LUFTWAFFE

For those who stray from convention, look outside the box or color outside the lines, Heaven and Hell Records presents you with LUFTWAFFE.

The band would be unheard of by most people unless you were one of the people who got the chance to see this enigmatic band on the Upstate New York club circuit around Utica. Between the years 1982 to ‘85 the live performances of LUFTWAFFE are said to have been a chaotic spectacle of destruction, burlesque and rock n’ roll.

Around the end of 1981, songwriter and guitarist Bob Acquaviva was looking to start a new band. Acquaviva had unusual ideas for this new venture, but he needed to find like-minded people to realize his vision for the project.
Acquaviva would call upon his old friend Tim Gilles to see if he would be interested in a new endeavour. Gilles was an incredible drummer and all-around musician. He was also a fan and influenced by progressive rock artists such as Gentle Giant, Gong and Henry Cow; this would prove beneficial to the fledgling band.

Acquaviva already had a bass player in mind named Paul St James who could do the job required. Within a couple of weeks after the three would first get together, they would begin to audition singers. Many notable local singers would try out for the position, but none were quite right. Eventually, Acquaviva came across a young guitarist who he felt had a voice and could be just what the band was looking for. Dave Wolfgang Von Slife would become the eccentric and idiosyncratic frontman of the band. The band was now complete.

Now, the band would need a moniker. But not just any name, but something powerful, something grandiose. The band wanted to make an impression and take over the Upstate New York scene. After a few, over-the-top suggestions, were made, they would settle upon LUFTWAFFE. The word meaning ‘air force’ seemed large and strong. The name would be inspired by all the members’ fandom of German heavy metal and hard rock bands such as Accept, Scorpions and MSG.

Both Acquaviva and Giles were keeping an eye on the growing popularity of heavy metal. They decided to take the band in that direction. They would also bring in their shared influences of progressive rock and jazz. What they would create would be a unique and somewhat hard-to-describe hard rock band. Several names such as; Budgie, UFO, Scorpions and Tank would sometimes be suggested in an attempt to try and describe LUFTWAFFE. Yet those names would barely scratch the surface. The band’s weird themes, sometimes Zappa-esque lyrics and odd time signatures would only complement the bizarre live shows.

LUFTWAFFE would gain a reputation over the few-year course of the band and build something of a cult following in the area. By 1985 the band decided to record the album’s worth of songs they had written while they had the chance to do so. What resulted was an 8-song full-length album that would be shelved for the next 37 years.

LUFTWAFFE would end in 1985 not long after the recording sessions. The band would perform their biggest concert and that night while onstage simply made the flash decision to go in a different direction with the band,. And just like that LUFTWAFFE was no more.

After many years LUFTWAFFE’s 1985 album “The Cardinal Sin Sweep” will finally be released for the first time as a limited edition CD. All songs have been remastered from the original recordings by Bob Acquaviva. Artwork created by Steve Cobb. The release is scheduled for November 2022.

Luftwaffe: The Cardinal Sin Sweep” HHR143