As you may have noticed, we love series at Man Recordings. We started the Funk Mundial series and the Baile Funk Masters series, to establish platform for musical concepts. While Funk Mundial is the platform for collaborations between Rio based MCs and producers from the Northern hemisphere, the Baile Funk Masters series is exclusively dedicated to Rio producers and DJs. For our blog, we started the “Man Recordings Inspiration Series” which presents videos from artists that inspired the Man Recordings sound and look. So now it´s the time for another series for our blog. In “The Man Recordings Legends Selection ” we´ll present tracks by bands and artists that were inspiration for us as kids, opening our virgin ears.

There´s probably no better track to kick off the series as the following tune by Bavarian funk outfit Relax. The quartet rose to prominence in 1982 with their debut single “Radio Hörn” (Listening to radio), which is a hard boiled funk track – with err, Bavarian German lyrics. “Radio Hörn” shows that the early 1980s “Neue Deutsche Welle” (German New Wave) wasnt all about post punk and electronic instruments. In fact, it had various protagonists that were massively inspired by names such as James Brown, Ohio Players, Kool & The Gang, Earth Wind + Fire, George Duke and other U.S. funk outfits. George Kranz´s “Din Daa Daa”, the first album by Nena or the tracks by the former backing band of Nina Hagen, Spliff, illustrate that U.S. funk had a huge influence in German pop culture way before hip hop landed in Germany.

So check out Relax and their “Radio Hörn” – and you´ll understand that Germans do have the funk too, even in Bavaria!

RELAX “RADIO HÖRN”