CLOUDS CAN was founded in 1995 (!) when Thomas Thielen met Dominik Hüttermann at the University of Trier at the very first day of their studies there. According to ancient lore Thomas Thielen (shorter: t) stumbled on Dominik while the later was carrying around a 01/W Workstation by Korg in the department of Classics. It is not exactely remembered why Dominik did such a peculiar thing (even weird in terms of keyboarders). T - fresh from school - asked him about the synth and told him that btw. he had a Prog Rock band called POWDS CON FUSION, where the Keyboarder Udo Gerhards btw. had the predesessor workstation called M1. Thunder struck, when Dom told t that btw. he also had a progband called LAMIA, which btw. was touring with Clepsydra in a month or so. And btw. he really could play the intro to Firth of Fifth. After that they talked about Genesis, Marillion (Fish or Mr. Hogarth?) and „What do you think of the Ever-Album by IQ?“ T invited Dom to tea.
In short: They hit off immediateley and the rest is history.
Well, not so.
Later in 1995 Dominik got the call to compose some original songs for the „Lateinische Theatergruppe der Universität Trier“ (Latin Theatre Group of the University of Trier: a bunch even weirder than keyboarders) and was handed the royal sum of 700 German Marks (a sum unheard of for students) to buy a DAT recorder in order to immortalize his humble compositions for use in a stage play. The idea was born to use this sensational recording device (without the knowing oft he rightful owner) for some spontaneous compositions by t and Dom. T brought along some other synths, his famed Gibson Nighthawk guitar and a humble microfone. And there in Thomas ´ studio (i.e. sleeping, living, loving and sometimes also studying room) CLOUDS CAN was founded. According to oral tradition the name was insprired by a chalk writing in the middle of some university board in an englisch poetry class, where t by chance walked by. It is uncertain why t choose exactely this enigmatic name as the band title (t doesn´t remember that story anyway, must have been the cakes which he and Dom swallowed unintentionally at a certain wild student party).
Back to the music: In the winter of 95 the debut album „Moon“ was recorded mainly live (!) at t´s and was distributed (i.e. they made roundabout 15 copies of it) freely to music loving students CC personally knew.
In the winter of 1996/97 CC even had a live gig at the Christmas party of the classics department, performing a heartfelt version of „Fake Plastic Trees“ and the all time t-crowd pleaser „Do not come back“. The later was taken too literally by some of the older professors of the Classics department, who made some weak excuses to suddenly leave the premises in spite of freezing temperatures. CLOUDS CAN were invited to do the same at the summer party though.
Against all odds and odd meters the CC train was unstoppable and in the summer of 1998 t and Dom ammassed all the instruments they could hold of (Dom even brought along a valia and a 200 year old musical box) and recorded their classic yet very experimental album number 2: „Per aspera“. They even sold more copies of this magnum opus than before (25?). Also noteworthy: Many classic t songs made their debut here.
Unfortunately CC had to be put on ice after Dominik moved to Ostfriesland (!) in the very north of Germany early 1999 to start his Referendariat (= last step of the education for being a teacher) there. Thomas changed his name to t, recorded one album with Scythe and six albums under his own banner and the rest is history.
Well, not so.
All these years t and Dom held contact, played together at the first North German Prog Festival 2012 in Oldenburg and in 2013 Dom accompanied t for some memorable shows in order to promote the „Psychoanorexia“-Album. At a gig at Lutz Diehls „Eisenschenke“ in 2014 even some old CC-Songs where performed. Both agreed while driving home in the car that the time was more than ripe for a new and bolder chapter of CLOUDS CAN.
