George Grünblatt K-Priss

Two years after the reissue of "Pole" from Besombes & Rizet, Gonzaï Records goes
on with réhabilitation of french weird-but-great bands. Next step is "K-Priss" by
George Grünblatt, co-founder of the cult band Heldon, author of a solo LP inspired by
Philip K. Dick, recorded in 1977 then published in 1980. After that, George Grünblatt
became a famous psychiatrist for the next 40 years, till Gonzaï knocked to the door.
For fans of Cluster & Eno, Bernard Szajner, Jean-Michel Jarre, Zombie Zombie and
other instrumental science fiction. Recorded on 1977 at Ramses Records studios, the
first and very last album from George Grüblatt sounds like an instrumental disco-prog
weirdness of 38 minutes, where you can find the best rhythm section of Paris at that
time (bassist Didier Batard from Space Art, Christophe and Heldon, Michel Ettori
from Weidorje and Jean-Philippe Goude), both reunited around the two founding
members of Heldon, Richard Pinhas and George Grünblatt. Since he began music,
Grünblatt tried to conciliate his two loves, music and psychiatry, alternating lessons
with Gilles Deleuze, Michel Foucault and Jean François Lyotard and ramshackle
recording sessions, with Heldon, where he played synths and guitars from the
beginning till 'Its Always Rock'n'Roll' (1975). By that time, he decided to record what
still remains his only solo album, "K-Priss", from the name of a alien hallucinatory drug
invented par Philip K. Dick in The Three stigmata of Palmer Eldritch (1955). Five
instrumental tracks, oscillating between futurist free jazz and novo-rock. Quoting
Mutant Sounds about "K-Priss"', « It' a kind of Grail. But it's not just a big experimental
French record, it's also a big piece of 'French cheese', a incredible record in many
ways ». Grünblatt signs with "K-Priss" one of those indescribable pieces that make all
the charm of the marginal France of the seventies. After the recording, the freak will
be invited into the German forest for a week to play with Klaus Schulze (Tangerine
Dream, Ash Ra Tempel) but he will finally decide to devote himself entirely to his
profession of psychiatrist and psychoanalyst until... Gonzaï, 40 years later, did find him
to reissue this album oh so disturbed. « Grünblatt approaches the boundaries of taste
and urinates all over them - but again, not in a punk way. The backing track chunters
along, the guitars are vertiginous, ostentatious, fromage-y, the piano tinkles around the
fringes like an ornate freeze » (The Quietus review, 2017)