Nikhil Dev

Rammstein is a German band that was formed in 1994. Their musical style incorporates elements of metal/hard rock, industrial metal, and electronic music. The band is also widely accepted as part of the Neue Deutsche Härte-scene, alongside bands such as Oomph! and Die Krupps. Some critics have also dubbed their sound as Tanz-Metall (lit. “Dance metal”) . Their songs are performed almost exclusively in German. They have sold over 12 million records worldwide.

Rammstein takes its name indirectly from the western German town of Ramstein-Miesenbach, site of an airshow disaster in 1988. The band’s signature song, the eponymous “Rammstein”, is a commemoration of the tragedy that took place at the Ramstein Air Base. The extra “m” in the band’s name allows the word to mean “battering ram” (literally “ramming stone”), reinforcing the image of the band’s music as fierce and relentless. Also, the verb “rammen” in german, means to hit something. With that said, the name is really a wordgame, made of the town’s name and an extra “m” in relation to the air-show tragedy. Despite lyrics that are in German, the band has enjoyed success outside of Germany, in Europe, North America, Mexico and South America, as well as Japan, India, Australia and New Zealand. With the album Reise, Reise (2004), they became the most successful German-language band of all time internationally. Rammstein has had several top ten singles in Europe. The asteroid 110393 Rammstein is named in the band’s honour. The Rammstein website released a statement on the bands new tour in 2008 saying “rammstein will hopefully be touring most of europe in 2008,and are currently about to begin work on a new album for late 2007″ (Statement from Big John McAleer)

The band’s members all come from the former East Germany, specifically East Berlin and Schwerin. They are:

• Till Lindemann – lead vocals
• Richard Zven “Scholle” Kruspe – lead-guitar
• Paul H. Landers – rhythm-guitar
• Oliver “Ollie” Riedel – bass-guitar
• Christoph “Doom” Schneider – drums
• Christian “Flake” Lorenz – keyboards

Riedel, Schneider and Kruspe were the original founders of Rammstein, following an attempt by the latter to compose American-influenced music with a West Berlin band called Orgasm Death Gimmick. As Kruspe put it, “I realized it’s really important to make music and make it fit with your language, which I didn’t do in the past. I came back [to Germany] and said, ‘It’s time to make music that’s really authentic.’ I was starting a project called Rammstein to really try to make German music.” He invited Till Lindemann, a basket-weaver and drummer for the band First Arsch, to join the project as a vocalist. The four entered a contest for new bands and won, attracting the interest of Paul H. Landers, who knew them all and decided to join the band. Christian “Flake” Lorenz was the last member to join; he had played with Landers before in the band Feeling B and was initially reluctant to come on board, but was eventually persuaded to join. Their first album was released a year later. They have been nominated for two Best Metal Performance Grammy Awards: in 1999 with the song “Du hast” and in 2005 with the song “Mein Teil”.

Although Rammstein is often generalized as industrial metal, its music spans a variety of related styles, including hard rock and heavy metal. The band was strongly influenced by Laibach, a Slovenian neo-classical and industrial group. Other influences include DAF (Deutsch-Amerikanische Freundschaft), Oomph! and Ministry, but the contrast between individual songs such as “Bestrafe mich”, “Ohne dich” and “Te quiero puta!” makes the band difficult to classify.

Rammstein’s style has tended to divide critics, some of whom have responded with memorable comments. Jam Showbiz (April 2001) described Mutter as “music to invade Poland to.” New Zealand’s Southland Times (Dec. 17, 1999) suggested that Till Lindemann’s “booming, sub-sonic voice” would send “the peasants fleeing into their barns and bolting their doors.” The New York Times (Jan. 9, 2005) commented that on the stage, “Mr. Lindemann gave off an air of such brute masculinity and barely contained violence that it seemed that he could have reached into the crowd, snatched up a fan, and bitten off his head.” Other critics have been more positive. Stephen Thomas Erlewine of All Music Guide commented that “their blend of industrial noise, grinding metal guitars, and operatic vocals is staggeringly powerful”^[5]. “We just push boundaries,” said Till Lindemann in an interview with rock magazine Kerrang!. “We can’t help it if people don’t like those boundaries being pushed.”

