''Ludwig's Law'' is the one and only album released by trio of

Dieter Moebius Dieter Moebius (16 January 1944 – 20 July 2015) was a Swiss-born German electronic musician and composer, best known as a member of the influential krautrock bands Cluster and Harmonia. Moebius was studying art at Berlin's Akademie Grafik and ...

Conny Plank Konrad "Conny" Plank (3 May 1940 – 5 December 1987) was a German record producer and musician. He is known for his innovative work as a sound engineer and producer in Germany's krautrock and kosmische music scene in the 1970s. Plank was invo ...

, and

Mayo Thompson Mayo Thompson (born February 26, 1944 in Houston, Texas, United States) is an American musician and visual artist best known as the leader of the experimental rock band Red Krayola. Background His formal education includes Garden of Arts Kind ...

. It was actually the fourth album recorded by the team of

Moebius & Plank Moebius & Plank was a German electronic music duo consisting of musicians Dieter Moebius (also of the act Cluster) and Conny Plank. They recorded three albums between 1979 and 1986 as well as two additional albums, one a collaboration with Mani ...

. In 1983 the duo recorded a series of electronic tracks using an

Emulator In computing, an emulator is Computer hardware, hardware or software that enables one computer system (called the ''host'') to behave like another computer system (called the ''guest''). An emulator typically enables the host system to run so ...

, an early form of sampling keyboard that enabled them to duplicate other instruments without having to deal with the musicians who played them.

Red Krayola The Red Krayola (originally Red Crayola) is an American avant rock band from Houston, Texas formed in 1966 by the trio of singer/guitarist Mayo Thompson, drummer Frederick Barthelme, and bassist Steve Cunningham. The group were part of the 196 ...

recorded a series of monologues and vocal tracks which were added to the music Moebius & Plank had recorded. According to the Earpiece website "topics include the fate of chickens owned by a 'farmer gabriel' and the effect of lack of sunlight on human intelligence."

Sky Records Sky Records was a Hamburg, Germany-based independent record label specializing in krautrock/Kosmische Musik and electronic music. Some of their releases could be classified as progressive rock or art rock, experimental music, industrial, ambient, ...

, which had released the first three Moebius & Plank album, rejected the master and ''Ludwig's Law'' was relegated to the vault. It was finally released on November 16, 1998 on the Drag City label. Bill Meyer, who wrote the editorial review for Amazon.com, describes the album, in part: "The duo recorded a series of stately fanfares and brittle

Talking Heads Talking Heads were an American rock band formed in 1975 in New York City and active until 1991.Talkin ...

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 ...

, over which Thompson narrated a series of skewed monologues about philosophy, art, history, and careless farmers."Meyer, Bil
Amazon.com editorial review
/ref> Despite the rejection of ''Ludwig's Law'' by Sky, Moebius & Plank did decide to tour and perform the music, albeit without Mayo Thompson. Conny Plank fell ill while touring in South America and finally succumbed to cancer in 1987.

Track listing

#"Scientists" - 0:38 #"Das Apartment" - 4:30 #"The Truth?" - 5:14 #"Ludwig's Law" - 4:20 #"42" - 3:44 #"Farmer Gabriel" - 4:51 #"Gestalt" - 4:43 #"Taras Bulba" - 5:06 #"Boy Boy Boy" - 3:16

Personnel

- vocals

Notes

References

* Album liner notes * Amazon.co
Ludwig's Law
Retrieved September 28, 2007. * Drag City catalo

Retrieved September 28, 2007. * Forced Exposur

Retrieved September 28, 2007. * Interlo

Retrieved September 28, 2007.

External links

* Anonymou

Retrieved September 7, 2007. {{Authority control 1998 albums Moebius & Plank albums Albums produced by Conny Plank