Cataclysmic ensemble” declared the headline on the full-page music press ad announcing the 1973 release of Magma’s first UK-released album, Mekanik Destructiv Kommandoh. To those already smitten by Can’s stratospheric brilliance, Gong’s eccentric surrealism and Tangerine Dream’s synthesised bubble bath, this black-clad bunch sporting the claw medallion looked intriguingly foreboding. The press stoked fascination, reporting how Magma, led by thermonuclear master drummer Christian Vander, were performing an epic space age morality tale of doomed Earth and the spiritually idyllic planet Kobaïa – all in his self-invented language.
Magma’s debut London concert, at The Marquee club on 5 December 1973, saw them play for over three hours, covering new and next albums, plus Vander’s jawdropping drum solo. Shell-shocked reviewers struggled to describe what they’d witnessed, stammering phrases like, “devastatingly idiosyncratic”, “immensely powerful”, “overwhelmingly exciting”, “music for all the way to eternity and back”, or even “Magma make the kind of music Ken Russell might use as a soundtrack for the firebombing of Dresden.” Gulp. All agreed that Magma was like nothing they’d ever heard before, but it would be years before the group’s importance in the evolution of new European music was acknowledged.
Maybe Magma were simply too berserk or impregnable for that time when vapid singer-songwriters and stadium prog ruled, but they had split by the end of the decade. They returned in the 21st century with renewed strength, repositioned now as the ultimate cult band, having sparked a new musical sub-strata that’s huge in Europe called Zeuhl Music (rhymes with earl, means celestial in Kobaïan).
While original fans may remember the most seismic outfit to strafe a British stage, others recall John Lydon citing them as a seminal adolescent boost or snooker champ Steve Davis famously splashing his winnings on bringing them to London in 1988. Original pressings are collectors’ items but the group and Vander’s solo career have been well-served with reissues on his Seventh imprint (not least 2008’s Studio Zund boxset, holding the first eight albums and two outtakes CDs).
Christian Vander was born on 21 February 1948 in the commune of Nogent-sur-Marne in the Eastern suburbs of Paris; the stepson of French jazz piano player Maurice Vander and grandson of a nomadic gypsy violinist, with Polish, German, Slav and gypsy blood. Interviews have mentioned the Balkan forests of his childhood, Vander professing Hans Christian Andersen’s stories were “closest to situations I experienced in my childhood”.
He started drumming at the age of 11, but recalls getting lost in his aunt’s 78s by the age of five, whacking a tambourine to Bach and Bartok. His mother Irene was an accomplished bebop dancer who took the young Christian to clubs where he witnessed great drummers such as Art Blakey, Philly Joe Jones and Kenny Clarke. He was digging Coltrane, meeting the legendary saxophonist in the early 60s, along with his polyrhythmic powerhouse Elvin Jones, whom he rates as “one of the greatest drummers ever”. The teenage Vander received his only drum lessons from Jones, who was moved to invite him to take his place at that night’s gig. Vander has said he got his first kit courtesy of jazz trumpeter Chet Baker, who was living with his mother at the time in Paris. “He took me to the club he was playing and came out with a drum kit and said, ‘That’s for you.’” Vander’s joy was short lived: the police took it away because the kit had been hired for Baker’s club engagement.
While professing his love for Motown (“I didn’t understand the words, but I felt the music was spiritual”), R&B and early rock, alongside Wagner, Stravinsky and Carl Orff, Vander credits Coltrane with giving him the Damascene moment, motivation and “real material to work on to be able to move on”. Coltrane’s ’67 death sparked a mission to keep the flame burning by imparting the spiritual force he drew from his music to the world.
Vander, who previously played with a group called Wurdalarks with bassist Bernard Paganotti, was so affected by Coltrane’s death he left for Italy afterwards, touring with Arthur Conley, protégé of his other great inspiration, the late Otis Redding, for whom Vander wrote a heart-torn vocal tribute, Otis, which is still a live vocal showcase today. Seeing the sorry state of French rock prompted him to form Magma in 1969, initially using Johnny Halliday’s horn section plus Laurence Thibault on bass, guitarist Claude Engel and keyboardist Rene Graber.
