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Thread: Anyone's Daughter

  1. #1

    Anyone's Daughter

    I dug recently a bit deeper into the discography of the German band Anyone's Daughter. Founded in the early 70s , named after a Deep Purple song they released their first record Adonis only in 1979. Interesting record with a side long track and a majority of instrumental passages but without memorable song material. Their second self named record from 1980 , one of my favourite , goes into a more song based direction and shorter tracks but still with lots of instrumental passages featuring mainly vintage keyboards like Rhodes, Hammond and Moog. The songs are very well written , sung in English by vocalist and bass player Harald Bareth, one of the best German prog vocalists.
    Coming from the Stuttgart region in southern Germany the band toured heavily and was quite popular in southern Germany AD had a record deal with Spiegelei , from memory a Decca subsidary.
    The third record presents another turn , a concept record , Piktors Verwandlungen, an adaption of an esoteric story by Herman Hesse, who came from Calw , a small town from the same region.
    The record alternates between narration in German and longer instrumental tracks with a jazz rock flavour. For me the balance between the narrated parts and the instrumentals does not work too well.
    Their fourth record In Blau from 1982 goes back to medium long songs and one longer track this time sung in German and is IMO their best record. The lyrics are very good and quite deep especially on the long track Tanz und Tod. They stuck to the vintage keys and the record has kept a classic prog vibe.
    Neue Sterne from 1983 is the last studio record with Bareth and also their last prog record. The tracks have become shorter and more radio friendly , but including still interesting instrumental passages.
    Neue Sterne has again very good lyrics, among them two of my favourite AD songs Der Plan and In Zerbrochenem Glas , the latter narrating a car accident from the perspective of one of the victims and a highlight in song text writing .
    The band reunited in 2000 but changed completely their style. There are three live records from the Bareth period which are all excellent

  2. #2
    Hugely influenced by Genesis, they were probably the most successful band of the 2nd wave of german prog. Piktors Verwandlungen is their best i.m.o. A very interesting venture out of the safe-side and onto more uneasy realms by experimenting to bridge spoken text and vast symho passages. In Blau on the other hand sounds exactly like a mid-period Genesis album with german vocals.
    Macht das ohr auf!

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    Member thedunno's Avatar
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    Piktors verwandlungen is excellent but you have to be able to understand German to appreciate it fully.

    I loved In blau in the early 80ies but it has been ages since I last heared it.

  4. #4
    Dieter Moebius : "Art people like things they don’t understand!"

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    Highly Evolved Orangutan JKL2000's Avatar
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    Can someone post a song from In Blau that sounds like Genesis? I have most if not all of their albums somewhere, but it's been years since I've heard them.

  6. #6
    Quote Originally Posted by JKL2000 View Post
    Can someone post a song from In Blau that sounds like Genesis? I have most if not all of their albums somewhere, but it's been years since I've heard them.
    As Bareth sings in German on In Blau I don't find it particularly close to Genesis. This track from their second record comes closer to Genesis nice video btw

    Dieter Moebius : "Art people like things they don’t understand!"

  7. #7
    Quote Originally Posted by JKL2000 View Post
    Can someone post a song from In Blau that sounds like Genesis?
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    Member moecurlythanu's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by alucard View Post
    they released their first record Adonis only in 1979. Interesting record with a side long track and a majority of instrumental passages but without memorable song material.
    Wow. I find the side long track and the eponymously titled track to be quite memorable. It remains one of my favorite German albums, but I never made a big push to acquire their other albums, as the word on the street was that they were not as good as Adonis. This thread is the first I've read taking a different view.

  9. #9
    I can give or take Adonis and Vervandlung, but I always found their ensuing material hopelessly bland and stagnant. Yet those first two records are at least more "influenced" by the 'sissies than the total ripoffs of Neuschwanstein et al.

