Halt An

Artists

Album Info

Release Date: 2022

Label: aufnahme + wiedergabe

© Music by Neu Rot
except „Sometimes“ (traditional)
recorded Oktober 1988, Leipzig
„Sometimes“ and „Bewegung“
were slightly shortened.

Produced by – Mike Stolle, October 2 – 5 1988
Remastered by – Black Flag Mastering/ Friedemann Kootz

Tape digital distribution via
www.aufnahmeundwiedergabe.de

Published by Henryk Gericke
Liner notes by Henryk Gericke

Vinyl artwork – Laireen & tapetopia

Limitied to 100 Arabic and 10 Roman hand-numbered copies.

In memory of Michael Pfaff.

www.tapetopia.de

NEU ROT (Leipzig 1988)

Neu Rot represented a singular phenomenon within the alternative music reservoir of the
GDR. With a remarkable rigour against itself, the band steadily worked its way towards
post-rock over a period of several years. This thorough process came to fruition in 1988
with the production of the tape “Halt An”. It had been preceded by the band’s emancipation
from punk and a struggle for its very own means and their technical feasibility. “Halt An”
was also marked by mourning; Michael Pfaff, the band’s first bass player, had died in
1987.

As with so many bands that cultivated a more sophisticated sound in the late 80s, Neu
Rot’s beginnings had been in punk rock. Michael Pfaff, Jörg Stein and Henrik Eiler first
appeared as Egacell in 1982 and performed live a few times in and around Leipzig. At a
concert with punk legend Wutanfall, worlds collided within the same genre. In a flat where
the punks quickly tore down a wall to make room for the ensuing melee, Egacell’s
reflective punk met the affect-based punk of Wutanfall. Following the logical system break
from punk to post-punk, Egacell was renamed Neu Rot.

Initially, this break was marked by the lyrics of the new singer Klaus-Peter John, who in
1987 would turn his attention to his own project The Oval Language, and from 1984 by the
violin of Anke Mehlhorn. In order to be able to perform more frequently, Neu Rot
underwent the bizarre process of a so-called “Еinstufung” (classification for the purposes
of a playing permit). The graciously granted “basic level”, with the simultaneous threat of
its withdrawal, included both a permission and a ban; the band was declared legal, but its
lyrics illegal. The state classification committee had reflexively left the room during the
song “Wozu Grenzen ziehen” (“Why Draw up Borders”). And the band’s name was
perceived by the committee as an erratic chain of associations between the suspicious
word “Neu” and the ideological signal colour red. Even a year later, the band was told by a
municipal authority: “You know very well that the music you make is undesirable in our
state!”

Neu Rot continued its pilgrimage to its own centre. The tape “Brot & Spiele” (“Bread &
Games”), recorded in 1987, presented a sluggish version of Birthday Party, its dimmed
impression due to a tape that ran a little too slowly during the recording. This welcome
effect triggered a creative obsession to economise, which was to prove directional for “Halt
An”. Jörg Stein’s vocals felt like he was talking to himself and were squashed by a guitar
compressor through which the mic was routed. On his guitar, Stein only struck certain
strings on recurring fret positions. Henrik Eiler deliberately reduced the dynamics of the
songs by means of odd time signatures and eliminated the cymbals as far as possible or
even replaced them with sheet metal from the production of printing plates.

Neu Rot used its “basic level” and gigged frequently to develop its performance style.
Karsten Maaß, a multi-instrumentalist and active in the project Das Messer, saw a Neu
Rot show and intuitively understood the concept that was based on participation but not on
unconditional commitment to the audience. The band and his bass merged, Maaß joined
just in time for the recording of “Halt An” and remained an influential constant. The tape
was produced by Mike Stolle, a gifted technician who would turn lead into gold, for
instance by breathing stereo into a mono mixer. An empty flat served as the studio, its
tenant apparently gone, either having fled the republic or simply disappeared. The name
on the door was Lachmund (lit. “laughing mouth”), aptly contrasting the sounds coming
from inside.

An abandoned flat was also of significance for the tape cover. During his stationing near
Görlitz as a conscript in an unarmed construction unit, the artist Daniel Schörnig had
unceremoniously occupied a flat in the town for his off-hours. He wrote a breakdown of the
tape’s titles and names on the walls of one room, then took a picture. The covers came
from the darkroom, the prints were cut by hand. The edition of “Halt An” can no longer be
reconstructed; it was somewhere between over fifty and under one hundred copies, most
of which were sold at shows.

From 1985 onwards, Henrik Eiler and Anke Mehlhorn also played in pffft...!, an industrial
project by the former Wutanfall singer Chaos. Since Chaos was considered a pariah in the
GDR, pffft...! with Eilers and Mehlhorn would perform using the alias Neu Rot II a few
times; circumstances made it necessary to disguise themselves by using a real name.
Jörg Stein and Karsten Maaß fled these circumstances in autumn 1989 and turned their
backs on the GDR. Temporarily history, the band would reform in 1992 with Stein, Eiler
and Maaß. Neu Rot is still active today.