“The music of Magma started one day because it had to come out,” he said. “I would call it a revelation. The music came out of me naturally, without the need to compose it.” What he describes as “a vision of humanity’s spiritual and ecological future” drove him to form the ultimate group, whose abilities would be tested playing his story, set many centuries in the future, about a group of questing souls fleeing the morally decayed Earth to settle on the spiritually advanced distant planet Kobaïa.
The group wore black, sporting bronze medallions cut into the Magma insignia which Vander had sketched, inspired by ancient Egyptian breast plate armour. It adorns everything they do. The Magma name refers to lava. “When Magma came about in 1969 it was completely modern, hard to compare with anything at the time,” he explains. “Magma was a shock. People were shocked.”
Initial stories had Vander stating that the Kobaïa story would run over 10 albums. While it’s now apparent that Theus Hamtaahk was the three movements recorded in the studio for MDK and Kohntarkosz, plus the first which appeared on 1981’s live Retrospectiv 1&2 set, the biggest unreleased work in Vander’s canon is called Zess, which he once said should be five hours long. Extracts have appeared on live albums cut in 1981 and 1992.
Vander wrote in Kobaïan, the language he invented himself, reasoning that French audiences didn’t understand the words of the rock they listened to, while Vander didn’t speak English and disliked French set to music. He wrote phonetically, using elements of Slavonic and German, peppered with guttural syllables meant to be felt rather than heard.
“Kobaïan wasn’t created in an intellectual process, it is a language which imposed itself naturally onto the music and sounds. The language came parallel with composing; when I was composing on piano, certain sounds would appear. The first word I pronounced was ‘Kobaïa’. The other words came as a result of the music. It was a natural process.”
A key element in Vander’s ethos came from his love of Otis Redding, backing band Booker T & The MGs being, “in service of the music. We have the same goal in Magma. Magma plays black music. Black music is devotional music; a spiritual music. The white peoples’ music is music of the intelligence. Mostly. When I started doing music, I played in rhythm and blues bands with Bernard Paganotti. I learned a lot from that about holding a rhythm. There are codes and a certain spirit to it. Same thing with Tamla Motown. It taught me discipline, regularity, at a time when I was a young savage.”
Fasten your seat-belts… here’s the result.
MAGMA (France, Philips 63595 001/2, 1970)
First released as a double, Magma’s debut (the first French underground rock album) came in a gatefold sleeve, with notes in French detailing the first part of the Kobaïa story. Produced by Laurence Thibault, the band included guitarist Claude Engel, bassist Francis Moze, reeds man Teddy Lasry and imposing Basque-born vocalist Klaus Blasquiz: a key figure in the Magma story. Fatefully, as a friend of Engel’s, Blasquiz found himself at Magma’s first demo session, recruited on the spot to let rip with his multi-octave range after Vander overheard him scat singing.
The album saw the Magma concept finding its feet, using repetitive chants, sepulchral mid-tumult chorales and undulating electric pianos, while traversing complex proto-prog arrangements, time signatures and repeated brass riffs, sometimes recalling Van Der Graaf Generator, prone to exploding into operatic bombast. The strident jazz-fusion romp of Vander’s Kobaïa remained in their set for the rest of their career.
The first disc covered the meteorite-battered journey from Earth before arrival on Kobaïa. Side three sees our heroes exploring their new home, falling in love with its “beauty, happiness, wisdom”, attempting to spread the message to Earth, which wants to destroy it. Decades later, Vander revealed that Kobaïa referred to Earth.
By then, Magma’s manager was the legendary Giorgio Gomelsky, pivotal figure in the London R&B boom. After running the Marmalade label, he had moved to France, seeing Magma in 1970.
1001 DEGREES CENTIGRADE (France, Phillips 6397.031, 1971)
The second LP covers the Kobaïan party’s return to Earth, which listens to the stories of the distant planet’s growing civilization, its philosophy and ideas for improving life through enlightenment. The missionaries are imprisoned, but get a message to Kobaïa, which sends a rescue party offering Earth’s authorities the choice of releasing the Kobaïans or being destroyed by the planet’s ultimate weapon. They are released, vowing never to return but remembered by the few they met, their ideas preserved for generations.
A similar lineup released another album in 1972 as Univeria Zekt, designed to ease listeners into Magma’s music. Entitled The Unnamables, Lasry and Cahen’s tracks traverse jazz-fusion (with English titles and lyrics), while Vander’s three pieces ride the ongoing interplanetary trajectory which would soon draw a line in the sand for the musicians.
