Cafe Exil (New Adventures In European Music 1972-1980)

Bob Stanley of Saint Etienne compiled this with Jason Wood. The concept: an imagined jukebox for Cafe Exil, a real venue in Kreuzberg, West Berlin, where David Bowie and Iggy Pop were regulars from 1976 to 1979 — the years Bowie was making Low, “Heroes”, and Lodger. The building is now a restaurant called Horvath on Paul-Lincke-Ufer. The compilation asks what rare 45s might have been on rotation there, what sounds seeped into Bowie’s consciousness while he sat in a smoky room in a divided city.

Sixteen tracks, none by the obvious names. No Kraftwerk, no Tangerine Dream, no Can. Instead the network around them: Michael Rother’s “Feuerland” from his 1977 solo debut, featuring Jaki Liebezeit of Can on drums — connecting two of Krautrock’s defining acts through one track. Cluster’s “Sowiesoso,” produced by Conny Plank, the engineer who also produced Kraftwerk’s early albums and all of Neu!‘s records. Faust’s “Jennifer.” Popol Vuh’s score for Werner Herzog’s Heart of Glass. Eno’s “No One Receiving.” The compilation maps the terrain around the famous peaks rather than climbing them again.

The reach is wider than Germany. Cortex’s “Troupeau Bleu” represents the French jazz-funk scene — a track recorded in two days in 1975 that became one of hip-hop’s most sampled records, used by MF DOOM, Madlib, and Tyler, the Creator. Piero Umiliani and Toni Esposito bring the Italian library music and percussion traditions. The opening track credits Rubba but is actually Karl Jenkins and Mike Ratledge of Soft Machine under a pseudonym. Stanley and Wood’s thesis is that the European experimental movement of the 1970s was continent-wide, not just German — a shared sensibility around motorik rhythm, electronic texture, and the rejection of Anglo-American blues-rock conventions. Bowie and Iggy were receivers, not originators. The jukebox was already playing when they walked in.