The American music market is ticking differently than the European and especially the German one. Quite a few musical greats there find little or no attention in the Old World. Guitarist Henry Kaiser, for example, is only known in Germany to absolute connoisseurs of the niche between rock, jazz and avant-garde. He combines the best sides of Jerry Garcia, Frank Zappa and John McLaughlin.

Since the mid-1970s, the 67-year-old, who has already released more than 50 albums, seems to be constantly squatting in the studio and hatching new projects. But appearances are deceptive: if he is regarded in the music world as one of the most innovative minds of the last 40 years, scientists value him as one of the most renowned research divers. With filmmakers like Werner Herzog he is in demand as an underwater cameraman. Henry Kaiser is an all-rounder who leaves many traces behind.

Tim Bowness, singer of the artpop duo No-Man, whose other creative half is known as Steven Wilson, expects that their new album "Love You To Bits" could cause controversy: "One of the most interesting things about it is that I can't at all estimate how the reactions to it will be," admits the Brit and adds: "I hope, however, that it will be perceived as a work that is as accessible as it is ambitious and one of the most courageous and extraordinary No-Man albums. Hopefully people will give him a chance and hear it as a whole. Where it leads and how it ends cannot be determined from the first five minutes."

The Wall", Pink Floyd's eleventh studio album, was released at the end of November 1979. It is the most famous album of the British art rockers. It is the most successful double album in rock music history. Along with "The Dark Side Of The Moon", "Wish You Were Here" and "Animals" it belongs to the four big albums on which the superstar status of the band is based. But "The Wall" is more than just an art rock album. It's stylistically singular. There's hardly anything like it. It's also Roger Waters' soul striptease. It is timeless and has expanded its importance over the decades. It started out as an individual psychological analysis and catharsis, but today it is a global political and sociological study. Now 40 years of "The Wall" - and Pink Floyd and Roger Waters do what they usually do on such occasions: nothing.

The second solo album after "No Decoder" from 2010 was a long time coming. Of course, Yogi Lang, his character's singer, songwriter and keyboardist the art rocker RPWL is a busy man. In the meantime, the Freising team started with several concept albums. "I didn't really want to wait that long, but I had to hand in songs for RPWL albums again and again. I really had to do the solo work and keep the songs," admits Lang in retrospect. The question of where the differences to the RPWL material are is obvious. "The beauty is that I can be more radical and build my own world here because I don't have to stick to a band concept." But isn't there also an overriding theme on "A Way Out Of Here"? "But yes," laughs Yogi Lang, "the subject is me! That's the radical."

Whoa! The Classic Rock heart was literally overturning when the first announcements of the January live event "Music & Stories" were released: Uriah Heep, Nazareth and Wishbone Ash, three bands of almost the same age, all around 50 years old in the Rock Earth orbit, actually come together at the same concert event! That's the "music" part, but what's with the "stories" component? Sweets Andy Scott, the host of this classic rock show of superlatives, gives us a first insight. And also points to sweet prospects for the future.

The Englishman, born on 27 December 1944, started his musical career at the beginning of the sixties. At first he was mostly a session musician in France, from 1971 he was back in England, first with Wonderwheel and later with Spooky Tooth. The Leslie West Band went from London to New York City for Jones. Shortly before that he played on albums of Peter Frampton and George Harrison. In 1976 he founded Foreigner with Lou Gramm, Dennis Elliott, Al Greenwood and Ian McDonald, among others. Since the "40th Anniversary Tour" in 2017, these original members and at the same time the current Foreigner line-up around singer Kelly Hansen have been performing together again and again. To be heard on the recently released live work "Double Vision - Then And Now".

eclipsed: Are you still in your best rock years when you're almost 75?

For over 20 years the phantom of Blind Guardian's orchestral album has been haunting the metal scene. Announced again and again, postponed again and again, "Legacy Of The Dark Lands" is now not only the most ambitious composition project ever undertaken by metal musicians in Germany, but also the (temporary) logical endpoint of a development already hinted at on an early album like "Somewhere Far Beyond" (1992). We spoke with the two makers Hansi Kürsch and André Olbrich.

eclipsed: Were there moments in the last 20 years when you lost interest in this mammoth company or ran out of patience?

Under the name Erik Cohen, the Hamburg musician Daniel Geiger has attracted attention with three outstanding albums that develop a new vision of German-language rock music: hard, uncompromising, dark - but also very classical and paying homage to the great rock gods of the 70s. This approach was unusual from the start and served Cohen - also known as Jack Letten, frontman of Smoke Blow - as a playground for experiments.