Conservatory-trained cellist Jannick Top joined to add his schooling and unlikely tunings on monolithic bass. Vander heard him in a club, stating, “I had to have him in Magma, although I realised that his inclusion would mean the destruction of the band in its current form. Jannick has changed everything.” Leading French jazz pianist Michael Graillier joined and Stella stepped forward as main singer, a position she holds today. Born in Paris to Polish immigrants, she began writing music in the 60s, releasing her first EP in 1963 at the age of 12.
MEKANIK DESTRUKTIV KOMMANDOH (A&M SP-4397 1973)
For many, this magnum opus was their introduction to Magma. Although Gomelsky is credited as producer, Vander had taken the reins, writing it all. Even then, the much starker and scarier original recording was rejected by the record company (released on Seventh in 1989 as Mekanik Kommandoh).
The Kobaïan saga gets confusing as MDK is announced as part three of Theus Hamtaahk, although the first and second hadn’t appeared yet, despite the first two albums! The subject of Magma’s third album is spiritualist Nebehr Gudahtt, one of those touched by the Kobaïans’ visit to Earth. This key text in Magma mythology is transmitted through Vander (now calling himself Zebehn Strain de Geustaah). The Theusz Hamtaahk (Time Of Hatred) takes place in the period between the Kobaïan visit and Nebehr Gudahtt’s march for enlightenment. He meets hostility, but gradually Earthlings are convinced and march with him.
From the ominous marching brass opening blast of Hortz Fur Dehn Stekehn West, Magma elements now seem in place in the operatic voices and rollercoaster riffing, while steely resolve has gripped the players. Jannick Top puts a rumble in the engine-room, whether fret-abusing or growling like an awakening sea-bed behemoth. The vocals benefit from Stella’s counterpart to Blasquiz’s stentorian emissions, boosted by four more singers (inviting comparisons with Carl Orff).
Perhaps extraterrestrial gospel or even Sun Ra with focus was the best description of this trance-like music, but after their devastating power live, their studio masterpiece seemed to have suffered at the mastering stage.
There’s a story that, when Magma were recording the album at Virgin’s Manor Studios in April 1973, Mike Oldfield was halfway through producing Tubular Bells. Vander claims that Oldfield absorbed a song he wrote for his grandfather into his mega-selling opus, which the drummer didn’t hear until attending the premiere of The Exorcist. (Oldfield said that Bach was his inspiration.)
In 1993, Seventh released Sons Document 1973 – Le Manor (AKTII), capturing a jam at the Manor between Blasquiz, bass clarinetist Rene Garber and the rhythm section.
To promote their first UK release, Magma toured, including the Marquee showcase. “From the beginning to the end there was silence,” remembered Vander. “The attitude changed and they liked it. We got them with fear. People came to see us afterwards, saying, ‘You guys are demons!’ They were terrorised and they loved it. That was exactly our idea.”
TRISTAN ET ISEULT (Barclay 80.528, 1974)
The album first appeared in the UK as soundtrack to Yvan Lagrange’s 1972 avant-garde film Tristan Et Iseult; it was credited to Vander but actually a fourth Magma album, recorded with Stella, Blasquiz and Top, and it’s the favourite of many. It’s announced on the cover as second movement of the Theus Hamtaahk trilogy, reissued in 1989 on Seventh under proper title Wurdah Itah (“Dead Earth” in Kobaïan). If MDK is the third part, Theus Hamtaahk (Time Of Hatred) itself has only appeared on live albums and a monumental Peel session.
Side one of the original vinyl s upposedly represented The Time Of Darkness on Earth, now left behind by those on the Kobaïan quest but about to be visited by the spiritually-evolved Kobaïans. The music goes from calm to storm, sinister chants building over hypnotic piano riffs and Vander’s subtle martial undertow.
