Always forward: Damo Suzuki’s ‘Never Ending Tour’
Touring often seems like an exhausting endeavour. While some artists thrive on the thrill of life on the road, others dread the endless travel, longing for the comforts of home or time to focus on studio work. Yet, touring almost nonstop for nearly 40 years seems almost unimaginable—something only a truly relentless or eccentric spirit would undertake.
Enter former Can vocalist and experimental music icon Damo Suzuki, a man who seemingly never ceased touring from the mid-1980s until his death in 2024. While not particularly noted for his singing ability, he rose to prominence in the early ’70s after joining Can as their frontman after members Jaki Liebezeit and Holger Czukay discovered him busking on the streets of Munich and were captivated by his untrained and free approach to music.
Despite only appearing on three of the seminal Krautrock band’s studio albums, his impact on the group’s output during this period was immeasurable, and the records he helped make in Tago Mago, Ege Bamyasi and Future Days are still cited as among some of the most influential and groundbreaking releases of all time.
Departing the band in 1974, he hid from music altogether for a period, becoming a Jehovah’s Witness and unfortunately receiving a cancer diagnosis in 1983. Following his recovery, he made the decision to return to music, although reluctant to enter the studio again or be part of the wider music business.
Thus began the so-called ‘Never Ending Tour’; an infinite string of performances that rarely followed any sense of traditionalism or convention, and would incorporate different performers every night from whichever city he was performing in. This boundaryless exercise took on new forms each time and saw Damo Suzuki as his most uninhibited performer in various cities across the globe.
Having been born and raised in Kobe, Japan, Suzuki lived a nomadic lifestyle from the age of 18 onwards, spending time within Swedish communes and briefly living in many countries across Europe before settling in Germany where he would join Can. This desire to pursue the unexpected was clearly a big part of Suzuki’s philosophy in life, and clearly played a large part in his decision to undertake such a monstrous feat of endurance.
In an article for The Wire following Suzuki’s passing, writer Mike Barnes recalls meeting with him and being told that “if you think about the end, then better not to start.” This sentiment perfectly summarises the ethos behind Suzuki’s desire to never think too far ahead with an idea and to be guided by instinct on whatever path he chooses to take in his personal or creative life.
This journey of experimentation through performance led Suzuki to rediscover a love for his craft that survived until his final moments and took him across the world to perform with a variety of different musicians. As Mike Barnes continues in his essay, he says of Suzuki that “he had an unwavering confidence that, by serendipity, they would always make some kind of magic together”. For someone whose main desire was to express himself in whatever way he felt right for the moment, doing a different thing every night was surely the only solution to achieving this goal.
