I didn’t buy this 12″ of Zazu’s Captain Starlight the first time I saw it over at Volver Records. I picked it up, sure. Appreciated it. Admired it. Smiled. Then put it back. But I couldn’t stop thinking about it. It was still there during my next two visits to the shop. Toying with me. Taunting me. Secretly begging me to take it home and make it my own. “You know you want me,” it seemed to whisper.
Last week I caved. Why? I don’t know. Why does the sun rise? Why do the birds chirp? Why do people keep sending me Teams messages? I’ve learned over the years to put aside my critical, questioning brain when faced with an object of such obvious beauty. The rapiers made to look like light sabres. The Han-Solo-esque laser pistol being shot into the air. The glasses. The mustaches. It’s all right there on display. The tracks are “Captain Starlight” and “Andromeda”. It’s late 1970s spaciness.
The jacket reverse has eight full paragraphs about the record. But alas it’s all in German and I’m way too lazy to type it into Google Translate. Oddly the top part has text in both German and English, but this simply describes the sonic properties of the deep groove 45rpm 12″ format. There is, however, a hint to be find on the jacket reverse of the 7″ version (which includes much shorter versions of “Captain Starlight”…):
Two top musicians enter the “magic room” and dive as a bundle of energy named Zazu into the galactic spheres.
The title track opens with… strings. Violin, some cello underneath. That is… until the expanse of space seeps in, overwhelming it, covering it in dark matter. Modulated, robot-like voices kick in with the guitars and drums to then introduce us to what can best be described a prog rock space fusion. The first two minutes are like three… no, now four, different songs, because now the bass line is funky and the singer is shouting at us like Roger Waters on The Wall or something. I’ve seen this record described as disco on various websites, but that’s clearly insane. Could you dance to it? Parts of it maybe. Some kind of crazy futuristic dance with people dressed up like cast members from the old Buck Rogers in the 25th Century TV show. “Andromeda” is a bit more straightforward prog and, well, a bit less interesting.
I couldn’t find much online about Zazu, other that that member Frank Zander is a pretty well known celebrity in Germany. And you know, at times like this I’m reminded of character Jim Williams’ like from Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil – “I rather enjoy not knowing.”