KOHNTARKOSZ (A&M 68260 1974)
The second Magma album released in the UK broke from the Kobaïa story because Vander was worried about his ideas being stolen. He now launched another cycle, Ementehtt-Re, of which this was the second part, the other two not appearing until the 21st century. Ementehtt-Re concerns a man called Kohntarkosz who discovers the ancient Egyptian tomb and secrets of the priest of the title, using mesmeric chanting and pianos to build tension over long stretches; it’s dark, shadowy and screamingly intense by the end of its 31 minutes. Produced by Gomelsky using the Manor Mobile in Valbonne, Kohntarkosz has been compared to a classical piece in structure, plotted for maximum impact,
veering between ominous to pastoral, the Top-Vander juggernaut on fire (although the mastering diluted the impact). The original vinyl split the title track over both sides, also including Vander’s pastoral Coltrane Sundia (Coltrane Rest In Peace), and Top’s Ork Alarm, contrasting with overdubbed cellos, bass and gargling monster voices.
When some of Magma visited the UK in March, 1974, they recorded a Peel session, produced by Tony Wilson at the BBC. The stripped down line-up of Vander, Top, Blasquiz, pianist Gerard Bikialo and Engel recorded two songs which UK fans would not yet have heard unless they’d seen Magma live. Theusz Hamtaahk was the first part of the previous trilogy (though never released in a studio version), while Kohntarkosz was still a work in progress. The 27-minute version here might not yet boast the climactic finale but has its own raw, simmering menace, the smaller line-up on vicious form, living up to the late Ian McDonald’s description of “a band whose collective instrumental conflagration couldn’t be extinguished by the entire London fire brigade”. It’s out as BBC 1974 Londres (Seventh XIII).
LIVE (Utopia CYLZ-1245 France 1975)
Recorded at Paris’ Taverne de l’Olympia between June 1-5, and the first time Magma’s ferocious live power had been captured on record. Initially a double album, it’s led by an apocalyptic Kohntarkosz (renamed Kohntark for copyright reasons), plus Mekanik Zain’s fearsome showcase for new bassist Bernard Paganotti.
Several volcanic live sets have been released on Seventh, best of the bunch possibly THEATRE DU TAUR 1975 (AKT IV 1996), recorded that September in Toulouse, which bears witness to a band which is infused with a malevolent energy dripping from every bass heave or drum fill like an avalanche. Christian Vander was practically unable to contain his inner pressure cooker until a climax that dwarfs even the Live version. This writer saw them around this time and has never been the same since.
UDU WUDU (RCA FPL1-733Z France 1976)
Jannick Top was back, Vander calling Udu Wudu “his album” because of his songwriting on Soleil d’Ork (Ork Sun) and 18-minute bassdrum colossus De Futura, credited with igniting the “brutal prog” strain. The band now included the core trio, plus Alain Hatot (sax, flute), Patrick Gauthier (piano, synth) and a choir. It’s the first Magma studio set not confined to the two concepts, being a collection of (to be revisited) songs such as Zombies Dance. Paganotti contributed Weidorje before leaving to form his own Zeuhl outfit of the same name.
INEDITS (Tapioca 10001, 1977)
Inedits ran into criticism over sound quality, consisting of practice sessions recorded on cassette (as per sleeve sticker warning). Sowiloh+KM-EXII – Opus 3 is a tough act to follow, becoming a fearsome duel between Vander and Top, who goes off the scale on his solo and on KMX – BXII. The rest is marred by bootleg quality recording, Vander laying into what sounds like a sandwich box.
ATTAHK (Arabella 25376 France, 1978)
In an Ork-adorned sleeve by HR ‘Alien’ Giger, Attahk saw Magma return after disbanding for a year, Laurent Thibault back producing with a horn section, resulting in elements of jazz-funk, gospel, R&B; even pop.
RETROSPECTIVE Vol 1 & 2 (RCA PL77497, 1981) RETROSPECTIVE VOL 3 (RCA PL 37481, 1981)
Three years elapsed before another album, documenting reunion shows at Paris Olympia on 9, 10 and 11 June 1980. Retrospectiv Volume 1&2 includes full MDK and definitive Theus Hamtaahk, first part of the same-named trilogy, still only heard in live performance. Paganotti was back, along with violin fiend Didier Lockwood. The inner gatefold shows dead bodies in an empty venue, while Vander’s visage glowers from the backdrop. After Theus Hamtaahk has screeched to a close, there’s sirens, screaming for the exits and evil laughter.
Retrospective Volume 3 came from the same shows, the episodic, fairly lightweight jazz-funk chorale of Retroversion (Je Suis Revenu De L’Univers) occupying side one.
