Future Days

Future Days is the fourth studio album by the German experimental rock group Can, released in 1973. It was the last Can album to feature Japanese vocalist Damo Suzuki, and sees the band exploring a more atmospheric sound than their previous releases.[3]

For the Pearl Jam song, see Lightning Bolt (Pearl Jam album).
Future Days
Studio album by
Can
Released1 August 1973
Recorded1973
Genre
Length41:04
LabelUnited Artists
ProducerCan
Can chronology
Ege Bamyasi
(1972)		 Future Days
(1973)		 Soon Over Babaluma
(1974)

Content

Music

On Future Days, Can foregrounds the ambient elements they had explored on previous albums, dispensing largely with traditional rock song structures and instead "creating hazy, expansive soundscapes dominated by percolating rhythms and evocative layers of keys".[1] PopMatters wrote that "It feels as if Future Days is driven by a coastal breeze, exuding a more pleasant, relaxed mood than anything the band had previously recorded."[4]

Artwork

The album cover shows a Psi sign in the middle (drawn in the same style as the font used for the cover) and the I Ching symbol ding/the cauldron below the title. The surrounding graphics are based on the Jugendstil artstyle.

Some versions of the vinyl album have a slightly different cover in which the graphics don't have a light emboss or in which the lightly reflective gold tint is replaced by a flat yellow instead. These differences are also present on the CD releases. Even though not all versions of the covers are fully identical, the tracks do not differ on any release version.

Reception
Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
AllMusic[1]
Encyclopedia of Popular Music[5]
The Great Rock Discography7/10[6]
Pitchfork8.8/10[7]
Q[8]
The Rolling Stone Album Guide[9]
Spin Alternative Record Guide9/10[10]
Tom HullB+[11]

From contemporary reviews, Ian MacDonald of NME praised the album, opining it was "an immaculate piece of work, the best German rock record so far, apart from Faust", and concluded that it was "sheer good music and is perfectly easy for anyone with a pair of ears attached to their heads to get into and thoroughly enjoy. Forget the krautrock tag. Forget how you're supposed to react."[12] Ray Fox-Cumming of Disc gave the album a negative review, declaring the album "attempts nothing that hasn't already been done, often to death, before" while finding "some of it is quite pretty, the music is well-played, nicely spaced and unscrambled, but even after half a dozen hearings I still found most of it went in one ear and straight out the other."[13] NME ranked it the 11th best album of the year in 1974.[14]

From retrospective reviews, AllMusic's Anthony Tognazzini called it "fiercely progressive, calming, complex, intense, and beautiful all at once" and "one of Can's most fully realized and lasting achievements." He also praised Suzuki's vocal performances - described as "all minimal texture and shading" - as being his "most inspired", and praised the track "Bel Air" as "a gloriously expansive piece of music that progresses almost imperceptibly, ending abruptly after exactly 20 minutes."[1]

Legacy

As of November 2020, Acclaimed Music finds Future Days to be the 697th most acclaimed album of all time.[15]

Accolades for Future Days
Publications/Sources Accolades Year Rank
Uncut "200 Greatest Albums of All Time" 2016 121[16]
Rolling Stone "50 Greatest Prog Rock Albums of All Time" 2015 8[17]
Tom Moon "1,000 Recordings to Hear Before You Die" 2008 -[18]
GQ "The 100 Coolest Albums in the World Right Now!" 2005 70[19]
Pitchfork "Top 100 Albums of the 1970s" 2004 56[20]
Stylus "Top 101-200 Albums of All Time" 2004 160[21]
Mojo "The 100 Greatest Albums Ever Made" 1995 62[22]

Track listing

All tracks are written by Holger Czukay, Michael Karoli, Jaki Liebezeit, Irmin Schmidt and Damo Suzuki

Side A
No.TitleLength
1."Future Days"9:34
2."Spray"8:28
3."Moonshake"3:02
Side B
No.TitleLength
1."Bel Air" / "Spare a Light" ([lower-alpha 1])20:00
Total length:41:04

Personnel
Can

Footnotes
  1. The United Artists 1973 UK release of the LP (UAS 29505) shows track 1 of Side B as "Bel Air" on the LP sleeve, and "Spare a Light" on the vinyl label.

References
  1. Ankeny, Jason. "Can: Future Days > Review" at AllMusic. Retrieved 2 November 2011.
  2. "50 Greatest Prog Rock Albums of All Time". Rolling Stone.
  3. Can at AllMusic
  4. "For the Sake of Future Days: Can's Second Golden Era". PopMatters. 5 August 2005. Retrieved 20 July 2017.
  5. Larkin, Colin (2011). "Can". Encyclopedia of Popular Music (5th ed.). Omnibus Press. ISBN 978-0857125958.
  6. Martin C. Strong (1998). The Great Rock Discography (1st ed.). Canongate Books. ISBN 978-0-86241-827-4.
  7. Leone, Dominique (12 July 2005). "Can: Future Days". Pitchfork Media. Retrieved 6 October 2020.
  8. "Radiohead Press Clipping - the King of Limbs album review Q Magazine". 2011.
  9. Nathan Brackett; Christian David Hoard (2004). The new Rolling Stone album guide. New York: Simon & Schuster. p. 134. ISBN 978-0-7432-0169-8.
  10. Weisbard, Eric; Marks, Craig, eds. (1995). "Minutemen". Spin Alternative Record Guide (1st ed.). New York: Vintage Books. ISBN 0-679-75574-8.
  11. Tom Hull. "Grade List: can". Tom Hull - on the web. Retrieved 4 September 2020.
  12. MacDonald 1974.
  13. Fox-Cumming 1974.
  14. "Rocklist.net...NME End Of Year Lists 1974." www.rocklistmusic.co.uk. Retrieved 2020-11-26.
  15. "Acclaimed Music". www.acclaimedmusic.net. Retrieved 2020-11-26.
  16. "Rocklist.net..Rocklist.net... Uncut Lists ." www.rocklistmusic.co.uk. Retrieved 2020-11-26.
  17. "50 Greatest Prog Rock Albums of All Time". Rolling Stone. 17 June 2015. Retrieved 31 August 2015.
  18. "Rocklist.net...Steve Parker...Tom Moon 1000." www.rocklistmusic.co.uk. Retrieved 2020-11-26.
  19. "GQ - 100 coolest albums (2006)". www.muzieklijstjes.nl. Retrieved 2020-11-26.
  20. "Top 100 Albums of the 1970s – Page 5". pitchfork.com. Retrieved 28 January 2017.
  21. "Top 101-200 Favourite Albums Ever : The Stylus Magazine List - Article - Stylus Magazine". stylusmagazine.com. Retrieved 2020-11-26.
  22. Stephen, Gordon (August 1995). "Rocklist.net...Mojo Lists..." Mojo. Retrieved 28 January 2017.

Sources
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