Supersempfft
Roboterwerke
2024 Bureau B

After introducing listeners to the techno-tropical pop of Supersempfft via an essential reissue of their stargazing sophomore LP Metaluna, those surefooted folks at Bureau B beam back a couple of years to bring listeners the Hessen outfit's outrageous debut. The collaborative vehicle careers through the cosmos like a high-performance clown car, disguising daring chord progressions, technical innovation and a heap of hooks behind its cartoon chassis, and taking lucky listeners along for the joyride. Operating at the unlikely nexus between creative studio and sixth form common room, and fusing all the expertise of the former with commercial disinterest of the latter, Supersempfft served as the multidisciplinary moniker for a trio of childhood friends whose separate skills combined perfectly for their high-concept high jinks. The prodigious musical talent of Dieter Kolb, augmented and elevated by Franz Knüttel's electronic innovation, provided the ideal medium for Franz Aumüller's wacky world building, which made up the lyrical thrust and visual flair of the project. Roboterwerke, both the name of this 1979 LP and the revolutionary drum machine created by Knüttel, tells the story of a mellow tuba-toting frog (apparently an avatar of Kolb), who is technologically transformed by a mad scientist (a Professor Knüttels, as it happens) into a star surfing superhero. So far, so far out -- especially considering the lurid, lysergic lunacy of the comic book cover art -- but this slapstick silliness also serves as sleight of hand, a daft disguise to keep these sublime sounds away from the squares.