MERCI (Jaro 4120 Germany 1984)
The often-maligned Merci sported few recognisable musicians (Vander on percussion, another guy on drums), full brass, English lyrics and jazz fusion workouts. The opening Call From The Dark (Ooh Ooh Baby) features catchy vocals from Stella, while Otis is Vander’s heartfelt tribute to his other big inspiration. It would be the last Magma studio album for 20 years, Vander forming his acoustic-dominated Offering project, while undertaking various solo projects.
Magma returned to the UK in 1988, somewhat bizarrely at the behest of snooker champ Steve Davis, who described Magma as his “true obsession” after catching them at the Roundhouse in June, 1974 (“the most musically life-changing experience of my life”). Davis set up Interesting Promotions to put Magma on for three nights at London’s Bloomsbury Theatre, not releasing he was financing a 14-piece band “which raised the overheads slightly”, although the last night sold out.
Vander started the 21st century resurrecting Magma, recording its 30th anniversary shows at Paris’ Trianon Theatre on 13 and 14 May 2000, where a new line-up including guitarist James MacGraw and bassist Philippe Bussonet played all of Theus Hamtaahk, released as a three CD boxset and DVD on Seventh (SRA 29-30-31).
KA (Seventh/Le Chant De Monde 274 1709, 2004)
KA (Kohntarosz Anteria) rekindled the Egyptian saga with music written by Vander in 1972 as the prequel to 1974’s album. As he explains in the accompanying booklet, he wrote KA having nearly finished MDK, while also “trying to get Kohntarkosz into shape”. When the latter was complete, KA was shelved for 32 years, until Vander started figuring he’d been writing about the young Kohntarkosz or someone “looking for something…maybe it’s the missing link between Mekanik and Kohntarkosz.” He reveals the piece contains the first things revealed to Kontarkosz before he entered Emehntehtt-Re’s tomb. After much work with McGaw and Bussonet, the piece was reassembled and recorded in 2004 with three numbered lengthy tracks. Magma now benefited from modern recording techniques, spiritual depth of the Offering project and massed chorales of his solo outings.
The Kohntarkosz trilogy describes a quest to understand the secrets of the universe and achieve immortality through a modern archaelogist discovering murdered Pharoah Emehntehtt-Re’s tomb. Om Zanka (initially in the BBC Kohntarkosz-in-progress) and Gamma (in demo form on Inedits) reappear in the third part. Vander declared that nearly 18 months of work on this immensely complex piece was worth it: “The quality of this recording goes beyond my highest hopes.”
EMEHNTEHTT-RE (Seventh A 35, 2009)
In his KA notes, Vander paved the way for the third part of the Kohntarkosz trilogy, taking place after 1974’s album, admitting “the different pieces weren’t released in the right order and people lost track of things”. Emehntehtt-Re Part 1 uses Rinde from Attahk, Part 2 includes Hhai from Live and Zombies (Ghost Dance) from Udu Wudu. Running for 46 minutes, it’s a staggering piece of work with familiar pieces providing launch-pads for further action. The incandescent massed vocals never sounded so well recorded, the bells-accompanied intoning of Funebrarium Kahnt lowering the curtain on one of Vander’s crowning achievements.
The CD came with lyric booklet and DVD showing the album’s creation with Frances Linon at the Univeria Zekt studio they’ve used for years. As the band toil, Vander seems to have the finished track in his head, listening back to himself with the twitches and inner surges he displays on stage.
FELICITE THOSZ (Seventh A37, 2012)
Finished in April, 2012, yet another twist as the Vanders further explore the vocal harmonies they’ve turned into a fine art on the post-comeback albums. The 28-minute title suite works as an ultimate realisation of Vander’s original mission to achieve spiritual peaks through music, Stella leading multi-tiered vocals with the core musicians over exquisite textures, twinkling melodies and even Motown soul in the harmonies.
Meanwhile, Magma continue touring Europe for their devoted following, hopefully planning new epics and, 40 years since those early albums first confounded listeners, still standing as one of the most original, enigmatic and downright mind-blowing outfits in this or any other language.
SEVENTH SON: CHRISTIAN VANDER SOLO
When Vander put Magma on hold in 1984, he embarked on an array of exploratory solo albums, which inevitably fed into the returning band but stand as an often-stunning separate body of work. The Seventh label he started in the early 80s provided an outlet, also reissuing projects from band members.
