1036 words on German Music , Live
Oh, what a day! Or what a week, rather. On Monday night we received an e-mail newsletter from Café Glocksee that the wonderful Wir sind Helden will be having a small gig in Hannover in a small-ish club. How cool. I felt like I should go there and with Google not giving any relevant results on the event a few hours before it took place I figured that I should be able to get a ticket. So I went to the station rather than home after work and – shock horror! –learned that I must have taken my university card which also serves as a train ticket out of my card case. Not good at all! Luckily the conductor was nice enough to say that I should just search my rucksack and she’ll come back and see whether I found my ticket later on. Which she didn’t do. Cool! Some trouble saved there.
After stopping at Susanne’s place in Hannover and dropping my stuff there I went on to the club where quite a queue was in place already. From where I stood it didn’t look too bad but word spread that there wasn’t a proper queue at the front and people were just standing there in a massive bulk. But I’m not good at guessing the number of people in a group when seeing them and neither at estimating how many people you can fit in a room (four per square metre? six?), so I didn’t worry too much. What did worry me more at the time is the typically German lack of civilisation in queueing. Jumping the queue for whatever reason is done all the time and we saw plenty of people just walk past us. I really preferred the proper first come first served scheme in the UK where people are actually sent back – or just beaten up – when jumping the queue. None of that happens in Germany of course and the lesson to learn is that you really should skip the ‘queue’ bit of queueing and just join everybody as far in the front as you can. So in the end I didn’t get in. It looked like they could’ve easily filled the venue twice with the people who turned up.
A shame for sure but luckily there was another event on just down the road where Björn and Susanne were going anyway: Element of Crime were playing. As I may have pointed out before they are great. Not rock’n’roll, but quiet music with brilliant lyrics. The place was packed, but I still managed to get a ticket at the door. Luckily having to stand rather far back doesn’t spoil things too much for their kind of music. Which was still brilliant there. While it’s likely that you won’t be able to fully appreciate their music if you don’t know German and all the subtleties in their lyrics – which could merit the use of the word poetry – I still recommend checking out some of their songs.
As their music is rather quiet, doesn’t exhaust you when listening to it and as they have many albums to play great songs from, this is the kind of gig which you really want to go on an on. And it did. Enthusiastic noisemaking managed to get us four encores. Which I’d usually consider too many but which were just right in this case. Fantastic!
Siehst Du wie sich die Wolken zusammen drängen
Als ob es sie da oben alleine friert?
Ich hab nicht darum gebeten Dich wiederzusehen
Wer als erster von weinenden Wolken spricht verliert.
Frag mich nicht wie ich ohne Dich lebe
Den ganzen Tag unter Wasser und Spaß dabei;
Und alles geht immer irgendwie weiter
Im Himmel ist kein Platz mehr für uns zwei.
Siehst Du dort den orangenen Held der Entsorgung,
Der die schweren Container vom Hof an den Straßenrand schiebt?
Der ist heute da und übermorgen schon wieder,
Weil es immer wieder was wegzuschmeißen gibt.
Frag mich nicht ob ich noch bei Trost bin
Den ganzen Tag untröstlich und Spaß dabei;
Und alles geht immer irgendwie weiter
Im Himmel ist kein Platz mehr für uns zwei.
Siehst du den alten Mann mit der E-Gitarre,
Die er jeden Abend in höchster Erregung zerschlägt,
Die er jeden Morgen wieder mit Alleskleber
Zur Erregungsrequisite zusammenklebt.
Frag mich nicht ob ich dich noch liebe
Das Herz endlich gebrochen und Spaß dabei
Und alles geht immer irgendwie weiter
Im Himmel ist kein Platz mehr für uns zwei.
Element of Crime – Im Himmel ist kein Platz mehr für uns zwei
So let me try to translate this – at the cost of some of the beauty, I fear. The title of this one is There’s no more space in heaven for the two of us
or perhaps There’s no room in heaven for the two of us
or possibly the same with the sky
instead of heaven
.
Do you see how the clouds crowd together
as if on their own they’re freezing up there?
I didn’t ask to see you again,
whoever starts referring to crying clouds will lose.
Don’t ask how I live without you
under water all day and enjoying it.
And everything goes on anyhow
there’s no room in heaven for the two of us.
Do you see the orange hero of disposal
moving the heavy bins from the yard to the curbside?
He’s here today and the day after tomorrow again
because there’s always something to throw away.
Don’t ask whether I still am sane [bei Trost]
inconsolable [untröstlich] all day and enjoying it.
And everything goes on anyhow
there’s no room in heaven for the two of us.
Do you see the old man with the electric guitar,
which every night he breaks with the greatest passion,
which every morning with super glue
he reassembles to be the passion requisite.
Don’t ask whether I still love you
the heart finally broken and enjoying it
And everything goes on anyhow
there’s no room in heaven for the two of us.
Ah, great.
Try using last.fm for samples of some of the tracks. They have a little player for that right on the page.