My initial contact with the band came in Hamburg in July of 1977 when I saw them support Randy Pie which was a life-changing experience! I didn’t know either band but a friend suggested we go to the gig at least so I could get to know the city a little better. I was in Hamburg as I was entering into a year-long placement at the Hamburg University for my journalism degree and my German was, and still is, garbled. So I definitely felt out of place and a little homesick. The one thing that I knew I could rely on to decrease my feelings of alienation was music, so the gig seemed a safe bet. In the end I didn’t actually stay for Randy Pie, Lustfaust were that explosive. I wasn’t even sure if they were musically any good. The spectacle just blew my mind.

I went to Berlin to see them on the final gig of the Randy Pie tour (the gig that sent the headliners into meltdown) and was even more impressed. I met Hans-Georg Petersen at the gig who I found out was something of an expert on the band. He had seen them live more times than anyone I knew and gave me a couple of bootlegs he’d made along with the band’s first tape. Petersen also divulged the band’s history to me which was something of a coup as neither of us shared a fluent language. It struck me, even at this early stage, that the band had more than just a musical and performative side going for them. Petersen introduced me to friends of his who all followed the band and kept in touch about what Lustfaust were up to and when and where they would play. Knowledge about the band appeared to be communicated by word of mouth, their very existence seemed built on a kind of community mythology – you had to be in the ‘loop’ to know when they released new material and when and where you could catch the band live.