* * * * * * * kdm

A phone call at nine on a Monday morning. Nanu? ...another fan asking me urgently for a copy of ANDROMEDA ? ... No.
A German woman's voice, "Albrecht. De-und-Ha," and if I can help. They don't know what connection I have to Klaus Schulze but they saw my name on the official website and maybe I can help them. Okay, I said, what is it?
They wanted to buy old titles from KS. "Old titles? What old titles? You mean from CDs?" I asked, and "what for?" Yes, they want to buy some old titles from KS. "Don't you know that the 'old titles' are released with big record companies?" I asked, "...and most of it is still available" - realising that the woman on the other side don't know too much about 'Klaus Schulze'. I tried to explain: "Schulze's recordings are released by record companies, you should ask them. You mentioned the official KS website, you must have seen this."
She was a bit puzzled that Schulze has not the rights to "sell" his early recordings to her company (of which I have never heard before): "But Schulze must be able to sell us his titles?! We make compilations, as we did, for instance, with 'Mythos', and others," she said a bit proudly. "Ach ja? One of those cheap oldies samplers?" I tickled her. "No, no," she answered, "we make high-grate samplers." Yes, she mentioned the word "hochwertig", and obviously she did not know one thing about the artist they want to release.
"On which labels he was, then?" she asked a bit sceptically. My reply was quickly: "WEA, EMI, Virgin, Universal..., and you should contact those companies, they have the recording rights, but not Schulze. And this is common procedure in this business, for samplers and for other use." I waited that she also asked me for the addresses of these (well-known) companies, but no such or any other question came. What came from her instead, were some bitter words, and I hung up. It seemed to me that she was pretty new in that music record business. ...
In the kitchen, while preparing my coffee, I thought this over, and found the story quite amusing. Of course not so amusing for the poor girl - Miss Albrecht - whose job it is to find and to call diverse (long-forgotten? she may think) artists and ask them for their early recordings and if they can buy it cheaply for re-release on samplers.

(entry in THE KS CIRCLE, March 2004 edition)