Wolfgang Pérez - Who Cares Who Cares

Format: LP (Gatefold)
Catalogue No.: FUN16
Barcode: 4260437156091
Release Date: 27 Aug 2021
Genre: Indie / Alternative

Format Details: 135g Black LP, Gatefold Sleeve, includes Insert with lyrics.

Who cares, who cares?!

Does anyone remember the great Barry Künzel?! Of the band Butter?! The funk-pop duo Q?! Or Fuschimuschi?! All this funk-, jazz- or hip-hop-influenced, wondrous psychedelic soul music from German lands?

A quarter of a century later, "Who Cares Who Cares" is the name of Wolfgang Pérez's solo debut album. In recent years, he was mainly busy as the keyboardist of the native German speaking pop band GOLF. Now he is preparing to leave the German pop worlds as a solo artist - supported by an opulent session band. As the son of a Spaniard, Wolfgang grew up multilingual anyway - an alien by nature, so to speak. His music, on the other hand - caught between indie pop, funk, jazz and tropicalismo - doesn't sound at all like coming from someone who doesn't know where he belongs. Quite the opposite: It sounds like the big wide interconnected world of pop out there and inside of us.

The result is some groovy music between Frank Ocean, The Whitest Boy Alive, Phoenix, Melvin Van Peebles, Marcos Valle and the record collection of a lovable jazz records collecting uncle. And Wolfgang is hailing from Essen in the Ruhr region, of all places. Yes, why not, or, to stay with the album title: Who cares, who cares?!

On the cover packshot we see the album title scrawled in countless variations. The short story: Wolfgang started the following call in his messenger portals one night:
- Write "Who cares who cares" at last 10 times now.
- Do it in your own style.
- You are free to vary a bit like using small letters or writing without spaces between the words.
- You don't have to go crazy, if you feel like it, keep it simple.

The cover now shows a colourful collage of his care-taking friends.

By the way, Wolfgang was born in the year the white stork was bird of the year (who cares, who cares?). 27 years later, he proves himself to be an accomplished composer and arranger on this eight-song debut album. Oh ja, this young Mr. Pérez, at any rate, is someone we would like to call a wunderkind. A truly heart-warming wimp on the microphone, and a virtuoso keyboardist who immediately knows how to get something out of every sound.

If he had lived in another time, say the 18th century, he would have composed chamber music and orchestral works for the nobility at some court. Or written, you guessed it, operas for the opera houses. He could have arranged great East Soul records for Manfred Krug in the GDR in the 70s, or provided a fancy score for Western German television for a crime scene instead of CAN's Irmin Schmidt. In the 80s, he could have come up with a cool NDW act for Intercord, which no one would have understood back then, but which today would be traded on Discogs for 180 Euros. As a 7" single, mind you...

Enough with the steep theses and references. There are already far too many in this text. And Wolfgang Perez is living and making music here and now! But: Who cares, who cares?!

Tracklisting:
A1. Who Cares Who Cares
A2. Maybe
A3. FAMF
A4. Feel Like Change
B1. Times At Ease
B2. No Animal
B3. Sunshine Forever
B4. My Favourite Century