Excerpt taken from Julian Cope’s Krautrocksampler:
“The dissolution of Ash Ra Tempel proved too much for poor Hartmut Enke. Their former leader never got any other projects together and nothing would be heard of him afterwards. Meanwhile, the weekend acid raves at Stommeln continued in top gear, and the Dierks studio was an incessant orgified [Timothy] Leary-X-perience. With Brian Barritt and his partner Liz Elliott on full patrol, Ralph-Ulrich Kaiser and Gille Letmann put all their bands through their cosmic paces. Wallenstein were by now far better than their recent and ultra stodgy Mother Universe LP on Pilz Records. But compared to the other Cosmic Couriers releases [Walter Wegmuller’s Tarot, Timothy Leary & Ash Ra Tempel’s Seven Up, Klaus Schulze’s Cyborg, Ash Ra Tempel’s Starring Rosi, Sergius Golowin’s Lord Krishna Von Goloka], they would always remain an extremely stiff proposition however cosmic they got. Brian Barritt attempted to add Psy-Phi to Tangerine Dream, who were naturally extending their boundaries from the first three Ohr LPs. But really, no one could add more Psy-Phi to T. Dream.
Control. It was close to the end of 1972 and R-U Kaiser had wrestled control of almost everything. But it was still not enough. After those first three Cosmic Couriers releases, the Trip had been diminished, compromised. His Tangerine Dream plans had soon lain in ruins when Edgar Froese refused to let The Kaiser release their forthcoming LP Atem on the Kosmiche Musik label. Not surprisingly, T. Dream begrudged having Kaiser’s ideas thrust upon them, and reacted furiously, insisting that they remain on the Ohr label. To add further insult, Kaiser had licensed Atem to British Polydor label without even asking the group. But R-U Kaiser kept dreaming. If only he could construct a group from the players already involved — those contributors to the first three classic LPs. Kaiser never doubted their musicianship, their allegiance to the Trip Itself, or their integrity. BUT, as the main with the Vision, was he really getting the full mileage out of the Cosmic Couriers that it deserved? No. He thought not…And then, as Johnny Rotten would later write of the Sex Pistols: “Out of all shambolic glory, something lent itself to chaos.” In a Divine instant, born more out of necessity and desperation than true vision, Rolf-Ulrich Kaiser decided to sell his musicians out and formed The Cosmic Jokers.
It was a puppet Krautrock supergroup — the first and only one of its kind. This was clear from the day Manuel Gottsching walked into a Berlin record store and heard a cosmic jam-session that he had played on only one month before blasting over the speakers. “What record is this?” he asked. Oh, it’s The Cosmic Jokers LP. Manuel looked at his own photograph on the back sleeve, a well-known standard publicity pic., and got very pissed off. He’d been paid only a session fee for the recording, yet here was Rolf Kaiser getting free mileage out of his credibility and integrity as Ash Ra Tempel’s guitarist. There were also pictures of Jurgen & Harald from Wallenstein, and a shot of Dieter Dierks, who probably wouldn’t mind. But when Manuel saw the photo of Klaus Schultze on the sleeve, he knew there was going to be trouble. Klaus already barely tolerated Rolf Kaiser and now he was gonna get him for sure. Manuel wondered about how to approach the situation. After all, the LP was fucking fantastic — two side long phasetone freakouts that sounded like augmented Ash Ra Tempel. It had all their contemporaries utterly beaten. Like a whole album of Funkadelic’s cosmic freeform “Maggot Brain” — it went all the way and just didn’t back off. No vocals apart from one Brian Barritt spoken cosmic interjection “Galaxy of Fallon to Telepath 1”. Manuel Gottsching was almost broke and felt very used. But he decided to wait and see how it all unfolded before taking further action…
The Cosmic Jokers was the ultimate cosmic trip with Rolf Kaiser as the Dhiagilev, the choreographer, the Ur-McLaren of the band. Now in complete control, he would edit the hours of Kosmiche freakouts into semi-coherent tracts of sound, add vocals, or use vocals already found on the tracks. he would release these albums in a coherent package, a ridiculous and crass marriage of the Spiritual and the supermarket. And he would no longer have to listen to these musicians’ complaints. It was his Trip…[He] could, with Dieter Dierks’ consent, put loads of stuff together — the fall-out from the Leary scene had been one long, beautiful orgy of Creation & Magic. If it was created on a higher plane, then they were just the people to rationalize it into palatable listenable Sonic Wisdom.”
Cosmic Jokers
The Cosmic Jokers
MediaFire Download Link
Tracklist:
01. Galactic Joke A
02. Galactic Joke B
03. Galactic Joke C
04. Cosmic Joy A
05. Cosmic Joy B
Cosmic Jokers
Galactic Supermarket
MediaFire Download Link
Tracklist:
01. Kinder Des Alls A
02. Kinder Des Alls B
03. Kinder Des Alls C
04. Galactic Supermarket A
05. Galactic Supermarket B
06. Galactic Supermarket C
Cosmic Jokers
Planeten Sit-In
MediaFire Download Link
Tracklist:
01. Raumschiff Galaxy Startet
02. The Planet Of Communication
03. Elektronenzirkus
04. Der Narr Im All
05. Raumschiff Galaxy Fliegt In Die Sonne
06. Intergalactic Nightclub
07. Loving Frequencies
08. Electronic News
09. Intergalactic Radio Guri Broadcasting
10. Raumschiff Galaxy Gleitet Im Sonnenwind
11. Interstellar Rock: Kosmiche Musik
12. Raumschiff Galaxy Saust In Die Lichtbahnen
13. Der Planet Des Sternenmädchens
