If 1972′s Ege Bamyasi is Can’s most extroverted and eager-to-please work, their next offering is the German band’s most introverted and alluringly aloof. 1973′s Future Days isn’t the proto-ambient work that some critics have claimed it is: Drummer Jaki Liebezeit still hammers like a funky octopus; singer Damo Suzuki gets as close as he ever could to crooning conventional pop-rock melodies, and there’s way too much tension played far too in-the-pocket for Can to comfortably recede into the background. But there’s a palpable, sexy sense of restraint here, and although it doesn’t approach Brian Eno’s subsequent Spartan random drones, it points in that direction. A sleeper album that reveals its nuanced depths over time, this is Can at its coolest.

The minimalism Irmin Schmidt learned from Steve Reich and Terry Riley comes to the fore: It takes bassist Holger Czukay six minutes to deviate from the one note he plays through most of the introductory title track. Although the band is still generating most of this stuff live in the studio and capturing it with simple stereo recording, there’s much more sound manipulation: The volume drops suddenly on “Future Days” to build back up, and that chugging hum throughout… read more »