    In other words: pleasantly listenable, but never exciting - to me. Which is also how I feel about their contemporary colleagues Werwolf, Tibet, Trilogy and Amenophis.
    "Improvisation is not an excuse for musical laziness" - Fred Frith
    "[...] things that we never dreamed of doing in Crimson or in any band that I've been in," - Tony Levin speaking of SGM

  10. #10
    Quote Originally Posted by moecurlythanu View Post
    Wow. I find the side long track and the eponymously titled track to be quite memorable. It remains one of my favorite German albums, but I never made a big push to acquire their other albums, as the word on the street was that they were not as good as Adonis. This thread is the first I've read taking a different view.
    Adonis for me is their 2nd best after Piktors Verwandlungen.
    Macht das ohr auf!

    COSMIC EYE RECORDS

  11. #11
    Man of repute progmatist's Avatar
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    I always got a kick out of their German language rendition of In The Dead of Night.
    "Well my son, life is like a beanstalk, isn't it?"--Dalai Lama

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    Quote Originally Posted by moecurlythanu View Post
    Wow. I find the side long track and the eponymously titled track to be quite memorable. It remains one of my favorite German albums, but I never made a big push to acquire their other albums, as the word on the street was that they were not as good as Adonis. This thread is the first I've read taking a different view.
    Yes, "Adonis" suite is one of my favourite tracks by a German symphonic band, with the third and fourth part having some fantastic melodic material and all parts having great instrumental parts. I like all of Anyone's Daughters albums up to and including the poppier Neue Sterne, but Adonis is the best of the lot. Piktors Verwandlungen is quite good and certainly the one that stretches out the most instrumentally, but it doesn't have the impact on me like Adonis, perhaps because of the spoken Hesse sections. Still, if you liked Adonis, it's worth investigating.

    The early-2000s albums really are completely a different thing, an attempt to go to a modern-ish pop-style with an American vocalist, while still reworking two of their simpler classic tunes and throwing in a short instrumental or two to maintain a link to the past. Didn't work for me. However, I've not heard the last year's second comeback album Living the Future, which seems to have been slightly more positive.

    While I'm not a great fan of live albums, Anyone's Daughter's 1984 Live album and the CD/DVD Requested Document LIve 1980 - 1983 Vol. 2 offer some really good and slightly different interpretations of their prime material. And the latter one also has the fun U. K. cover "Schwärzer als die Nacht". Material from Piktors isn't included on these albums, since the album was a concert recording in the first place.

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    Member TheH's Avatar
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    Piktors Verwandlungen live with Heinz Rudolf Kunze (who is very famous in Germany)


  14. #14
    Quote Originally Posted by moecurlythanu View Post
    Wow. I find the side long track and the eponymously titled track to be quite memorable. It remains one of my favorite German albums, but I never made a big push to acquire their other albums, as the word on the street was that they were not as good as Adonis. This thread is the first I've read taking a different view.
    I seem to be the only one who prefers In Blau to the rest. I don't know enough about the band , but the way Bareth announces the tracks on the live records and his personal comments I suppose he wrote the majority of the lyrics which I like a lot. They were quite the opposite of Grobschnitt and their extroverted fun and joke shows. Bareth became later a medecin and the presence of death and grief is very present in his lyrics and with other singers the same words would have passed as corny but the way he sings them touches me a lot. I never saw them in concert, but apparently they were quite intense.
    btw there is another record based on Hesse lyrics which is IMO much better Hesse Between Music by Peter Michel Hamel

  15. #15
    Member TheH's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Kai View Post
    4
    While I'm not a great fan of live albums, Anyone's Daughter's 1984 Live album and the CD/DVD Requested Document LIve 1980 - 1983 Vol. 2 offer some really good and slightly different interpretations of their prime material. And the latter one also has the fun U. K. cover "Schwärzer als die Nacht". Material from Piktors isn't included on these albums, since the album was a concert recording in the first place.
    You should have a second look at the DVD of Vol. 2

  16. #16
    Member TheH's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by alucard View Post
    I seem to be the only one who prefers In Blau to the rest. I don't know enough about the band , but the way Bareth announces the tracks on the live records and his personal comments I suppose he wrote the majority of the lyrics which I like a lot. They were quite the opposite of Grobschnitt and their extroverted fun and joke shows. Bareth became later a medecin and the presence of death and grief is very present in his lyrics and with other singers the same words would have passed as corny but the way he sings them touches me a lot. I never saw them in concert, but apparently they were quite intense.
    btw there is another record based on Hesse lyrics which is IMO much better Hesse Between Music by Peter Michel Hamel
    I'm with you on "In Blau" by far my fav album by them. Maybe it needs a German
    background to appreciate it.

