Rammstein commentary

When I first heard "Du Hast" in the mid-90s, I kind of wrote it off as novelty metal. When I tell friends I'm a big fan, they often laugh based on the same assumption. I initially took the song at face value: a metal jam about being hated, pretty standard fare. However, one day a friend said that one could interpret "du hast mich" as either "you hate me"  or as "you have me".  This ambiguity turns the song into a much more emotionally complex piece of art. It also gives perfect context to the definitive Rammstein sound: heavily palm muted rhythm guitar juxtaposed against new wave keyboard melodies. These two sounds are great complements, and they keep drawing me back to this band, because we don't often hear them played together this well.

I often point to Depeche Mode as the biggest influence on Rammstein's music, which sounds strange at first. However, their cover of "Stripped" shows that they're coming from the same place as DM with respect to dark sexual imagery and powerful synth lines. Similarly, "Ich Tu Dir Weh" (from their 2009 album) is based around a soulful chorus and breathy, teasing verses that would make Dave Gahan proud. DM's bigger guitar jams - "I Feel You" comes to mind - would fit easily on a Rammstein album, and I could definitely see DM doing "Engel" or "Haifisch" quite beautifully. 

There's one song to which I keep coming back: "Keine Lust" from 2004's "Reise, Reise". Besides a fantastic video featuring the band dressed up as dramatically obese versions of themselves, this song is sparsely and sharply constructed. We hear the giant spaces between guitar riffs, and the drums are pure and heavy. Alien-sounding synth licks hide at the ends of a few bars for the first part of the song, but in the 2nd half they jump up and round out the vocal performance, so the climax and coda are pure headbanging bliss.

I got to see Rammstein live in Cleveland in 99, and it was a wonderful spectacle. Lead vocalist Til Lindemann is giant and beautiful and expressive. At various points through the night he shot flames from his hands, feet and head. He jerked off a giant dildo and sprayed the crowd with it. He felt up every member of the band and headbanged to every song. He was like the Terminator, but with soul - easily the most energetic person in the room, and I would jump at the chance to see this band again. 

The thing that really sets this band apart is that while they draw from dark and often depressing themes and images, the music is really quite poppy (especially for a German industrial band). This music invokes demons, and then faces them down without fear or irony. They've got the grandstanding of the best arena rock bands, but the dark, gruff sexiness of the best gothic glam bands. Four albums out from "Du Hast" with another due out in 2014, Rammstein has shown me that not only are they not a novelty act, but their unique sound continues to make their music fun and satisfying.  

PJ Harvey "Uh Huh Her" Commentary

There's a sexual act known as "edging" in which one is repeatedly stimulated almost to the point of orgasm, and then left alone for a moment. For many people this can result in an extended state of heightened arousal, but it takes patience and practice and gentleness. PJ Harvey's 2004 album, "Uh Huh Her" is the musical equivalent thereof.

This record is expertly executed and entirely empty of the usual tricks rock records use to grab us emotionally: there are no big opening hooks, no loud/quiet/loud dynamic, no 12 bar blues. Instead, we have understated instruments often bordering on lo-fi or the folk-singer-slob style of Sebadoh or early Beck. We have Harvey herself teasing and howling. Mouthy but not throaty, she's clearly holding back and exploring more subtle vocal textures. I confess I find this both appealing and at times off-putting, because I want to hear her wail.

"No Child of Mine" is my favorite on on this album. Barely over a minute long, Harvey harmonizes with herself and plays a chord progression so simple it's hypnotic. I keep waiting for the drums and the bass to come in, but like a proper punk, she gets in, says what she needs to say, and gets out. This band has soul to spare, and for better or for worse it leaves me wanting more.

"Cat on the Wall" follows, a rich chocolate truffle of a song, full of fuzzed out layers of bass and voice. Harvey growls at us and hints at letting go, but never does. Amazingly enough, we can hear what sounds like her ghost singing beautifully in the background, but it blends in with the keyboard, and hides behind the drums.

I can't say that this record ever really lets go, and there the metaphor breaks down, as I also can't say it's unsatisfying. It's not: it's as provocative and thoughtful as everything in this band's catalog so far. Taken as an exploration of musical textures as opposed to a collection of songs, it's very satisfying. However, overall, depending on set and setting, this can be either quite a sensual album, or quite a frustrating one.  

Love on the Dance Floor

     I absolutely and happily admit I have gone to the club to meet women. No question, and I would do it again under the same circumstances. But looking back on those times, I realize that while this choice was instinctual for me, it was by no means inevitable. Proper dancers are a relatively rare breed, and only a handful of us were regular clubbers and ravers. Everyone else was going to bars and mini-golf courses to meet people. I know now that really, I did it because I wanted to meet women who loved to dance. That's why I'm not ashamed. To meet a life partner, one has to do what one loves, and meet other people who love to do that same stuff. I danced, and I hoped to meet ladies who did, too.

     It didn't work back then, generally speaking. In all my club years, I met exactly one woman that I got to date (we're still friends and she's done awesome stuff with her life). At my first proper rave, I met a woman I still count among my best friends, but these two ladies are notable for being the exception. The club was a crappy place to go to hook up with strangers. What we really did there was bond and transcend. 

     I'm trying to write this while listening to dance music. I can't: I have to turn the sound off. It stops the flow, takes me out of sentence- and paragraph-length thoughts. When really feeling a great beat, I can sense the core - the root - of my consciousness because the past and future fall away. There is only the Rhythm Right Now, and it is plenty.

     Spent this past Saturday night on a dance floor. It was my living room, and we were dancing for my birthday. This was the purest dance experience I'd had in a while, and it both satisfied me and left me hungry for more. The core of us was just a handful of people: 10 or so out of the maybe 40 or 50 people there danced all night. We smiled, we sang along, we called for responses, and we responded to calls. We had a comment here and there, but in the way of old friends hanging out, we needed very little to enjoy each other's company. Thus we bond: we deepen friendship through shared experiences. 

     For those of us instinctually wired to love to dance, the richly physical act thereof brings great bodily pleasure. When my favorite song is on or I'm particularly feeling a beat, I will close my eyes, throw my head back and breathe deeply, just to open up to the music as much as possible. I looked around this weekend and at moments saw a roomful of people doing exactly that move, dripping with the sweat of a great workout. When so strongly feeling our physical selves while moving with powerful rhythms, we can easily forget the daily heaviness of life. Dancing takes away my stress, because my body can hold no stress while manifesting rhythm. Dancing cures my worries, because energetic physical movement affirms my existence. Thus we transcend: we move past the daily work of life and feel the play of our bodies in the here and now. 

     We bond, we transcend: this is the truest church I know. In dancing we let go our conscious and separate selves to join in something much greater; These moments are religious experiences. The beauty of it is: we've always had this love on the dance floor, from the nights we went out hoping to meet somebody to the nights we go out ready to celebrate somebody we met years ago. We benefit from dancing in the short and long terms and it takes no belief, requires no faith or dogma. Just a stereo or an instrument, a body to move, and a heart to move it.