found here if you know what to look for. Andreas Ingefjord (7/10)