Format: Vinyl LP - Tip On Gatefold Cover (Limited Edition)
Cat#: NOAJ001
Original release: 1980, Berlin (Private Pressing)

As you are listening to “Confidence In The Future” today, it quickly becomes clear what kind of worlds must have collided here. A stunning amalgamation of aural treats, created by making subtle compromises between Pop, Jazz, Rock and Folk, that exists in every single track across-the-board. Due to its stylistic complexity “Confidence In The Future” is an album that is somehow never really able to settle on any one taste, inevitably opening up new dimensions to the listener. Imagine how this was in 1980. Especially in Berlin's commercial music scene. And especially when the involved musicians treated the project after its completion, more like a matter of personal importance than a career move. And for Hirsch, Spinning Motion's initiator, all of this seemed to be fulfilling enough. Prophetically the record is named after the most significant song of the eight-piece collection “Confidence In The Future”. 35 years on the title finds the verification it deserves. It unleashes its bottled power no sooner than the day, Jazzanova member and Notes On A Journey co-founder, Stefan Leisering finds the record in a crate at the flea market on the Strasse des 17. Juni. Like a bottle of Château Lafitte-Rothschild unearthed after 35 years, forgotten about in an abandoned cellar, do we get to experience the quiet composure and savage intensity of a treasure brought to light. It takes Leisering another ten years to comprehend what kind of music historical treasure has been hiding in his record collection. He acquired “Confidence In The Future” sometime in the mid 90s and only by re-listening to this oddity one day in 2010 or 2011 did everything finally click into place. A lost gem of Berlin Pop history, one that could almost never have happened. Compositions so ahead of their time that you can only understand and classify them today properly. There's a sense of inadvertent (and therefore unaffected) ingeniousness in songs like “Devotion To You”, “Prisoner Of Life” and “Playground Of Burial-Funds” that you have to live in the 21st Century to appreciate fully. Each of the eight tracks (maybe apart from the instrumental closer “Elegy”) has some sort of melancholy, introverted reflectiveness, and yet still always something conciliatory. Manfred Tappert's voice lends his lyrics, written by him, but preconceived by Hirsch, something utterly personal, intimate even. Every single song, particularly within the framework of the oeuvre, tells a story, and due to this intimacy, and the adventurous arrangements touches you deeply. No matter the time or place.  To add to all of this, this incomparable record has also an entirely different facet, which only becomes apparent with today's perspective. The title track, “Confidence In The Future”, and “Answer My Questions” remind one eerily of Kings Of Convenience, and the cosy “Naze” resembles Turin Brakes. So evidently that you'll find yourself, while listening, in a quaint retro-retro-loop, the musical equivalent of a time paradox. But this is exactly the beauty of music. Music doesn't abide by the rules of time and space as we do, and therefore each listen to each piece of music is unique and purely based on the context of the listening. And every once in a while times have to change just so music can find a new determination and new listeners. Confidence in the future ultimately means: Good music is patient, outlives everything and will sooner or much, much later find its destination. NOTES ON A JOURNEY is looking eagerly forward to finally celebrating the first proper release of Spinning Motion's “Confidence In The Future”. 

Liner Notes by Adrian Hoenicke.


A1 - Spinning Motion - Blue

Format: 12inch, Download | Releasedate: 18.03.2016 | Label: Sonar Kollektiv

Last June, Berlin based reissue label Notes On A Journey released a celebrated re-issue of an album which in its original release in 1980 attracted scarcely or almost no attention at all: „Confidence In The Future“ (NOAJ001) by obscure, short-lived Berlin Folk Jazz project Spinning Motion – a spontaneously assembled Jazz trained group around Manfred Tappert and Achim Hirsch recorded this forgotten gem but disbanded soon after again. Looking back on a bit more consistent past, another Berlin institution, Jazzanova established their worldwide success (f.e. with their early, groundbreaking remixes) almost twenty years ago and now demonstrate with their absolutely emotive and laid-back rework of “Naze” that as you get older you're not only getting wiser but also continue to stay musically relevant and contemporary. As Jazzanova is concentrating on own material at the moment, we are really happy for the incident that Notes On A Journey found the original multi-track tapes of the recordings. That’s the only reason why Jazzanova took their time to go into the studio and did this remix of Naze. On the digital release you'll find three different versions of this outstanding remix.

Another song off the warm-heartly recommendable Spinning Motion album, “Prisoner Of Life”, gets a treatment by two founders of Notes On A Journey and operators themselves. With Stefan Leisering in the game, being one of Jazzanova's musical mastermind, this release's staff intersects somehow or other anyway. Oliver Glage, the other one thirds of Notes On A Journey and Oliver Haertel, the sound man behind several Sonar Kollektiv productions, are in different capacities part of the Sonar Kollektiv family as well. Their rework of “Prisoner Of Life” relocates the listeners back to the original's year of origin, offers though, with Leisering's cunning drum programming (plus added synths and choirs) somewhat like an alternate version. Therewith this tune will not only be catapulted into modern times but hopefully soon into the Heavy Rotation of any respectable radio station around the globe.


Naze (Jazzanova Remix)

Naze

A - Spinning Motion - Naze (Jazzanova Remix)

Reissued on heavyweight 180g vinyl: https://www.bbemusic.com/downloads/11291/

We are both proud and excited to present this highly sought after early 80's gem, originally created as a showcase project for young artists and composers by a community music organisation in Texas.
Originally referred to as the 'Pop Music Lab', the Peoples' Workshop was formed in 1976 at Texas Southern University as a space for students to compose and perform, free from the constrains of Western classical music education.
Swiftly gathering momentum, in 1980 the organisation was granted non-profit status and in 1983, moved off the TSU campus. The Workshop has since grown in size and scope, becoming the first Black-founded organisation to present shows in major performance venues around the Greater Houston area.
Houston Talent Expo '82 features original compositions by members of The Peoples' Workshop, performed exclusively by musicians from Houston. The songs vary in style, but remain centered around gospel, funk and soul; music and lyrics with a powerful positive message. Many of the artists featured remain active today around the world, working with such acts as Alice Coltrane and The Charles Mingus Band among others.
Houston Talent Expo '82 comprises a truly special collection of songs born from the struggle, true to the spirit of togetherness that underpins The Peoples' Workshop, written and performed by astonishing young talents.

Houston Talent Expo '82

The People's Workshop - Houston Talent Expo '82 (Album Sampler)

B3. Cy TImmons - Nowhere

„Discovering and rediscovering music“ is NOAJ's slogan and by this credo productions and recordings (records, cassettes, never before released master tapes) from days gone by shall and will find its audience. NOAJ tells the tale of mis-launched careers, failed dreams, gutted hopes, criminally overlooked masterpieces and of music that has been probably way too ahead of its time.

A1 - Spinning Motion - Blue

Notes On A Journey

Related tracks