Vander first saw his name on a non- Magma album in 1973, when Palm released the pure jazz Christian Vander And Et Les 3 Jef, featuring the drummer, tenor saxophonist Jeff Saeffer, string bassist Jef Catoire and pianist Jef Gilson. The tapes from 1969 and 1973, included a Vander drum solo. Gilson also released Fiesta In Drums on Palm, creating a drum duet between Vander and Frank Raholison by mixing two separate performances. The LPs were unauthorised.
In 1979, Vander formed a parallel group, Alien Quartet, with Benoit Widemann, Patrick Gauthier, Jean-Pierre Fouquey and Dominique Bertram, followed by the Trio Vander with keyboardist Michael Graillier and Alby Cullaz. A 1980 gig with Vander, Jannick Top and violinist Didier Lockwood was released under the apt name Fusion.
Vander’s outfit Offering explored Vander’s Coltrane-influenced spiritual leanings in a more acoustic setting of voices, keyboards and percussion, debuting live in Paris in October, 1983. Offering 1&2 was released in 1986, followed by 1990’s Offering 3&4. 1993 also saw another set called Afieh.
In 1988, Vander issued To Love, his first solo set, focusing on his voice and piano (influenced by Mal Waldron, whom he’d played with in 1968). This was followed by 1992’s ambitious vocal-synth outing Les Voyages De Christophe Colomb. Two Christian Vander Trio albums, Jour Apres Jour and 65! were also recorded between 1990 and 1993, the latter featuring songs by Coltrane and Pharoah Sanders.
Between 1992-95, Vander also directed Les Voix De Magma, where a dozen singers (over keyboards and contrabass) put Magma themes into a vocal context, captured at the Douarnenez festival on Jazz En Baie (as Magma Les Voix). Vander explained how ideas which hatched outside Magma would feed the mothership; “It’s two different ways of reaching the same goal. The goal of taking music further and discovering new sounds.”
This extraordinarily active period also saw Vander and Simon Goubert create Welcome with double pianos, drums, string-basses, saxophones plus one piano, resulting in the Bienvenue album. In 1994, Vander also released the strangely unsettling A Tous Les Infants. Ostensibly life of a child, it features just piano and voices, plus chanting kiddie choir, in a succession of nursery rhyme melodies, rounds, mood pieces and solo reflections, interspersed with chants. The elaborate packaging of 42-page lyric book fronted by child dressed as a malevolent witch adds to the unsettling, dark and sinister aura.
2000’s limited-edition Korusz: A La Recherce Du Chorus Supreme is another lavish package, its long-form book containing two CDs of seismic Vander drum workouts recorded at shows between 1972-75. Witnessing Vander’s drum solo from close quarters in 1975 has rendered any experienced since pathetically indulgent as he transcended impossible technique with superhuman power and frightening intensity, eyes rolling while he emitted unearthly banshee wails. In his notes he admits to punishing self-exorcism, declaring, “Finally, the invocation of certain forces leads the Korusz to its climax. Each evening I emerge from the combat exhausted – but purified.”
In 2002, Vander released his most challenging, out-there work. Les Cygnes Et Les Corbeaux uses only dense layers of keyboards and Stella-led chorale to construct a modern classical masterpiece inspired by the flocks of birds on the cover paintings. The music is a deep, rich tapestry of flickering vocal squalls and ghostly melodies, ebbing, flowing and colliding at the same level. He arranges every note meticulously, it’s nothing short of a work of Van Gogh-style genius. Mention has to be made of Vander’s long-time collaborator, Francis Linon at the Univeria Zekt studio.
In May 2009, Vander performed To Love solo in Paris and Japan, coinciding with the album’s reissue on Seventh. Still on a ferocious creative roll with Magma, he found time to record his most recent solo peak, 2011’s John Coltrane L’Homme Supreme. Some 43 years after Coltrane’s passing, Vander had finally dedicated a whole album to his lifelong inspiration, carrying on from the spiritual calm of Coltrane John Coltrane Sundia on Kohntarkosz (re-recorded here). Still using mainly piano and singers, recording took place between 17 July (the date Coltrane died) and 21 (his funeral), Vander pouring his heart into every utterance while Stella is positively transcendental. Vander might have made more dazzling or complex albums, but this most personal labour of love is the most beautiful.
