biography
Udo Hanten & Albin Meskes
| After breaking his steps as a solo-artist, Udo Hanten collaborated with Ulrich Weber and brought up the band "YOU". Hanten on synths and Weber on electric guitar. In December 1978, first songs were presented in Berlin at the "Paragon" studio of Peter Baumann. Later a conversation with Conny Plank tipped the scales, to do a production by them self.
The first album "Electric Day" was recorded between May and August 1979 at Udo Hanten's Spiegeltraum Studio (2 floors over North Sea). The production emerged from a collaboration between Udo Hanten, Ulrich Weber and Harald Grosskopf (at that time living in West-Berlin and member of Ashra). Albin Meskes completed the party during the production. HG owned an eight-track tape recorder (which he got from Klaus Schulze) while Hanten supplied a couple of synthesizers and sequencers. In this recording environment, the team produced two records: Harald Grosskopf's debut LP "Synthesist" and "Electric Day".
The line up included Udo Hanten and Albin Meskes on synthesizers, sequencers and Mellotron, Ulrich Weber on electric and acoustic guitars and some percussion; on acoustic drums and some synths-lines the famous "Lhan Gopal". (Drums on the title track "Electric Day" is a "first take" recording.) Mixdown took place at Panne-Paulsen Studio in Frankfurt/Main with the legendary Eberhard Panne at the desk from August 1 to 4, 1979. The young "Cain" label released the debut album of YOU. Design and front cover painting was done by Albin Meskes. Photographs on the cover backside by HRay/Holger Heine (San Francisco). On May 1981 YOU releases the 12" EP "Scanner part 1 & 2", again on "Cain" Records. The track was recorded in the AVC Studios in Ratingen and featured heavy guitar work by Ulrich Weber and was mixed in two, slightly differend versions. The line up was the same as on "Electric Day". The engineer was Helmut Brüker, an ex-partner of Udo Hanten from the synth-duo "Brüker and Hanten" in 1977. "Time Code" is the second album from Hanten and Meskes and appeared on the scene in summer 1983. It was released on the newly formed "Rock City Records" label by the late Merlin W. Frank. "Time Code" was the YOU album which took the longest recording time - between March 1982 and February 1983 and was the first production as a Synth-Duo. Guest musicians were ex-YOU member Ulrich Weber on guitar (track 8) and Helmut Brüker on electronic devices (track 1, 4, 8). Mixdown took place at MTK Studio with Bardo Kox. The LP-cover shows an air brush painting by Albin Meskes, the CD shows a computerized rendering of the same scene done on an Apple Macintosh with the program (you guessed it) KPT Bryce (special thanks to Kai and Eric). Original release June 6th, 1983 on Rock City Records. In 1996 the song "Live Line" from the "Time Code" album has been covered by Italian dance project DIOLAC DUVAI (aka Claudio Diva) in a Robert-Miles-style manner. The cut is available on maxi-CD and 12-inch vinyl. In August 2004, the same artist added a new version. Further cover versions were done by the Italien DJ "Gigi D'Agostino" in a Synth-Pop style entiteld "Elektro Message" and as a "Hardcore-Trance" version by the Italians "Julian DJ and David Sonar" more information to the concert at SYNCH FESTVAL, ATHEN, soon... |
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