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2LP
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FORTE 028LP
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CD
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FORTE 028CD
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"Surprisingly and totally unexpected Christian Morgenstern died on the 17th of June, 2003 because of a sudden cardiac arrest. He was a producer and the label manager of Forte Records, his own company. Until his sudden death he worked full time and as if possessed on his new album which was scheduled to be released in September 2003 -- as if he knew that he wouldn't have much time. This album has been the most personal thing he left behind. He switched musical styles again, turning to more song-like structures in his music. For the first time he worked with partners, vocalists Gesa Schwietring and Egmont Badini, both close friends from Cologne, Germany. Christian wasn't able to finish the album, but he got really far with the tracks released here, most of them he finished, some of them have to be understood as sketches. With the help of his close friends his musical legacy could be saved for his fans."
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12"
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FORTE 027
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"Christian Morgenstern is back with a high-tech real Neo-disko piece, that is the sure shot feet-shuffler for this summer. 'Wasn't you' is the first track from the upcoming Christian Morgenstern album."
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CD
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FORTE 020CD
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"It's not just about skiing features several unreleased tracks/mixes and gives an insight on the Forte Records repertoire of the past year and a look ahead on the things to come in 2003. The CD layout was designed by the Colognian artist The Travelling Bombadils. This in the first part of the series, the compilation mainly features the 'most wanted' tracks of the Forte Records backcatalogue, which have merely been released on vinyl."
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2LP
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FORTE 018LP
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CD
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FORTE 022CD
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"Codec and Flexor that is Sven Zalac and Matthias Freund. That the two guys from Frankfurt moved to Cologne recently has certainly to do with their cooperation with Christian Morgenstern, owner of the label Forte Records, who has become a good friend to them. So it does not come as a surprise that their first album Tubed was produced by Christian Morgenstern at Forte Records. All of the ten tracks on the album show clear traces of Codec & Flexor's musical background, but are enriched with many electronic elements so that, if you wanted to label it, you could say Tubed is an electro rock record. Classical techno tracks like Robot Funk or Let It All Out alternate with calmer electronical and more classical rock oriented tracks like She. So even if the tracks may evoke very different reaction from wanting to dance to wanting to just listen, all in all Tubed sounds like a concept album as there is one idea behind it: rock music."
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CD
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FORTE 018CD
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"The outstanding space-post-trance-hiNRG-videogames-electro-funk-ad venture presented by James No.1 Spacerocker Dr. Shingo . Shingo comes from Tokyo/Japan, his musical career started in his earliest childhood as a multi-instrumentalist (piano, guitar, trombone, trumpet...). After studying at the Yamaha Music Academy he moved to Boston in 1997 to study guitar and classical composition at the Berkley College of Music. There he got in touch with electronic music from bands like Kraftwerk etc.. Overwhelmed by the new possibilities of composition and sounddesign which were yet to discover he decided to go back to Japan. From this moment on he works as a Dj and starts to compose/produce techno music. feat. 'Smells Like Teen Spirit' and 'Death Before Disko'." Includes remixes by: Ural 13 Diktators and Takkyu Ishino.
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CD
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FORTE 009CD
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"This album can be seen as a further step in Morgenstern's development towards musicality and songwriting. Still inhabiting his very unique style, this mixture of smooth and elegant sounds and a twisted tech-house moodiness, Hawaii Blue combines a range of of various styles and influences not heard before on one album. Unlike his rather dark and moody double 12" The Lydia EP from 1999, this album for the first time reveals Morgenstern's true musical origin: the 80s. Far from retro-cliches, he combines influences from the good ol' time with state of the art sound and ambiance.
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2LP
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FORTE 009LP
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CD
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FORTE 007CD
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"Pretty kickin' new full length by DJs Lauri Pitkänen and Lauri Vertanin on Christian Morgenstern's Forte imprint. Below is an excerpt from an interview with Pitkänen and one DJ Tsukasa Kato, which does more to flesh out the Diktators sound and philosophy than I could ever hope to. Q: "Please tell me about your profile." A: " We come from Helsinki, Finland that is located in the between of Russia and Western Europe. Because we have grown up with really different musical influences like Hi-NRG disco and Russian folk songs our music has been formed to something that is recognized around the world as Sound Of Helsinki. Currently we're working heavily on our own label Ural 13 Records but also with other international labels such as Low Spirit, Forte Records and Rapture just to name a few. What you guys probably have heard before about Finland is the moomin characters." Q: " What is the meaning of 'Ural 13 Diktators'? " A: " The people who these days live in Helsinki are originally from the Russian Ural Mountains. Ural 13 is a large crew that is ruled by us, the diktators. Number 13 is our lucky number." Q: "You always look like soldier on your artist photos. Does it mean something or nothing?" A: "The clothes give our live appearances more colour and atmosphere. Military clothes describing the hard kicking techno sounds of our music and the pink colour the disco atmosphere on it. We also feel comfortable wearing these uniforms as we both have served in the Finnish army's elite forces." Q: "Now In Japanese club scene, 80's Disco sounds: Patrick Cowley, Divine (Bobby O), Sylvester and Man Parrish ... are estimated again. I think you have a great interest in 80's disco sound. What is the different between this sound and URAL 13 Diktators' sound?" A:" For us those cult Hi-NRG producers of 80s are the true inventors and innovators of electric dance music. They invented techno like it's known today: straight mechanic beats and percussion with futuristic synthetic sound with progressive and repetitive structure. Patrick Cowley's tragic death in November, 1982 was a great loss to modern dance music and maybe because of that the Detroit based producers got the status of techno inventors in the minds of many people. We give great respect to the creators of Hi-NRG music but our music takes influences also from the melancholic Russian and Finnish folk songs. These elements mixed with modern techno we are proud to call sound of Helsinki." Q: " Lastly send a message to Japanese." A: " 80s Hi-NRG is Still alive. Join the Party!".
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CD
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FORTE 003 CD
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"After releasing several records on labels like Kurbel, Konsequent, Kanzleramt and Creation Rebel during the past 2 years, Christian Morgenstern now comes up with his first album on his own Forte label. Death Before Disko ranges from funky, pumping post-psychotic techno tracks featuring Latin-house like grooves towards weird atmospheric listening music. Mainly using vintage equipment and tube amplifiers from the early 80s, Christian Morgenstern managed to created an incredibly smooth, silky and fat sound."
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12"
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FORTE 002
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"Features mixes of said track by Claude Young (Utensil/DOW/Acacia/Frictional/7th City/Emissions Audio Output/Djax-Up Beats/Elypsia/Studio !K7/Muller/Surface/Urban Substance recording artist, 2nd-gen Detroit legend), Richard Bartz (Kurbel, Kanzleramt, Disko B recording artist, techno legend), and Morgenstern himself (Kurbel, Kanzleramt, Konsequent, and now Forte recording artist) in a lean, stripped down floor-filling style.
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