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Thread: What makes it "Zeuhl?"

  1. #1
    Estimated Prophet notallwhowander's Avatar
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    What makes it "Zeuhl?"

    Okay, I was pondering this question today and would like your thoughts. Part of my problem is that, having no musical training outside of playing a few scales, I have no technical vocabulary to describe music. One could simply narrow the definition down to Christian Vander's music in Magma, but then it's not a genre, not even a sub-genre, but just another name for Magma. Clearly other bands have taken a cracks at this.

    Can anyone here provide the technical vocab that can describe the basics of the genre?
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  2. #2
    Zeuhl means celestial in Kobaļan, the constructed language created by Christian Vander of the band Magma. Originally solely applied to the music of Magma, the term "zeuhl" was eventually used to describe the similar music produced by French bands, beginning in the mid-1970s. Although primarily a French phenomenon, zeuhl has influenced recent avant-garde Japanese bands.

    Zeuhl typically blends progressive rock, symphonic rock, fusion, neoclassicism, avant-rock, and vocal elements of African-American spirituals and Western military call and response. Common aspects include dissonance, marching themes, throbbing bass, keyboards including piano, Rhodes piano or organ, and brass instruments. Zeuhl shares much in common with the Rock in Opposition movement, and many bands have participated in RIO festivals.

    “Zeuhl sounds like, well, about what you'd expect an alien rock opera to sound like: massed, chanted choral motifs, martial, repetitive percussion, sudden bursts of explosive improv and just as unexpected lapses into eerie, minimalist trance-rock"

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    Estimated Prophet notallwhowander's Avatar
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    Yeah, I read that too.
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    Member rcarlberg's Avatar
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    For me, "Zeuhl" is RIO with extra drama added.

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    "Zeuhl" is Klingon for "wank".

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    ^ That's pretty funny.


    Quote Originally Posted by notallwhowander View Post
    Can anyone here provide the technical vocab that can describe the basics of the genre?
    There really isn't a specific "technical vocab" of any kind to do this. There were and are a few characteristics and archetypal components to the Zeuhl expression, but the main code is basically cerebral - in understanding the music's origins and what essentially marks it out from other styles. Let's see:

    1) Aesthetics - Most (if not all) Zeuhl music pursuits a level of formality in its approach to composition, instrumentation, orchestration and more. Little if anything is ever left to chance, mostly due to the objective of authority in sound; Zeuhl seeks to speak through more channels than just the sonics - very often it will strive for a 'spiritual' or (as I said) cerebral dimension in its effect and impact on the listener. Therefore it needs to be not only authentic, but genuine - you can not have 'true Zeuhl' if it's fake (and there are examples of that).

    3) Expression - Zeuhl music usually moves along lines actively overlapping the vertical and horizontal in metric pattern, elaborating a dynamic between basic levels of structure and texture in order to reach said "effect" of totality and impression. Apparent repetition (which is actually often additive rhythms or interlocking intervals), firm bottom (the notorious "throbbing" bass, machine- or march-like drumming, chord carpets with the main intention of emphasizing that very same bottom more than executing melody), mantric chant, "colossus harmonics", angular dissonance as primary motif in circular motions (which is more or less the exact opposite of what you'll find in most "symphonic" rock, for instance) - and almost always a vast scope of unifying form.

    2) Influences - Neo classical (i.e. from the modernist era and on) music, experimental/avant-garde jazz, recent/current developments in rock/pop (which may include disco, for that matter), noise and radical art sonics, religious music, "world music" etc. Christian Vander has always been informed by names like Bartok, Stravinsky, Orff, Coltrane, Ellington, Monk, Redding - his stab at "rock" came through witnessing other, equally eclectic experiments therein. Following Zeuhl acts (Zao, Archaļa, Eskaton, Potemkine, Vortex, Weidorje, Dün, Eider Stellaire, Shub-Niggurath, Ruins, Koenjihyakkei, Happy Family, Bondage Fruit, Simon Steensland, Thollot, Neom, Setna, Rhūn, Combat Astronomy, Guapo and many others) extracted and/or added from and to this; some are/were heavier on the jazz side, others expanded on the contemporary/modernist aspect.

    3) Appeal - Its main audience sits not with the regular "prog" crowd but rather with either fusion aficcionados, new music buffs or people into the generally experimental, weirdo or "arty" as concerns rock/pop. Well established artists like Sunn O))), Boris, Ulver, The Locust and Hella are examples of initially "non-prog" groups whose impulse from Magma/Zeuhl rendered their appearance all the more "proggy", as they say - yet their respective fanbases exceed the usual community in both size and variety.
    "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

  7. #7
    Member Steve F.'s Avatar
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    It has to be approved by the 'Zeuhl foundation', owners of the trademark.

