Two hippies, the Canadian Dolly Holmes and Maik Hirschfeldt from Germany, met in London in 1970. Together they went to Berlin to perform in the musical Hair. Emtidi was founded and the duo started to play the underground clubs of the city. Their repertoire consisted of traditional acoustic folk music. Rolf-Ulrich Kaiser, later owner of the labels Ohr and Kosmische Kuriere, heard them play and offered a record contract. The possibilities of multi-track recording enabled the duo to expand their musical style on Saat. The album is a sadly little-known masterpiece -- a unique mix of folk, art rock, and psychedelic.
Their first album was a low budget production, released in a very limited quantity on the minor Thorofon label. The music presented here was a somewhat ordinary kind of acoustic folk. Far more interesting and completely different was Emtidi’s classic second album ‘Saat’, made with a solid involvement from Dieter Dierks (engineer, bass, mellotron, percussion) in the Dierks Studio, Stommeln in February 1972. Here is a complete run-down of this absolutely essential album: “Walkin’ The Park” started side one - the first half of it was a quiet, lush folk song with treated acoustic guitars and electric piano, this running into a furious acid guitar solo. “Traume” was a nonsensical interlude with wordless vocals, floating keyboards, vibes and jew harp, while the long track “Touch The Sun” finished side one. For several minutes an electronically treated organ created a cosmic atmosphere similar to vintage Klaus Schulze or Ash Ra Tempel. Then the track developed into a beautiful folk ballad, which Holmes sang in her most angelic voice. “Love Time Rain”, opening side two, was a short folk-rock song recalling British groups like Fairport Convention or Steeleye Span. Tile title piece “Saat” was another acoustic showcase, but far more cosmic sounding than the previous track. The concluding track “Die Reise” was the only one with German lyrics, sung by Hirschfeldt. It could be argued that the energetic sections of this track ruined the relaxed atmosphere elsewhere on the album, but otherwise it was a great track. Luckily, this album is now available on CD on the Galaxis label.
Unfortunately Dolly Holmes soon left the band and went back to Canada. Maik Hirschfeldt moved to a village near Munich and formed a new lineup with Rudi Haunreiter, Georg Karger, and Franz Müller. Although they worked on material for an unreleased third LP for some years, they never did a gig again and finally disbanded because they never found a suitable substitute for Dolly Holmes. Maik Hirschfeldt quit the music scene; the other musicians founded the jazz-rock band Niagara and are still active in various jazz bands. Rudi Haunreiter later played the drums on some albums of dark, ambient synthesist Peter Frohmader. Maik Hirschfeldt organizes rallies in Africa and only sometimes plays guitar just for fun. (Klaus Kehrle)
Personnel:
Maik Hirschfeldt - Guitar, Bass, Synths, Flute, Vibes
Dolly Holmes - Vocals, Keyboards, Mellotron
Albums:
LP: Emtidi 1971
LP: Saat 1972 (also on CD)
Touch The Sun:
Saat:
Sources: Last.fm, allmusic.com
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