4D - Fauve Moderne/Sex Appeal 10" + bonus tracks

(Click on the picture to download.)

Big up user oldskool, who generously hooked me up with these tracks! About the source for one of the bonus tracks he'd like to add: "This (even back in 1982) ultra rare cassette was a gift from Andrea Kühler, one of my very, very best friends, who died just three weeks ago."

A couple of moons ago, I used the flexi-disc version of 4D's Fauve Moderne for one of my compilations of German post-punk and new wave. In the comments, oldskool provided some additional information, including what probably amounts to the complete 4D discography. I did a bit more digging (well, I mainly followed the links from this discogs entry and I'll probably lose a few nerd points now for not having done so the first time around) and unearthed the following:

4D were a shortlived project involving two of the guys from wacky German synth-pop outfit Supersempfft/Roboterwerke (read up on them over here), who custom built one of the first programmable drum computers. I actually used to own their Best Of, but eventually sold it off on eBay. The music was mostly quite lovely, with endearingly weird, inventive arrangements and sweet'n'crisp textures, but I just couldn't get over the horrible vocals. Here, have a listen yourself.

The Fauve Moderne 10" is just flatout great though. I've already heaped praises on the B-side's incredibly suave, francophile/phone new wave funk. But the A-side Sex Appeal is equally superb with its reggae-inspired teutonic skank, its dub effects and the singer's cool, detached crooning in German and French.

What Is Going On? from the above mentioned tape is yet more goodness, albeit in a harsher, more dissonant and spaced out style. We know Major Tom's a junkie-spaced out that is, not floating in outer-space on hash cakes-spaced out. Unfortunately, oldskool lost the cassette and only digitized this one track.

The second bonus track Dreidimensional is my least favourite of the bunch. Still, it's a solid piece of early eighties minimal synth-wave and it further shows the band's range. Dreidimensional was taken from a volume of The New Wave Complex, a series of semi-legit CD-R comps that you can grab over here, by the way.