a Metal Monday post.
Yes, most of you remember “Du Hast”. A crunching, aggressive, industrial, and not in English metal hit from years ago. Those who spoke German sang along and the rest of us banged our heads. Earlier this year the band released a new album that is one of the loudest, catchiest, meaningful, disturbing things I’ve ever heard.
“Deutschland” was the first single and first video from the band in 10 years. It’s a disturbing look at their homeland, for better or worse. History can be taught and understood but by no means can all of a country’s history be glorified. Rammstein shows the history isn’t all black and white but it does take paths down the blackest blacks and the whitest whites.
“Radio” is a history lesson from a divided country. The wall could block people, food, physical things from the East and West sides of the country. But walls can’t hold back radio waves. It’s a powerful statement on oppression, censorship, and fascist states. I wonder what inspired them to record such an album today.
If you speak German, or even want to run the song through a translator, there are some lines that land just as hard and others that seem to lose something in the translation. The music though speaks all languages. Heavy, aggressive, unforgiving. A power they created on their own and now harness and wield as deadly as any weapon.
Metal is one of the few music genres that knows no boundaries of borders or language. Any fan of the genre will hear something eye dropping from the first note and need drops by the end of this album.
MASKED LIBRARY 