I once had a German gentleman–my ex-father in law to be exact–tell me in all seriousness that Germany would have won WWII if it’d had time to perfect its vengeance weapons. Something tells me he was talking about Rammstein.
Lots of people listen to these Tanzmetal schnitzel eaters because they Sprechen Sie Deutsche (how cool is that?), others because they sound like a mechanized armored division invading Poland. And then there are those who like ‘em because frontman Till Lindemann’s got a voice as viscous as panzer oil and likes to set himself on fire. All of ‘em are of the opinion that Rammstein are the best thing to come out of Germany since nudism, and I say jawhoh to that.
On first listen Rammstein can be mistaken for a King Tiger tank crushing everything in its path–your immediate instinct is to dive into the nearest foxhole and pray. On repeated listening the melodies and dance beats reveal themselves, and you realize Rammstein’s idea of heavy is nothing compared to that of their Central European neighbors Laibach. They’re Laibach Lite and let’s be glad for it. Who needs the extra calories?
Still, heavy is as heavy does, and for all your talk about Rammstein’s being the founders of the NDH movement 2001’s Mutter is far more metal than dance. Aside from the V2 fast “Zwitter” and near power ballad “Nebel.” Rammstein prefers to employ brute force. Your friendly neighborhood WWII fanatic will gladly inform you–if you can’t run fast enough–that a King Tiger tank weighs in at 70 metric tons. On Mutter at least, Rammstein is that King Tiger tank. Forget about doing the blitzkrieg bop–Mutter will have you banging your nut like ein gutes Metalkopf.
Rammstein adds welcome color to its standard Wehrmacht grey, including horror movie female backing vocals, heavenly choirs, Nuremberg Rally singalongs, lots of great blips and eerie Exorcist sounds gratis keyboard ace Christian “Flake” Lorenz, the orchestral stylings of the Deutsches Filmorchester Babelsberg–hell, they even mix in some baby babble.
Most importantly, Rammstein tosses in some Middle Eastern flavoring of the sort that made Jimmy Page famous. I dare you to listen to the Deutsches Filmorchester Babelsberg sawing away behind the band on the choruses of “Mein Herz Brennt” and tell me you don’t hear the ghost of Led Zeppelin. And the Led Zep analogy holds true for most of the songs on Mutter; this is Hammer of the Gods muzik by a band that comes from the land of Eis and Schnee. Ah-ah-ah! Ah-ah-ah!
There are those who’ve intimated Rammstein falls to the far right on the political spectrum; the phrase “neo-Nazi” has even been tossed around. Mutter includes Rammstein’s retort to such allegations in the form of “Links 2 3 4,” on which Lindemann tells us his heart beats to the left and the choruses allude to Bertolt Brecht’s anti-Nazi, pro-labor anthem “Einheitsfrontlied.”
Rammstein’s blitzkrieg stomp occasionally borders on overkill; some of these songs go so far overboard in the histrionics department that they crack me up. But I suspect (or hope) they know this, and prefer to bust our chops with a straight face. Who says your Germans lack a sense of humor?
GRADED ON A CURVE:
A
