For the rest of the week our worker's council sent me for a further training in labour law and communication and collaboration to Hamburg. So I had the idea to create some posts about the so called Hamburg school. It is a synonym for musical movement started at the end of the 80's until the mid 90's. Developed by new wave the bands combined elements of indie-rock, punk, grunge and pop and became an important part of German youth culture and made a new self-conception in using German language in popular music.
At the end of the 1980s, a German-language music scene was created in Hamburg, whose bands had no record contracts and did not release it anything. Only with the founding of the label L'age d'or in October 1988 this kind of music got a platform. One of the first acts that were signed was Huah! Formed by Frank Möller they made their very own thing between punk, hip-hop and soul. Sadly they never got the critical acclaim they should have.
Another band from Hamburg that never made great success was Kolossale Jugend. Named after Young Marble Giant's epic album Colossal Youth. This was guitar based indie rock, as it was so intense and reluctant at that time only American or British groups got it.
Another label that released bands from this genre was Alfred Hilsberg's What's So Funny About. Blumfeld's first albums were released on this label. Blumfeld are probably the ones that got success in these days. Their sound, originally strongly influenced by guitar feedback, turned into a more pop-oriented sound after the band was reshaped in the mid-1990s. The most important feature is the interleaved German lyrics, partly performed in voice vocals by the singer Jochen Distelmeyer, which combine their own emotional worlds with social criticism in pictorial language.
The latest hype in German independent music is Trümmer (ruins). Deeply based in the sound and tradition of influential German bands like Tocotronic, Blumfeld or Die Sterne from the mid 90's they make a real good and for German conditions an unique sound. I like the way they play their guitars and the way they arrange their songs. But I can't get any access to their lyrics. Many critics call them revolutionary and the voice of young German rebel kids but for me it is only prases of pubescent kids. But maybe it's only because I am too old to understand what a twen feels in these days. Anyway, it is up to you who don't speak German to form an opinion of your own about their music.
Let me take you back 20 years ago to German rock music. The Hamburg school is a loose music movement which originated in the end of the 1980s and reached her commercial high point middle him of 1990s. She went back to traditions of the new German wave and connected them with elements of Indie rock, punk, Grunge and pop. It was and is with it an important part of the German youth culture and brought a new self-image for the use of the German in the pop music with itself. In the beginning purely from Hamburg based bands like Cpt. Kirk &., Kolossale Jugend, Blumfeld , Die Goldenen Zitronen or Huah! carried, the Hamburg school is not simply a „storage tank of similarly sounding music“. It's distinguishes herself above all by German-speaking lyrics to which often a high intellectual claim is portioned out and which are connected extensively with society criticism, left political setting and postal-modern theories. In the middle of the 1990s became in particular of three bands very successful: Blumfeld, Die Sterne and Tocotronic. By the success of the Hamburg school also attained a lot of German-speaking guitar bands a higher fame whose attempts were not necessarily to be compared in music and text to the Hamburg school. However, with the establishment of a national, German-speaking indie-pop scene and the concept „Hamburg school“ became less important bit by bit. But this will be a story to be told another time.
So let me introduce some band from the 'Hamburg School' that made German ears listen to some new sounds:
And if I talk about the so called 'Hamburg School' this story would not be complete without any word about Bernd Begemann from Bad Salzuflen who was still a member of the scene. He did a lot of good things all over the years and I was glad to see him live last year in a very very small bar in Stuttgart.
Last week I told that me and Kerstin made the decision to go separate ways. Now I asked myself what to do with your new life? Should I creep away in my flat and live a life of sorrow or should I go out looking for another woman? I am not really sure what I thought I should at this time but I remember that I started to contact my older mates and friends more and more. I also started playing football again. The last thing I wanted to start was a new relationship again. But sometimes the life plays a trick to you and you cannot fulfil your intentions. This trick came to me with Christiane which I met in my local pub at the end of last year. I knew her for a long time because she has been in a relationship with my brother's class mate. The more we talked about nearly everything we recognized that we thought about most of the themes the same way. It was also great that we had the same kind of strange humor, liked the same movies and what was important - the same music. That's what I didn't knew from my former wife - she was in that fucking Cologne stuff not paying any listen to The Smiths or something like that. And at last thus we have become a couple. To find out whether we also can spend longer time together we booked a vacation to Southern Italy. And at least it worked. We had a real fine time in this small club spending a pretty nice time together. I remember one evening when we watched the UEFA Champions League final together. It might sound strange for a German but I supported Manchester United this evening. The reason is that I don't like that snooty team filled up with so called stars. So Mario Basler made a pretty goal and it looked like they are going to win another time. I ordered me another beer to stand the last five minutes as Teddy Sheringham tied in the injury time. And Ole Gunnar Solksjaer made it perfect to minutes later. We both were happy about this result and had a wonderful evening. But there was one more thing that impressed me more this year. We are able to watch a solar eclipse in our hometown. Presumably I will never get this experience again when the moon pushes before the sun and it becomes pitch-dark on midday. Totally silence on our market place and so a good feeling to have. It was also the year I quit my job because I got in trouble with my bosses. But this will be a story maybe told next time.
Here are some records I used to play this year ...
Blumfeld - Old Nobody: German Indie Pop at it's best
Blur - 13: Very good record including Tender
Terry Callier - Lifetime: A brilliant album by a legend
The Beta Band - The 3 Eps: Underrated at this time
Built To Spill - Keep it Like a Secret: Arty high school rock
Tom Waits - Mule Variations: He's back with a superb late work
Michael Franks - Barefoot on the Beach: It's jazz and a little funk but fine songs
Red Hot Chili Peppers - Californication: More direct than before and listen to the bass
Diana Krall - When I Look in Your Eyes: A lot of great ballads and versions on it
Underworld - Beaucoup Fish: Fantastic record made for dancefloor
Fun Lovin' Criminals - Mimosa: They were cool as hell at this time
... and some songs you will surely remember:
The movies we went in this was:
The Matrix: Bewildering story but style-pedagogic camera settings
Notting Hill: The romance of the year
American Beauty: Kevin Spacey at his best
The Green Mile: Just a wonderful movie
The Blair Witch Project: You don't need millions of dollars to make a great movie
Arlington Road: Are your neighbors terrorists?
Fight Club: Bored men try to get their fulfillment in boxing matches
Sleepy Hollow: Excellent pictures and a mystery story makes a fantastic movie
And some remarkable things that happened in 1999:
The Euro is established - no way back // Bill Clinton is acquitted in impeachment proceedings in the US Senate // Kurdish rebel leader Abdullah Öcalan is charged with treason in Ankara, Turkey // Former Warsaw Pact members Hungary, Poland and Czech Republic join NATO // A fire in the Mont Blanc Tunnel kills 39 people, closing the tunnel for nearly 3 years // For the first time the Dow Jones Industrial Average closes above the 10.000 mark // The Kosovo War drags on // Manchester United defeat Bayern Munich 2:1 in the injury time of the UEFA Champions League Final in Barcelona (thank you Mr. Solskjaer) // Napster debuts on Internet and millions starting downloading tracks .
I picked out this record by Jim O'Rourkeas the one that I connect with this year. Jim O'Rourke is an American musician, composer and director influenced with jazz and classical music. He collaborated at this time with Sonic Youth playing bass. Why I love this record? Because them compositions, arrangements and songs on it. This was one of the less records I listened from the first to the last song in a row. Never a dull moment on it. Even if he plays long and quiet songs. You think nothing will happen and suddenly some pearls begin to creep into your ears. And also the cover version of Burt Bacharach's Something's Big is worth to listen. Eureka is simply a masterpiece and very underrated.
