It’s a sunny Friday afternoon and I’m en-route to meet up with Caspar Brötzmann Massaker before their show at Café Oto. I’m quite excited. It’s a show that many people, myself included, never dreamed would actually happen after the band quietly ceased to exist back in the nineties.
Massaker are one of those bands that people either love, or have never heard of. In Brötzmann himself they boast one of the most original, innovative, and noisy guitarists out there, and their back-catalogue speaks for itself. They take the rock rulebook and give it a thorough shoeing. There’s no verse/chorus/verse, no three-and-a-half minute ditties, no concessions to commercial acceptability. They are simply Massaker, and they make music that sounds like nothing and no one else on the planet.
When I arrive at the venue the band are outside, smoking. They’re easy to spot as Brötzmann is about 8-feet tall and the whole band possess a certain aura - like when you walk past someone you don’t really recognise at an airport – but you’re sure they’re famous.
Although usually identified as a German band, Brötzmann is actually the only German - bassist Eduardo Delgado Lopez and drummer Danny Arnold Lommen being Spanish and Dutch respectively. Amusingly, for ones who create such dark music, they’re some of the most polite and softly spoken people I’ve met in some time.
We sat down at a table outside the venue (so the band could smoke, naturally) and I attempted to find out more about them, and why they’re doing this now.
Clash: It’s been 17 years since Home (the last album) came out, what made you start playing together again?
Caspar: The story is easy really, Danny had 13 years time out, and one day he called me to say ‘hey Caspar, shall we play music together’, and I said ‘yes’. It was as simple as that. It was an easy decision. It’s not a revival, my opinion is that we are working in a friendship, and this is just a continuation of that.
Clash: Had you stayed in touch in the intervening years?
C: Eduardo and I have known each other a long time, since we were 16.
Eduardo: We both live in Berlin, Danny lives in Amsterdam – he always came over to see us.
Clash: So how did you come to be touring again?
E: We started writing new songs and a good friend, who’s also a promoter, said; ‘people would love to have a Massaker concert.’ It was a difficult decision. We didn’t know whether it really would be a good idea, or if we should just continue with the new stuff. But in the end, we all felt the old material was really good, and it was simply a case of ‘why not?’
Clash: You played the Berlin Live broadcast with Einsturzende Neubauten and Wire, and you looked like you were really enjoying being on stage together again.
Danny: Yeah, that was a fantastic show. That was really nice.
E: We were good together, I think.
Clash: Was it hard to relearn the old songs?
C: That’s what I mean when I say it’s a friendship.
D: They say friendship is in the blood, and it’s the same with this music – that’s why it’s so easy for us to play the songs after so long. It’s still in the system.
C: We know each other, yeah.
Clash: But, you’re playing 14-minute long songs…
C: But it’s important to say that music is timeless. It was a difficult thing to build up Massaker – for the music to go the right way. In the early days, around 1986, we played with another drummer and we were trying to ‘find a way’ in music. And now we have it. It’s completely outside of the commercial and business way of thinking. It’s personal, emotional and passionate. I did a lot of interviews in the past, where I tried to explain this, and people didn’t always get it. I think the best way to say it - is that it’s still fun.
Clash: What about the new material, have you been writing a lot of new songs?
E: Yeah, some. It’s not finished, and it’s definitely a work in progress…it’s difficult.
C: Just like our music, ha ha.
E: In terms of atmosphere, it’s maybe similar to the old stuff.
C: But, and we can say this now, we’re playing with two basses.
E: Yeah, Caspar is playing bass. We’d experimented with two basses many years ago, as a four-piece at some US shows. Henry Bogdan from Helmet played as a second bassist.
C: That was a long time ago.
E: But the new stuff is just the three of us - drums and two basses.
Clash: Will you be playing any new material tonight?
E: It’s not ready yet, it needs more work and we’re quite careful about getting it
right.
Clash: Regarding the older material, are there any albums you prefer to play songs from?
C: Koksofen, Home, Black Axis, Schwarze Folklore – all of them. It’s a mood thing.
E: Yeah, it depends on the setting and how we feel, on that day, in that place.
C: We change the set list to suit the venue.
E: We have an hour-and-a-half to play today, which is short for us - it’s like five songs or something.
Clash: You played Roadburn festival last year, how was that?
E: Roadburn was great
C: It was normal, go on stage, play…loud, ha ha. SunnO))) were headbanging at the front of the stage.
E: It’s strange, these things work in cycles. We haven’t played in over ten years, and there’s a different scene now, but people find out about you through other musicians, like Sunn O))).
C: It’s like there’s another generation of people out there to discover us.
Clash: I got into Massaker probably in the late 90s, and at that point, and even up until a year or so ago, it was really hard to find your music anywhere. Now you’re on iTunes and it seems people who I never thought would ‘get’ Massaker absolutely love you.
C: We were really involved with Blast First and Rough Trade, and of course Rough Trade closed up, so we had no label. That was really hard for us, because it affected a lot of friendships. We were close with people there, good friends, but when lawyers became involved it made it really hard for everyone.
Clash: So how might you release new music? Are there people who could put it out?
C: Yes, we know people. But the industry has changed a lot. Today, a record deal or whatever isn’t necessary, and it looks like we’ll have to help ourselves more than we might have done in the past. It’s new for us.
E: There are lots of ways to do it, so we just need to see what the best way is for us.
C: The most important thing is that we don’t repeat ourselves. Every album has been a development, or a new story. For the next one…it will be another thing. As Eduardo was saying, the atmosphere might be the same, but for us it’s a new adventure. We take our time, but the end result should be really good music.
- - -
And with that I leave them to go and soundcheck. As they finish their cigarettes they’re accosted by a jovial but persistent beggar, who - despite loudly claiming to speak six languages - can’t quite manage to get his message across. His international body language for ‘cigarettes’ attempts to harangue them into giving him some smokes, which they kindly do.
The sight of these three thoughtful Europeans, who are about to conjure up some of the heaviest sounds Café Oto will ever see, having a communication breakdown with a local madman is quite a comical one, but eventually they go inside and he comes over to hassle me instead.
Later that night, they put on a magical performance that has all the power and passion of their shows in the nineties. The friendship they talk about, and the connection they have, is plain to see. Hopefully the new material will find its way out there to us mere mortals, and there will be a new chapter in the story of Caspar Brötzmann Massaker.
Words by James Barry