Rammstein - Reise, Reise
My morning Markovian chain of looking up things on the internet somehow led me to Rammstein, and now i have to talk about Reise, Reise.
For those who don't remember or don't know them, Rammstein rose to prominence as one of the best industrial metal bands of the late 90s. Their success is predicated on two unrelated phenomena. First, they wrote super catchy, heavy dirty groove metal (hooray me for the 21 pilots reference). Second, they perhaps unintentionally elevated human intelligence by being a specifically German band who intentionally paid attention to the collision of German and American culture. So much so that one of the primary appeals is actually translating their lyrics so that we can understand what they are saying. In other words, they say "you and i have fundamentally different outlooks on the world. I have been acculturated to yours, now you need to learn something about mine and i'm not going to spell it out, you have to get out your German to English dictionary and get to work." And we did, and they are awesome.
I've been talking a lot about the conceptual context of albums, and this one is a plane crash. This album takes place in an airplane that has malfunctioned, and nobody knows if we are going to survive. That's a pretty apt metaphor, in my opinion. All of the songs involve a literal or metaphorical journey, or an alternate perspective that you the listener have to meet halfway. It's not an accident, they highlight specifically German philosophical, linguistic, and cultural perspectives and place them in the context of singing to American audiences. The best part is that once you bite the hook, there is a real reward at the other end. You do actually learn something, and that is an obvious recipe for success.
Now i'm going to fight with a published music critic because his essay pretty much is the wikipedia article about the album, and because i can.
I like the description "great black gaps in the fabric of human rationality," and his network of associations is ok, but the rest of Tim O'Neil's review in Entertainment Weekly is the standard misconception about how political oppression actually works. Their point is NEVER that their East German upbringing is better, their point is that global Americanization is unstoppable and generalized american culture doesn't understand the difference between basic human values and political ideologies. Their opinion of Russia is just as condescending as their opinion of the u.s., but "Moskau" wasn't released as a single. His notion that a socialist bias accounts for the poor decision to keep singing in German, thus not being superstars over here is laughable. Timmy didn't pull out his dictionary, and he probably didn't really listen to Sehnsucht, Mutter, and Reise Reise as a whole before pressing send.
They express their Germanity in the same way that Black Metal expresses its Scandinavian-ness, the same way any nationalistic identity expresses itself in the face of another intruding nationalistic identity. Like i said, being unapologetically German is the point, and they more than happily sing in other languages to specifically point out that simple translation doesn't work. You have to use the language of your subject matter, and Rammstein's subject matter is exactly the skewed perception that O'Neil demonstrates by telling them to "speak English" like a redneck at Taco Bell at 2AM.
Luckily, actual fans of Rammstein are more than happy to go back to school and learn about different points of view. You might not like that point of view, but at least 3 more brain cells are firing than before you made the effort.
Songwise, Rammstein approaches their inherently dark subject matter the same way Slayer, or Cannibal Corpse, or even Stone Temple Pilots approaches it. These things are so horrible, grotesque, and incomprehensible that they become fascinating and we have to conceptualize them in some way. Just like that Steppenwolf album where John Kay said right off the bat "i'm a despicable man and here's half an hour of songs from that perspective. For ladies only ;) ."
You can't really listen to the whole thing on youtube, because lawyers and stuff, but...
https://m.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLdm9HheOu8SizGEilsT4KqFpQO3SsBXTS
Next
For those who don't remember or don't know them, Rammstein rose to prominence as one of the best industrial metal bands of the late 90s. Their success is predicated on two unrelated phenomena. First, they wrote super catchy, heavy dirty groove metal (hooray me for the 21 pilots reference). Second, they perhaps unintentionally elevated human intelligence by being a specifically German band who intentionally paid attention to the collision of German and American culture. So much so that one of the primary appeals is actually translating their lyrics so that we can understand what they are saying. In other words, they say "you and i have fundamentally different outlooks on the world. I have been acculturated to yours, now you need to learn something about mine and i'm not going to spell it out, you have to get out your German to English dictionary and get to work." And we did, and they are awesome.
I've been talking a lot about the conceptual context of albums, and this one is a plane crash. This album takes place in an airplane that has malfunctioned, and nobody knows if we are going to survive. That's a pretty apt metaphor, in my opinion. All of the songs involve a literal or metaphorical journey, or an alternate perspective that you the listener have to meet halfway. It's not an accident, they highlight specifically German philosophical, linguistic, and cultural perspectives and place them in the context of singing to American audiences. The best part is that once you bite the hook, there is a real reward at the other end. You do actually learn something, and that is an obvious recipe for success.
Now i'm going to fight with a published music critic because his essay pretty much is the wikipedia article about the album, and because i can.
I like the description "great black gaps in the fabric of human rationality," and his network of associations is ok, but the rest of Tim O'Neil's review in Entertainment Weekly is the standard misconception about how political oppression actually works. Their point is NEVER that their East German upbringing is better, their point is that global Americanization is unstoppable and generalized american culture doesn't understand the difference between basic human values and political ideologies. Their opinion of Russia is just as condescending as their opinion of the u.s., but "Moskau" wasn't released as a single. His notion that a socialist bias accounts for the poor decision to keep singing in German, thus not being superstars over here is laughable. Timmy didn't pull out his dictionary, and he probably didn't really listen to Sehnsucht, Mutter, and Reise Reise as a whole before pressing send.
They express their Germanity in the same way that Black Metal expresses its Scandinavian-ness, the same way any nationalistic identity expresses itself in the face of another intruding nationalistic identity. Like i said, being unapologetically German is the point, and they more than happily sing in other languages to specifically point out that simple translation doesn't work. You have to use the language of your subject matter, and Rammstein's subject matter is exactly the skewed perception that O'Neil demonstrates by telling them to "speak English" like a redneck at Taco Bell at 2AM.
Luckily, actual fans of Rammstein are more than happy to go back to school and learn about different points of view. You might not like that point of view, but at least 3 more brain cells are firing than before you made the effort.
Songwise, Rammstein approaches their inherently dark subject matter the same way Slayer, or Cannibal Corpse, or even Stone Temple Pilots approaches it. These things are so horrible, grotesque, and incomprehensible that they become fascinating and we have to conceptualize them in some way. Just like that Steppenwolf album where John Kay said right off the bat "i'm a despicable man and here's half an hour of songs from that perspective. For ladies only ;) ."
You can't really listen to the whole thing on youtube, because lawyers and stuff, but...
https://m.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLdm9HheOu8SizGEilsT4KqFpQO3SsBXTS
Next
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