Wednesday, October 28, 2009

Virgin's Dream - The X-Tapes 71-72 (Ger 2001)

Virgin's Dream - The X-Tapes 71-72 (Ger 2001) (Krautrock rarity - only 300 pressed)

Formed: 1968, Germany

Members:
* Charly Weißschädel (bass),
* Winfried "Jazzy" Rüger (guitar),
* Rolf Trenkler (piano, guitar, vocals),
* Theo Marpe (drums),
* Frank Pieper (drums).

Tracks:
01. Wake up 1:20
02. Evening star 2:20
03. Der blaue Kapuzinermönch 17:17
04. Rainy day in June 9:20
05. The well 11:35
06. El dorado 3:40
07. The galant knight 3:33
08. I am one of those 4:50

...The Virgins first saw the light of day as “Virgin’s Blue Dream” in Essen, Germany at the beginning of 1968, founded as a blues-band, but actually they never played the old blues, because at that time a lot of new exciting and unforeseen musical developments shattered the rock-musicworld that practically no one in the business could escape, not even a bit honest (and boring) band like the Beatles. Their album Sgt.Pepper still today delivers evidence of that…so the Virgins too made themselves up to sail to yet unexplored musical shores.The biggest part on this development probably had a certain Dr.Hofmann, who in 1938 discovered by incident a chemical compound that showed some really strange peculiarities and, starting about 1965, began to enjoy rapidly growing popularity among young people under the name of lysergicaciddiethylamide - LSD25...
But better let΄s stay with the Virgins !They made their first steps to world fame in the youth-center of their hometown Essen but pretty fast they grew out of this scene and got to be known outside the cityborders, what at that times wasn’t that easy, because the bands shot like mushrooms, and there were a lot of clubs, festivals and concerts in which the bands could present themselves.But Virgin’s Dream always were a tic more creative, complex, fuller of spirit and also technically better than all of the others.At the end of their carrier (in the beginning of 1972) the band had reached cult status in the area of Northrhine Westfalia, was on the way to be known all over Germany and a first album was planned.Unfortunately for the world it didn΄t come to that because bandleader and songwriter Rolf Trenkler decided to seek his luck on an odyssey that took him as a professional musician to Greece and later to Syria and the Lebanon and finally to New York City... (more infos included).
~ taken from Reinhold Horst's 11/2000 review.
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Here is an ultra-rare record from a german band that sounds very different from the kraut fraction or the symphonic proggers. In their time the Virgins had cult-status in Western Germany because of their incredibly energetic live performances, nowadays they are totally forgotten, mainly due to the fact that they never released an official record (the band split up at the beginning of 1972 - just at the time when a first LP by a major record company was in planning). Everything from them that survived were some demo recordings (mostly live) that i had saved for about 30 years on a cassette-tape. Even Rolf Trenkler, former bandleader and songwriter, did not possess a single recording of his youth sins. In 1999 i gave the tape to him and he overworked and denoised it as good as it was possible. From the result a private pressing of 300 CD/s was made as a giveaway to friends; it was never sold officially. The music is quite unique, i couldn/t name another band that sounds like them. There are melodious songparts reminiscent of the wonderful UK band "Cressida" changing with very energetic and driving parts a bit in the style of early "Soft Machine" and Mr.Trenkler/s guitarplaying reminds me a lot of John Cippolina from "Quicksilver Messenger Service". Overall the music could best be described as acid-psych of complex nature, with lots of sudden tempo and rhythm changes. The sound quality still is quite limited, nevertheless the record is a real collector/s item. If you are into sixties "Underground" stuff, don/t miss it. This is another "Garden of Delights" exclusive, you won/t find it elsewhere.
~ Review by Unicorn.

Download links:
http://www.mirrorcreator.com/files/LXP2PWC2/_1971___Krautrock_rarity_-_only_300_pressed_.rar_links

...and also...

http://www.multiupload.com/36NU3VU4DN
Virgins Dream - The X-Tapes (Ger 1971) (Krautrock rarity - only 300 pressed).rar (77.35 MB)
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6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hi, my name is Reinhold (also known as "unicorn" on the net), as you might guess i am the one who saved the tapes, payed for the pressing, designed the covers and wrote the comments...was a bit surprised to find the VIRGINS here, but it is okay. The copyrights belong to Rolf Trenkler (who wrote all tracks except "Rainy Day in June" which is an old Kinks number) and he does not object to publishing.
One thing is definitely wrong: The Virgins broke up in 1972 and only the first five named in the list were members of this band. Where you got the other names from i don´t know, must be from a totally different band.

Ps: I can provide a much better sounding flac (or mp3 320k) rip if anyone should be interested.

unicorn

alfaios said...

Thank you for your comments and your correction notes, Unicorn!
I'm interested in a 320k rip if
you can provide this much better sounding for all the people out there!
Thanks again!:)

Anonymous said...

Virgin´s Dream 320k:

http://rapidshare.com/files/299675638/VirDre.rar.html

Enjoy!

unicorn

Anonymous said...

Still today Mr. Trenkler makes very good music under the name of TREP-X (expert turned round). Between 2001 and 2004 he published a series of 3 "Chupitos de Formentera"-Cds that were only sold in Spain and are impossible to get in the meantime. Here you find an 80min. compilation of these records:

http://rapidshare.com/files/300076056/TrepChup.rar

Don´t miss this! It truly is an excellent and extraordinary record from the first up to the last minute. I would really appreciate to find this one published on your blog as a follow-up to the VIRGINS (covers and infos are included - and kind permission of Mr. Trenkler).

Regards from Germany

unicorn

Anonymous said...

thanks - steve

Anonymous said...

If it wasn't your blog, we didn't get a 320K version from unicorn :)

thanks alfaios ! JB