Walter Wegmuller

While the US is caught up in the populist fever of Southern rock and half of Europe drowns in the self-indulgence of progressive rock, in Germany — until then hardly a rock Mecca — a squad of daring experimenters is pursuing the utopian idea of a music free from preset schemes, one finally capable of overcoming the narrow confines of time and space. For five years now, these musicians have been shaping the kraut-rock experience, which in years to come will go down as one of the most important musical avant-gardes of the last century. "Tarot" is the best-kept secret of that unrepeatable era, a remarkable summary of everything achieved by the cosmic couriers. It's no coincidence that the record features the cream of the new German rock scene: Klaus Schulze, the cosmic keyboardist par excellence; Manuel Gottsching and Mr. Wah-wah Hartmut Enke, the divine guitar tandem of Ash Ra Tempel; Jerry Brekers and Jurgen Dollase, former collaborators of Sergius Von Golowin, another madman of German rock. Directing it all is the Swiss painter Walter Wegmuller, a singular freak figure tripped out on lysergic acid, a sensitive, half-clairvoyant, occultism enthusiast, and noticeably unhinged.

An "off" record par excellence, "Tarot" is a concept album about the twenty-two major arcana of the tarot, of boundless length (by the standards of the time it could easily have been a triple album) and steeped in perverse fascination. As proof of the project's singularity, the original edition of the record came with the 22 tarot cards painted by Wegmuller himself.

From a musical standpoint, the record's sonic spectrum is truly boundless: it moves with utter nonchalance from extreme psychedelic music in the style of Agitation Free to the acid visions of Amon Duul II, from the cosmic vortices of Tangerine Dream to the electronic pulses of Neu!. Despite this flood of influences, the music flows smoothly, without fractures, in what can be considered a musical journey with neither beginning nor end. Broadly speaking, the keyboards of Klaus Schulze and Jurgen Dollase provide the skeleton of the tracks, over which sit Gottsching's metaphysical guitar and Enke's, always teetering on the edge of distortion, along with Brekers' primitive percussion and Wegmuller's catacomb-like voice.

The first record opens with the rock-blues jam of "Der Naar", where Wegmuller, like any self-respecting host, introduces us to his travelling companions. In "Der Mager", the swirling keyboards of Schulze and Dollase create abysses of anguish, in an esoteric ritual devoid of any temporal structure. A hypnotic ecclesiastical organ drone accompanies "Die Hohepriesterin", an anguished descent into the labyrinths of consciousness, with Wegmuller's catatonic singing lending a deep sense of unease.

The dreamlike interlude of "Die Herrscherin" eases the tension for a moment thanks to Gottsching's liquid guitar, moving confidently over a carpet of tribal percussion. "Der Herrscher" offers one of the album's more conventional moments, so to speak: the guitars grind out distorted blues chords that recall the sound of Ash Ra Tempel, aptly backed by a pulsing rhythm section.

The folk ballad "Der Hoheperiester" relies on a placid piano introduction, before developing around Westurpp's dreamy flute and Gottsching's acoustic arpeggios. "Der Wagen" is probably the masterpiece of the first half: an obsessive bacchanal in the vein of the hard, pure Amon Duul of "Psychedelic Underground"; the propulsive rhythm allows no respite, while the monumental keyboards of the Schulze-Dollase firm launch into spatial flights of unsettling classicism, in a crescendo that leaves you truly stunned.

Listening to the spectral "Die Gerechtigkeit" is like setting off on a dark journey into the recesses of the mind: Schulze's hammering synth builds masses of sound with harrowing repetitiveness, serving as the ideal backdrop for the increasingly possessed ravings of Wegmuller. Then, as if nothing had happened, the anguish dissolves into the romantic theme of "Der Weise", which in turn — further proof of the record's incredible stylistic variety — blends perfectly with the noise collage of "Das Glucksrad", a deflagrating explosion of sounds from other worlds.

The second record is, if anything, even madder; starting with the electronic trance of "Die Prefung", where metallic screeches merge with ancestral voices in a sonic spiral that transcends the laws of space and time. In "Der Massigkeit", the duel to the death between Gottsching and Enke's saturated guitars and Dollase's grandiloquent keyboards forms a majestic hybrid of "total" music. In "Der Teufel", Westurpp's lyrical flute reappears, painting sweet embroideries over a sonic carpet made of Gottsching's acoustic guitar, which indulges in arpeggios with a faintly Mediterranean flavour.

The musicians involved in the project push their extraordinary expressive abilities to the limit on what amounts to the ideal fourth side of "Tarot", made up of 5 tracks that intertwine with one another to form an incredible suite: 22 indescribable minutes of free lysergic improvisation, overlapping mental states, exploding consciousness and crystal-clear madness. A hallucinatory, demonic ritual of purification.

"Tarot" would remain Walter Wegmuller's only record, but that's enough: we will always be grateful to him for giving us one of the most absurd records of all time, as well as precious testimony to a fundamental experience like that of the Die Kosmischen Kuriere label, which, despite its short lifespan, marked a decisive step in the evolution of rock music.

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10/03/2026