A series for Saturdays in 2026 inspired by Brian Eno and Peter Schmidt's set of cards, Oblique Strategies (Over One Hundred Worthwhile Dilemmas). Eno and Schmidt created them to be used to unblock creative impasses and approach problems from unexpected angles. Each week I'll turn over an Oblique Strategy card and post a song or songs inspired by the suggestion.
Last week's card read this- Imagine the piece as a series of disconnected events- and I plundered my music folders for random songs about events by unconnected artists- Simon and Garfunkel, Gram Parsons, Captain Beefheart, Broken Chanter and Echo Ladies. My friend Chris suggested Ultra Vivid Scene's Not In Love (Hit By A Truck), a list of disconnected and unexperienced events narrated by singer Kurt Ralske over a pleasingly shambolic lo fi Velvets guitar noise.
Today's card was much more straightforward and could only be read one way. It said this...
Cluster Analysis
Cluster's Sowiesoso came out in 1976, the group reduced to just Roedelius and Moebius and the duo's relocation to Forst in rural West Germany. Sowiesoso has none of the driving motorik of Neu! or the energy of Can or the beatnik lunacy of Faust. It is almost ambient, pastoral music made in response to their surroundings, mixed by the legendary Conny Plank. Slow paced and gentle with odd quirks, it is a post- Eno album- as in it is influenced by his pioneering 70s ambient albums and post their own work with him on previous Cluster albums. It reflects some kind of peace and tranquility gained from rural living- green fields, trees and forests, birdsong, nature's calm...
Electric piano chords, birdsong, rising chords, the sun slowly rising over Forst, Baden- Württemberg.
Feel free to drop your own responses to Cluster Analysis in the comments box.
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