Klaus Schulze is an important figure in the development of the “kosmische musik” known popularly as Krautrock, being one of the founding members of Ash Ra Tempel and Tangerine Dream and a player on a staggering number of releases. While Can was breaking new ground in Cologne and Kraftwerk became international superstars based out of Düsseldorf, Schulze operated mostly out of Berlin, where bands like Cluster and Birth Control held sway, as well as the aforementioned bands Schulze was in.
Schulze’s contributions are littered all over Julian Cope’s top 50 Krautrock albums of all time. His solo albums Irrlicht, Cyborg, and Blackdance all get a mention. He was on Tangerine Dream’s first album Electronic Meditation, but that band went on to its incredibly prolific output without input from Schulze. Schulze also played on Ash Ra Tempel’s incredible self-titled debut as well as their fourth album, Join Inn. He was one of the composers of the legendary album Tarot by the Swiss musician Walter Wegmüller. He participated on all of the Cosmic Jokers releases, and he actually sued Rolf-Ulrich Kaiser (founder of the Ohr, Pilz, and Cosmic Couriers record labels) over the unauthorized release of the final one, which more or less sent Kaiser into exile.
On top of all of that, Schulze has released seven albums under the name Richard Wahnfried and released a dozen collaborations with Pete Namlook and Bill Laswell under the series title The Dark Side of the Moog, which engage a British visionary art rock group called Pink Floyd.
Clearly, this dude is in it to win it.
In 1977 Schulze put out three albums, two of which were a soundtrack to a porn film called Body Love and a follow-up featuring “Additions to the Original Soundtrack,” as the French release had it. Body Love was directed by Lasse Braun, who was born in Algiers but was from Italy—his given name was Alberto Ferro. Braun was the kind of principled porno director of whom it can be said (per Wikipedia) that he, ahem, “placed himself firmly in the tradition of 18th century pornographers such as Rétif de la Bretonne.....” One thing that made Body Love somewhat out of the ordinary was that the lead actress was Catherine Ringer, a member of one of France’s most innovative pop groups, Les Rita Mitsouko.
As “Yum-Yum” at the House of Indulgence put it a few years back,
Seriously, the score is incredible. Reminiscent of the chillout techno music that was semi-popular in the early ‘90s (The Orb, Pete Namlook, The Aphex Twin, etc.), the music—to be blunt—is way too awesome to wasted in a film like this. Okay, I realize that what I just said oozes the worst kind of porn prejudice (what? you don’t think porn movies deserve to have cool music?). What I’m trying to say is that there are only handful movies in this world that are truly worthy of the music Klaus Schulze was making in the late 1970s.
Yum-Yum is right! There really is hardly any movie that’s worthy of this soundtrack.
Continues after the jump…