Kiev Stingl was born in 1943 in Aussig a.d. Elbe in Sudetenland, from which he and his mother had to flee after the end of World War II. After having first having found refuge in Mannheim he was relocated to Hamburg in 1949, where he attended secondary school and unsuccessfully studied Politicology and Ethnology. Since 1975 he has been active as a composer, lyricist, singer, actor and performer and has authored four acclaimed LPs (Teuflisch, Hart wie Mozart, Ich wünsch den Deutschen alles Gute and Grausam das Gold und jubelnd die Pest) and four books (Flacker in der Pfote, Die besoffene Schlägerei, Kainer Maria Cowboy and Sink skin) and many other unpublished and unreleased works. His intoxicated and provocative behaviour, his existentialist stance paired with outstanding qualities as a song writer and lyricist make it fair to hail Kiev Stingl as one of the great lyricists, authors and performance artists of post-war Germany.
Moloko’s CD X R I Nuit was published as a companion to the EP of the same name that was released by Klangbad in 2022. On their website Klangbad announces this trove of Kiev Stingl recordings from 1982 as follows:
… Never-before-heard songs from Germany’s underground legend Kiev Stingl. Released on Klangbad, record label of Hans-Joachim Irmler, founding member of seminal Krautrock band Faust. Enfant terrible Kiev Stingl’s major label discography totals three records, on Philips, Metronome, and Teldec. More than any other German pop artist, Kiev Stingl embodies massive deviance. In 1982, he was arrested by the secret police of Madagascar; accused of assisting the CIA in a coup attempt, he was imprisoned in Antananarivo (Ambohibao) and narrowly escaped a death sentence. Upon release, he entered Teldec Studios in Hamburg to record new songs, accompanied only by Götz Humpf (City Preachers). Due to increasingly eccentric behaviour and a lack of commercial viability, producer Achim Reichel (The Rattles, A.R. & Machines) decided against releasing the recordings. The termination of the sessions marked the end of one of underground music’s most promising careers. Seven years later came Stingl‘s last album Grausam das Gold und jubelnd die Pest, which saw the participation of Alexander Hacke and FM Einheit (both of Einstürzende Neubauten) and was produced by Dieter Meier (Yello). Then Stingl disappeared from the scene. The pieces on X R I Nuit are based on the previously unreleased vocal and instrumental tracks from those 1982 sessions and were re-arranged and produced by Niklas David (Audiac)…