On her second album Schlachtrufe BRD, Stefanie Schrank, known to the German public as a visual artist and bassist in the Cologne band Locas in Love, turns her attention to pop that is as clever as it is minimalist and draws its strength from tranquillity. However, punk rock is the breeding ground for the singer's sometimes personal, sometimes political song gems. The title of the album is taken from the title of a sampler of German hardcore and punk rock songs from 1990, whose song selection was so radical that it was warranted a warning from German public television because of lyrics that glorified violence. That was the best advertisement: the series now has cult status.
Fans of analog synthesizers will particularly enjoy the album. They dominate throughout and are also given space for some instrumental pieces, which are among the strongest moments of the unfortunately rather short album.
Jens Moelle and İsmail Tüfekçi after meeting in Hamburg while record shopping, noticed similarities in their musical preferences and founded their joint music project Digitalism. Musically influenced by Philippe Zdar (Cassius), one of the central figures of the French dance underground of the 90s, they signed a contract with the French label Kitsuné and, like Justice, LCD Sound System and Rapture, became part of the indie dance groups that were extremely popular in the late noughties, with their banging bass drums (literally dozens of layered sounds are said to be involved) and crystal-clear synthesizer sequences. Their debut album Idealism from 2007 is now being released as an extended “Anniversary Edition” under the name Idealism Forever.
I was looking for beauty. Of course, (…) beauty can be shallow, and it’s somehow easier to use the language of conflict. (...) But I was sick of conflict. I longed for peace.
F.S. Blumm about his album "Torre"
This month's Popcast continues with the greatest possible contrast, namely with Frank Schültge aka F.S. Blumm. The classically trained guitarist has been touring Germany's musical underground as an endlessly creative solo artist since 1998 and can look back on dozens of collaborations, including with multi-instrumentalist Harald “Sack” Ziegler and internationally renowned pianist Nils Frahm, on whose label Leiter this new album has been released. F.S. Blumm recorded the guitars in the Italian Riviera “in the silent gaps between the ringing bells of the village church and the barking of the dogs”, added bass/contrabass, various keyboards, voices and melodica and finally enlisted the support of cellist Anne Müller and clarinettist Michael Thieke for the 13 tracks on Torre, which defy categorization.
Marten Laciny aka Marteria, who was successful as a footballer in his youth and later as a model (Diesel, Hugo Boss), says goodbye to his constantly stoned, free-associating and high-pitched rapping alter ego Marsimoto with his sixth album Keine Intelligenz. The slightly loopy Marsimoto initially served Marteria, who is one of the most successful German rappers, as an homage to Quasimoto, the alter ego of US rapper Madlib, but then took on a life of its own as a foggy side project in which the joy of experimentation replaced musical and content-related reason. But Marsimoto is more than just a droning troll, his unusual rhymes are biting commentaries on current affairs that are simply easier for a masked jester than a pop star like Marteria.
Reiner Sladek and Lenz Lehmair, members of the Munich electronic duo 3 Sekunden, have released an album on the legendary Hamburg indie label Zickzack that is reminiscent of the dark electronics of the early 90s. In an ominous atmosphere created by overdriven and detuned, constantly chugging analog synthesizers, Lenz Lehmair creates the perfect sound bed for Reiner Sladek's sometimes spoken, sometimes softly intoned baritone. Der deutsche Frühling, fed by the echoes of DAF and Suicide, is theatrical and disturbing in the best sense of the word, without sounding like a dark copy of what used to be called EBM.
