Germany!

Rodney Anonymous vs. The World

by Rodney Anonymous

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Published: Apr 14, 2009

"I speak Spanish to God, Italian to women, French to men and German to my horse." —Charles V

Germans. They make the most reliable cars, the creepiest porn and the best techno. This is because shortly after inventing those two other technocessities, beer and lederhosen, the Germans stumbled upon the highly efficient method of plugging in synths and samplers, and then threatening to shoot them if they failed to produce a song.

This brings us to Schallfaktor, whose latest CD, Sittenverfall, is a lot better than it has any right to be. Theoretically, anyone could've made this CD; all they would need are some glitchy beats and atmospheric synth pads. Of course, if everyone did this the result would be about as listenable as Stephen Hawking singing the greatest hits of Ernest Tubb, simply because not everyone is German. To pull this stuff off, one needs that special X-Faktor that only Germans seem to possess.

By the way, even though two of the songs — "Suicide Confession" and "Malfunction" — are sung in English, it really helps if you speak German. Not that you'd enjoy this CD any more, but at least you'd know that "Mein Gerbel ubst geige morgen fruh im dem Kartoffelstadt" means "My gerbil practices violin early tomorrow in the potato city."

Verdict:

As long as the Germans are kept busy making cars and techno, they're less likely to get up to any mischief, so let's encourage them to channel their energies in those two more productive areas.

(r_anonymous@citypaper.net)

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