Despite Rammstein’s brutalist image, many of its songs lyrics demonstrate a certain sense of humour. “Zwitter”, for example, is a bizarre take on narcissism (and bisexuality) through the person of a hermaphrodite:

Wenn die anderen Mädchen suchten (When the others searched for girls)

Konnt ich mich schon selbst befruchten (I could already fertilize myself)

Similarly, the song “Amerika” features a tongue-in-cheek adaptation of the normal chorus:

We’re all living in Amerika

Coca-Cola, Wonderbra! Usually “Amerika ist wunderbar” (”America is wonderful”), in one chorus is sung as “Coca-Cola, sometimes war”

We’re all living in Amerika

Amerika, Amerika!

Some of their songs show unexpected influences. “Dalai Lama” is an adaptation of the famous poem “Der Erlkönig” by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. “Hilf mir” was inspired by the short story “Die gar traurige Geschichte mit dem Feuerzeug” (from “Der Struwwelpeter“) by Heinrich Hoffmann. “Rosenrot” is inspired by the poem “Heidenröslein” by Goethe and the story Schneeweißchen und Rosenrot by Brothers Grimm.

Nearly all of Rammstein’s lyrics are in German. However, the band did record English versions of “Engel” , “Du hast” and “Amerika”, as well as covers of the songs “Stripped” (Depeche Mode) and “Pet Sematary” (The Ramones). In addition, the songs “Amerika” (German version), “Stirb nicht vor mir//Don’t die before I do” and “Moskau” contain not only German verses, but also English and Russian choruses, respectively; “Te quiero puta!” is entirely in Spanish. “Ollie” Riedel commented that “German language suits heavy metal music. French might be the language of love, but German is the language of anger.” (Sunday Herald Sun, Melbourne, Australia, October 24, 2004).

Wordplay is a fundamental component of Rammstein’s lyrics. In many instances, the lyrics are phrased such that they can be interpreted in several ways. The song “Du hast”, for example, is a play on German marriage vows (”Willst du, bis der Tod euch scheidet, treu ihr sein für alle Tage?” - “Will you, until death separates you, be faithful to her for the rest of your days?”).This is the English Translation. But it is sung (In English),
You You hate You hate me You hate me to say You hate me to say And I did not obey

Will you until death does sever Be upright to her forever

NEVER!

Will you ’til death be her rider Her lover too, to stay inside her

NEVER!
In the song, the traditional affirmative response, “ja” (”yes”), is replaced by its negation “nein” (”no”). The final repetition of this line further perverts the meaning of the original vows through a minor change in the wording: “Willst du, bis zum Tod der Scheide,(…)” (”Will you, until the death of the vagina…”) (where ‘vagina’ can refer to the woman), but it could also be interpreted as: “Willst du bis zum Tod, der scheide, “, which would have the meaning of: “Will you, until death separates, …”. The song starts, in fact, with a play on words: “Du… Du hast… Du hast mich…” meaning, “You have me”. This line is often mistaken for “You hate me”, which is wrong, because in German, there is a clear distinction between “du hasst” (double “s”) which means “you hate” and “du hast” (single “s”) which means you have. The verbs are hassen (hate) and haben (have). The wordgame is later resolved as the line is completed: “Du hast mich gefragt” (”You [have] asked me”).

Rammstein often uses rhyming to create similar effects. For example, from the song “Los”:

Es ist hoffnungslos (”It is hopeless”)

Sinnlos (”Senseless”)

Hilflos (”Helpless”)

Sie sind Gott [break]

Los

The last two lines above can be interpreted in three ways. “Sie sind Gott. / Los!” can mean “They are God. / Go!”; “Sie sind Gott los” can be translated as “They got rid of God;” while “Sie sind gottlos” means “they are godless”. However, in the context of the rest of the lyrics, the most likely meaning is the third one.

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