Guru Guru is a German

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

 Krautrock

Krautrock

Krautrock is a generic name for the experimental music scenes that appeared in Germany in the late 1960s and gained popularity throughout the 1970s, especially in Britain. The term is a result of the English-speaking world's reception of the music at the time and not a reference to any one...

 band formed in 1968 as The Guru Guru Groove by Mani Neumeier

Mani Neumeier

Mani Neumeier is a German rock musician, free jazz-drummer, artist, frontman of the German Krautrock-band Guru Guru....

 (drums), Uli Trepte

Uli Trepte

Uli Trepte was a German musician best known for his collaborations with various influential Krautrock bands in the early 1970s.-Early career:...

 (bass) and Eddy Naegeli (guitar) later replaced by American Jim Kennedy (guitar). In time for their debut in 1970, Ax Genrich had replaced Kennedy to solidify the classic Guru Guru line up.

Music

Guru Guru were related to the free jazz

Free jazz

Free jazz is an approach to jazz music that was first developed in the 1950s and 1960s. Though the music produced by free jazz pioneers varied widely, the common feature was a dissatisfaction with the limitations of bebop, hard bop, and modal jazz, which had developed in the 1940s and 1950s...

 music scene both through their work with Swiss pianist Irène Schweizer

Irène Schweizer

Irène Schweizer is a notable Swiss jazz and free improvising pianist. She was born in Schaffhausen, in 1941.She has performed and recorded numerous solo piano performances as well as performing as part of the Feminist Improvising Group, whose members include Lindsay Cooper, Maggie Nichols, Georgie...

 and through Neumeier, who had already won several Jazz-prizes . The band was also influenced by rock music

Rock music

Rock music is a genre of popular music that developed during and after the 1960s, particularly in the United Kingdom and the United States. It has its roots in 1940s and 1950s rock and roll, itself heavily influenced by rhythm and blues and country music...

, such as Jimi Hendrix

Jimi Hendrix

James Marshall "Jimi" Hendrix was an American guitarist and singer-songwriter...

, Frank Zappa

Frank Zappa

Frank Vincent Zappa was an American composer, singer-songwriter, electric guitarist, record producer and film director. In a career spanning more than 30 years, Zappa wrote rock, jazz, orchestral and musique concrète works. He also directed feature-length films and music videos, and designed...

, The Who

The Who

The Who are an English rock band formed in 1964 by Roger Daltrey , Pete Townshend , John Entwistle and Keith Moon . They became known for energetic live performances which often included instrument destruction...

, Rolling Stones and early Pink Floyd

Pink Floyd

Pink Floyd were an English rock band that achieved worldwide success with their progressive and psychedelic rock music. Their work is marked by the use of philosophical lyrics, sonic experimentation, innovative album art, and elaborate live shows. Pink Floyd are one of the most commercially...

.

Among the band's friends were Amon Düül

Amon Düül

-External links:* - Extensive bio @ Perfect Sound Forever* mainly focussed on their collaboration with Robert Calvert of Hawkwind...

, Can

Can (band)

Can was an experimental rock band formed in Cologne, West Germany in 1968. Later labeled as one of the first "krautrock" groups, they transcended mainstream influences and incorporated strong minimalist and world music elements into their often psychedelic music.Can constructed their music largely...

 and Xhol Caravan

Xhol Caravan

Xhol Caravan, known first as Soul Caravan and later as simply Xhol, was one of the first bands participating in the launch of the Krautrock movement in Germany in the late 1960s. Their music draws from varied influences and fuses rhythm and blues and free jazz with a psychedelic rock sensibility...

, with whom Guru Guru played jam sessions.

Frontman Mani Neumeier (drummer and singer) has an original style of playing drums, and is known in the European jazz rock-scene. He was also involved in numerous other projects, as Tiere der Nacht, The Psychedelic Monsterjam, Damo Suzuki's Network, Globe Unity Orchestra, Harmonia

Harmonia (band)

Harmonia is a Krautrock supergroup from Germany. They formed as a collaboration between Michael Rother of Neu! and Hans-Joachim Roedelius and Dieter Möbius of Cluster and later included the British musician Brian Eno.-Musical style:...

, Acid Mothers Guru Guru, Voodootrance & Lover 303.

Social environment

Guru Guru's live performances in the late 1960s and early 1970s were politically left-oriented

Left-wing politics

In politics, Left, left-wing and leftist generally refer to support for social change to create a more egalitarian society...

. They organized concerts together with the Socialist German Student Union, read political texts between the songs, and sometime played at the jails. Their shows were extravagant and anarchistic, some of the musicians lived together in a commune in German Odenwald

Odenwald

The Odenwald is a low mountain range in Hesse, Bavaria and Baden-Württemberg in Germany.- Location :The Odenwald lies between the Upper Rhine Rift Valley with the Bergstraße and the Hessisches Ried in the west, the Main and the Bauland in the east, the Hanau-Seligenstadt Basin – a subbasin of...

 region, experimented with hallucinogens (one of their songs is titled The LSD

LSD

Lysergic acid diethylamide, abbreviated LSD or LSD-25, also known as lysergide and colloquially as acid, is a semisynthetic psychedelic drug of the ergoline family, well known for its psychological effects which can include altered thinking processes, closed and open eye visuals, synaesthesia, an...

 March/German: Der LSD-Marsch). Mani Neumeier is one of the organizers of the annual Krautrock-Festival Finkenbach.

Publicity

Guru Guru released over 40 LPs and CDs, and over 500,000 copies of their records were sold (all releases combined). The band played numerous live concerts, appeared in films, radio and television. In 1976 Guru Guru was the first German band to play live in the TV-show WDR

Westdeutscher Rundfunk

Westdeutscher Rundfunk is a German public-broadcasting institution based in the Federal State of North Rhine-Westphalia with its main office in Cologne. WDR is a constituent member of the consortium of German public-broadcasting institutions, ARD...

-Rockpalast

Rockpalast

Rockpalast is a German music television show that broadcasts live on German television station Westdeutscher Rundfunk . Rockpalast started in 1974 and continues to this day. Hundreds of rock and jazz bands have performed on Rockpalast...

.

Discography

• 1970 UFO
• 1971 Hinten
• 1972 Känguru
• 1973 Guru Guru
• 1973 Don't Call Us, We Call You
• 1974 Dance of the Flames
• 1974 Der Elektrolurch(2 LP)
• 1975 Mani und seine Freunde
• 1976 Tango Fango
• 1977 Globetrotter
• 1978 Live (2 LP)
• 1979 Hey du
• 1981 Mani in Germani
• 1983 Mani Neumeiers neue Abenteuer (aka Guru Mani ... )
• 1987 Jungle
• 1988 Guru Guru 88
• 1988 Live 72
• 1992 Shake Well – MC
• 1993 Shake Well
• 1995 Wah Wah
• 1996 Mask (limited edition)
• 1997 Moshi Moshi
• 1999 Live 98 (3 CD - Set, also on 2 LP)
• 2000 2000 Gurus
• 2003 Essen 1970
• 2005 In the Guru Lounge
• 2007 Wiesbaden 1972
• 2008 PSY
• 2009 Live on tour 2008
• 2009 Wiesbaden 1973
• 2011 Doublebind

Mani Neumeier's discography: see Mani Neumeier

Mani Neumeier

Mani Neumeier is a German rock musician, free jazz-drummer, artist, frontman of the German Krautrock-band Guru Guru....

External links

• Interview with Mani Neumeier