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    Steve F.

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    Estimated Prophet notallwhowander's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Scrotum Scissor View Post
    Expression - Zeuhl music usually moves along lines actively overlapping the vertical and horizontal in metric pattern, elaborating a dynamic between basic levels of structure and texture in order to reach said "effect" of totality and impression. Apparent repetition (which is actually often additive rhythms or interlocking intervals), firm bottom (the notorious "throbbing" bass, machine- or march-like drumming, chord carpets with the main intention of emphasizing that very same bottom more than executing melody), mantric chant, "colossus harmonics", angular dissonance as primary motif in circular motions (which is more or less the exact opposite of what you'll find in most "symphonic" rock, for instance) - and almost always a vast scope of unifying form.
    This is along the lines I was hoping for (so thanks), though I'm not sure I understand it all. What's been impressing me in MDK lately is the weird rolling rhythm that under-girds, or I suppose unifies, the whole piece. It seems to me that when bands lock into that kind of underlying rhythm, I start to feel "this is really Zeuhl!" It can be overt, it can be subtle, the band can spend a long while syncopating instead of hitting it directly, but it undeniably defines everything else going on, whether it builds a platform for the rest of music, or the musicians start playing against it for a time.

    Quote Originally Posted by Scrotum Scissor View Post
    Aesthetics - Most (if not all) Zeuhl music pursuits a level of formality in its approach to composition, instrumentation, orchestration and more. Little if anything is ever left to chance, mostly due to the objective of authority in sound; Zeuhl seeks to speak through more channels than just the sonics - very often it will strive for a 'spiritual' or (as I said) cerebral dimension in its effect and impact on the listener. Therefore it needs to be not only authentic, but genuine - you can not have 'true Zeuhl' if it's fake (and there are examples of that).
    The level of composition strikes me too. This is where I keenly feel a lack of musical vocabulary. I kind of get the three-chord thing in rock music, from having listened to so much of it. It sounds like something very different it going on in Zeuhl. I really don't know, because I really don't know anything about composition.

    As far as authenticity goes, this is a slippery eel as well. From a subjective listener's point of view, I know it when I hear it. Is it a thing that can be quantified, or is it just a matter of banding together with like minded people who are similarly affected by the performance?

    What are examples of musicians attempting Zeuhl, but fall down in the authenticity of it?
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  9. #9
    Estimated Prophet notallwhowander's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Steve F. View Post
    It has to be approved by the 'Zeuhl foundation', owners of the trademark.

    Franchising opportunities available in your area!
    Who do you think I'm asking?!
    Wake up to find out that you are the eyes of the world.

  10. #10
    Quote Originally Posted by notallwhowander View Post
    What are examples of musicians attempting Zeuhl, but fall down in the authenticity of it?
    IMO, someone like the Italian band Runaway Totem or their brother unit Universal Totem Orchestra - who both have made some very solid material, but missing out on the core of what would make it Zeuhl. Another Italian act doing this were 90s band Lingam, who produced a fine record which never really reached "home". A third might be Russian 80s (semi-legendary) ensemble Horizont (or Gorizont) - again very good, but only "halfway to Zeuhl". As were 80s Czech group Stromboli (brainchild of guitarist maestro Michael Pavlicek of Bohemia, Mahagon and Prazsky Vyber) - whose first album is great all the same. Some moght even add the pretty wonderful Swedish unit Kultivator from the early 80s.
    "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

  11. #11
    Does it sound like Magma and/or is it related to the band Magma? Then it's zeuhl.

    Okay, a better, "real" answer .. I listen for things like pounding, driving rhythms. Incessant. Like marching. Bass is usually grumbly and sometimes fuzzy. Repetition and buildups are used to great effect. Vocals are often of the vocal/chant variety. There's sometimes/often/usually a jazzy feel, especially in the instrumental/solo/stretch-out parts. Often there's swirly boingy Rhodes piano, but not necessarily.

    Yeah, I'm just describing Magma, aren't I?
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    Quote Originally Posted by notallwhowander View Post
    I kind of get the three-chord thing in rock music, from having listened to so much of it. It sounds like something very different it going on in Zeuhl. I really don't know, because I really don't know anything about composition.
    There's often an extended vamp going on - just a few related chords that don't have a strong sense of direction and can move back and forth indefinitely. For an example, think of Coltrane's version of "My Favorite Things". In zeuhl, melodic lines will build up tension over the vamp, and it will eventually move - to another vamp in a different key, to a different chord, to a modulating section, or to any of these with a sudden dynamic change. There's a structural relationship to classical Minimalism, although I don't know whether Vander & Co. had any or much direct influence from that. But he owes a large debt to Coltrane's version of modal jazz, adapted to composition rather than improvisation, and he's always acknowledged that.

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