Burnt Friedman

BURNT FRIEDMAN was born in Coburg, Germany in 1965 and has lived in Berlin since 2009. After initially being a student of art in Kassel in northern Germany, Burnt started to focus on music exclusively from the late 1980s onwards. He went on to attend the Academy of Media Arts in Cologne as a postgraduate student and began to publish his musical works along with his studio productions in 1979. He also began performing live around the same time, both of which soon attracted the attention of the Cologne electronic music scene. From there he progressed to various notable music collaborations throughout the 1990s on projects with the likes of Jaki Liebezeit, Hayden Chisholm, Root70, Mark Ernestus, Steve Jansen and David Sylvian and under also under the band names of both Atom™ and Flanger. In 2000 Friedman launched his own record label, Nonplace, with 35 releases to date. Working under the solo artist name of BURNT FRIEDMAN, he sought to address the prejudices people had then about the authenticity of programmed music. His studio and on-stage partnership with Jaki Liebezeit, the former drummer of CAN (recently voted in the Top 5 drummers for alternative music of all time in SPIN magazine in the US), now dates back 13 years; the two musicians have developed pioneering electronic-acoustic music over that period. On the strength of their craft and universal musical vocabulary they have consciously distanced themselves from the tarditional formulas of Western European and Anglo-American music. Their recordings and work should be seen as intermediate phases in an on-going process. BURNT FRIEDMAN’s work has been critically acclaimed by the international music press as far afield as The Wire, Mixmag and Uncut in the UK, Exclaim magazine in Canada. The All Music Guide and Big Shot magazine in the US. Data Transmission in the UK described his recent album release with Jaki Liebezeit as “destined for cult success“, with The Arts Desk making it their Album Of The Week. He will be releasing a new album in the fall and carrying out a tour of Africa in association with The Goethe Institue too.