  17. #17
    Member ashratom's Avatar
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    I think Adonis is super and their best followed by Piktors. Those are the only 2 I own. I didn't care for the others some 25 years ago, but I should hear them again. My tastes are far more tolerant to melodic bands these days.

    Quote Originally Posted by Scrotum Scissor View Post
    than the total ripoffs of Neuschwanstein et al.

    In other words: pleasantly listenable, but never exciting - to me. Which is also how I feel about their contemporary colleagues Werwolf, Tibet, Trilogy and Amenophis.
    Just to provide a different opinion, I really enjoy every one of these (though I do need a fresh listen of Tibet). And honestly I would separate out Trilogy altogether, which I consider something special and much different than the other bands listed, in terms of style.

  18. #18
    Quote Originally Posted by ashratom View Post
    I would separate out Trilogy altogether, which I consider something special and much different than the other bands listed, in terms of style.
    You're probably right; Here It Is is arguably one of the very finest "symph" rock albums from the late 70s West-Germany. I just relistened, and it stands out from the rest I mentioned.
    "Improvisation is not an excuse for musical laziness" - Fred Frith
    "[...] things that we never dreamed of doing in Crimson or in any band that I've been in," - Tony Levin speaking of SGM

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    Quote Originally Posted by TheH View Post
    You should have a second look at the DVD of Vol. 2
    I'll get me coat...

    (Really should, it's minus six outside).

  20. #20
    Member ashratom's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Scrotum Scissor View Post
    You're probably right; Here It Is is arguably one of the very finest "symph" rock albums from the late 70s West-Germany. I just relistened, and it stands out from the rest I mentioned.
    Cheers!

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    Quote Originally Posted by ashratom View Post
    Just to provide a different opinion, I really enjoy every one of these (though I do need a fresh listen of Tibet). And honestly I would separate out Trilogy altogether, which I consider something special and much different than the other bands listed, in terms of style.
    Werwolf and Tibet are rather mediocre, IMO, though the latter has its moments, but I like the first Amenophis album, which I think is a damn good 80s symphonic work, even with low production values and mediocre vocals. Their 2014 album Time was surprisingly good, too. You and I, on the other hand...

    I agree that Trilogy is different.

  22. #22
    Quote Originally Posted by TheH View Post
    Piktors Verwandlungen live with Heinz Rudolf Kunze (who is very famous in Germany)

    I own that one. Been in Calw as well, though not at the time this was recorded.
    Matthias Ulmer plays keyboards in the band of Heinz Rudolf Kunze. I have several CD's by him.

    Anyone's Daughter has released a new album, with a new line-up. Only Matthias Ulmer is left.

  23. #23
    Quote Originally Posted by TheH View Post
    I'm with you on "In Blau" by far my fav album by them. Maybe it needs a German
    background to appreciate it.
    I love their German albums as well, but I suppose German is my favorite language. I have a lot of German language stuff.

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    Well, I like In Blau a lot, though not as much as Adonis, and I have no German background (and limited language skills). I haven't thought of the death and grief angle as being particularly salient with Anyone's Daughter, though a streak of bittersweet nostalgia is detectable all the way from "Adonis" and "Sundance of the Haute Provence". But thinking about "Der Begleiter", the first vocal section provides really a poignant and heartrending sense of mortality wrapped with a great melodic climax at "bleibt bei mir".

  25. #25
    Member Paulrus's Avatar
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    I haven't heard their albums in a while but as I recall there was a bit of a Saga vibe running through their late 70s/early 80s stuff as well. Or am I misremembering that?
    I'm holding out for the Wilson-mixed 5.1 super-duper walletbuster special anniversary extra adjectives edition.

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