"Halleluwah" (alternatively titled "Halleluhwah" on some post-1989 releases) is a song by the

krautrock Krautrock (also called , German for ) is a broad genre of experimental rock Experimental rock, also called avant-rock, is a subgenre of rock music that pushes the boundaries of common composition and performance technique or which experiments ...

band Can, from their 1971 album ''

Tago Mago ''Tago Mago'' is the second studio album by the German krautrock band Can, originally released as a double LP in August 1971 on the United Artists label. It was the band's first album to feature Damo Suzuki after the 1970 departure of previous ...

''. The track, which originally took up a whole side of long-playing

vinyl record A phonograph record (also known as a gramophone record, especially in British English), or simply a record, is an analog sound storage medium in the form of a flat disc with an inscribed, modulated spiral groove. The groove usually starts nea ...

, lasts for 18 minutes and 28 seconds and is characteristic of the band's sound around 1971 in that it features a vast array of improvised guitars and keyboards,

tape editing Reel-to-reel audio tape recording, also called open-reel recording, is magnetic tape audio recording in which the recording tape is spooled between reels. To prepare for use, the ''supply reel'' (or ''feed reel'') containing the tape is plac ...

, and the rhythm section "pounding out a monster trance/

funk Funk is a music genre that originated in African American communities in the mid-1960s when musicians created a rhythmic, danceable new form of music through a mixture of various music genres that were popular among African Americans in the m ...

beat". The drum beat for which the song is famous is repeated almost continuously by

Jaki Liebezeit Jaki Liebezeit (born Hans Liebezeit; 26 May 1938 – 22 January 2017) was a German drummer, best known as a founding member of experimental rock band Can. He was called "one of the few drummers to convincingly meld the funky and the cerebral". ...

, with only minor variations, throughout the course of the 18-minute jam. In one line of the song,

Damo Suzuki , better known as Damo Suzuki (ダモ鈴木), is a Japanese musician who has been living in Germany since the early 1970s and is best known as the former lead singer of the krautrock group Can. Biography As a teenager, Suzuki spent the late 196 ...

's lyrics mention all the songs from side one of ''Tago Mago'': " mushroom head, oh yeah, paper house." The original UK pressing of ''Tago Mago'' misprinted the song's title as "Hallelujah" both on the LP's center label and on the back flap of the album jacket.

Other versions

A much shorter version of the song appears as the B-side to the band's 1971 single "Turtles Have Short Legs", and a different shortened version later saw release on Can's compilation album ''

Cannibalism Cannibalism is the act of consuming another individual of the same species as food. Cannibalism is a common ecological interaction in the animal kingdom and has been recorded in more than 1,500 species. Human cannibalism is well documented, b ...

''. On vocalist

's 1998 solo album ''V.E.R.N.I.S.S.A.G.E'', a version of this song is performed along with "

Mushroom A mushroom or toadstool is the fleshy, spore-bearing fruiting body of a fungus, typically produced above ground, on soil, or on its food source. ''Toadstool'' generally denotes one poisonous to humans. The standard for the name "mushroom" is t ...

", also from ''Tago Mago''. His band at the time featured

on drums. The song appears on the 1997 remix album ''

Sacrilege Sacrilege is the violation or injurious treatment of a sacred object, site or person. This can take the form of irreverence to sacred persons, places, and things. When the sacrilegious offence is verbal, it is called blasphemy, and when physica ...

'', being remixed by

The Orb The Orb are an English electronic music group founded in 1988 by Alex Paterson and Jimmy Cauty. Known for their psychedelic sound, the Orb developed a cult following among clubbers "coming down" from drug-induced highs. Their influential 19 ...

Samples

The song's drum part was sampled by

Primal Scream Primal Scream are a Scottish rock band originally formed in 1982 in Glasgow by Bobby Gillespie (vocals) and Jim Beattie. The band's current lineup consists of Gillespie, Andrew Innes (guitar), Simone Butler (bass), and Darrin Mooney (drums) ...

for their 1997 single "

Kowalski Kowalski (; feminine: Kowalska, plural: Kowalscy) is the second most common surname in Poland (140,471 people in 2009). ''Kowalski'' surname is derived from the word ''kowal'', meaning " lackmith". " Jan Kowalski" is a name that is used as a p ...

". The song's piano segment was sampled by

A Tribe Called Quest A Tribe Called Quest was an American hip hop group formed in Queens, New York City, in 1985,Q-Tip

on their final studio album '' We Got It from Here... Thank You 4 Your Service'' on the song "Lost Somebody".

Notes

1971 songs Can (band) songs {{1970s-song-stub