http://www.slavestate.se/?e=2914
Oomph! are one of the biggest
and most influential bands in German Industrial Metal. They are even considered
to be the founders of Neue Deutsche Härte, the music genré that Rammstein made world
famous. They haven’t stuck to that but instead explored other styles and
developed over the years, something that has led to some criticism from older
fans. Their last album “Des Wahnsinns Fette Beute” had a lukewarm reception
because it was more lighthearted and poppy. With their new album “XXV” they
return to a darker rock sound but without repeating themselves. I managed to
meet the frontman, Dero, for an in depth conversation about the album,
politics, ageing and a lot more. The band also consists of Flux (guitar) and
Crap (guitar, keyboards).
First I asked Dero about the
new album.
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I think it’s
pretty versatile even though there is a dark line that goes through all the
songs. They are more rock oriented and we developed them with how they were
going to sound live in mind. We went back to the basics of rock music and
reduced the electronic influences a lot. I’m looking forward to perform the
songs on stage with two guitarists, a bass player, drummer, percussionist,
keyboardist and me as the singer. That’s what Oomph! is about! We don’t cling
to the old album and repeat it with new lyrics. We can’t please everyone and if
we had to think about what some fans would like, we would lose the main thing
with art: to be creative and authentic.
When I interviewed Dero two
years ago, he said that they already had 30 songs and that the album would be
out soon. Why did it take such a long
time?
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It was so
difficult to choose the right songs. We also added a few more after some jam
sessions. The whole writing process took such a long time because it was hard for
us to feel satisfied. The result is really cool and reflects different facets
of darkness in life. The album is “14 Shades of Black”. There are so many
different ways to approach darkness, so there are up-tempo, groovy, medium
heavy and slow ballads on the album. We want it to be like a rollercoaster and
always surprise you.
The earlier albums had filmic
interludes in between the songs, such as quotes from “Psycho” and the “Exorcist”.
They also had instrumental atmospheric pieces that could have been from a
soundtrack for a film.
Is this something we could hear again?
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Not directly but
Crap is still doing similar things for the intros. We wanted, as I said, to reduce
the electronics, so it’s now more orchestral, with choirs, strings and similar
real traditional instruments. In the future we might do something similar but
on this record it’s all about songs with lyrics.
The new album is co-produced
by Simon Michael from “Subway to Sally”. In the past Oomph has collaborated
with quite a few German big names like the Punk legend Nina Hagen.
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We just called
her up! At that time she was living in Ibiza. She said that she knew of us and
that our music was cool. We sent her the song and two weeks later we were in
the studio recording it. She was so professional and versatile with her voice. She can sing everything from rock, punk to opera.
There won’t be any more collaborations on the new one. We are open for
everything but you can’t force these things, they happen naturally.
2014 was actually Oomph!’s
25th anniversary but this year they celebrate the fact that they started
playing live as a band in 1990. So, the cover has “XXV” in Roman numerals.
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That’s right! We
think that’s more interesting because you never know how you can interpret it.
It could also have something to do with “X” and “Y” chromosomes.
Last year Oomph put on a live
performance at the Wave Gothic Treffen in Leipzig. Earlier Dero had posed half
naked and tied up in some artistic bondage pictures by the photographer Ronny
Zeisberg. He helped them to stage a special show with fully naked body painted
dancers. Is this a new direction for the
band and didn’t Dero himself say that society is over sexualized?
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We had the chance
to do it so we went for it. It’s what we stand for: to always try something
new. You try not to think too much about what is good, right or wrong. Just be
free as an artist and not create your own mind traps, because music has to come
from the heart. When there are too much mind and logic in music it gets too
technical but if it’s too much the other way it can also get a bit boring. So,
you have to try and find a balance between everything and that can be hard. I
said and still think that society is over sexualized but that’s how it is with
Oomph!, to be ambiguous, you never quite
know what we actually mean. You are supposed to question if we are serious or
if we are making fun of it. The more question marks it raises, the further it
reaches as art. Too many exclamation marks are boring. I think the dark side of
sexuality has always been there in my soul, so I thought it was time to let it
out. But as I said, I think repetition is boring and I have now shown that side
of me. There are many more to come. We are not going back to something we have
already done like the more humouristic side of the last album. Maybe some black
humour but this time it’s more like a nightmare than a fun LSD trip.
Is it still possible to shock?
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I think you first
have to build new walls so that we can tear them down. In our society there are
none left, so perhaps we have to create new taboos because it feels like there
are none left to break. There are in other societies but religious
fundamentalism is an old thing, you know. It’s as old as mankind, so it will
remain forever. This seems shocking to us because we think we are free but our
kind of freedom scares other people. It’s not understandable for everybody. We
can’t make the mistake of judging them and try to impose our kind of democracy
on each society. That’s impossible in my eyes, because there are many societies
that don’t want to live as free as we do. We have to accept that but not if
they try to stop our way of life. That’s when we have to tell them “Stop, not
with us!” It’s a very dangerous balancing act like after what happened in Paris
with the terrorist attack on the magazine Charlie Hebdo. They needed a
scapegoat and people always want to generalize so they started hating Muslims.
Like most of us know there is only a minority of them that will react so fundamentally.
The media is constantly reporting about atrocities from these countries to
scare us. It’s the same with America where we only see black people committing
crimes. We have to be careful and skeptical with what the news is trying to
tell us. Our children must learn that they are constantly being manipulated
even in a so-called “free” society like Germany.
I have only included a
fraction of his long statement about the corrupt media, prejudices and
religious fundamentalism here. Dero likes to go in to big political and
philosophical arguments, something he does frequently on his Facebook page.
Unusually for a rock star, he sits there for hours, discussing with fans from
all over the world.
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I think it’s
important to ask questions more so than to receive answers. There are so many
people, especially politicians, who suggest they know the solution but I don’t
think they have a clue. There is no final answer but rather seven billion! In
our modern world where we are all connected through new media, we have to
realise that it’s very hard to find a truth. We have to ask ourselves who is
making us believe in their version and who created it. All I know is that I
want to keep this level of freedom because I remember the time when Europe and
Germany were divided. When we in one country had borders and different
currencies. I want to continue to live in a united Europe. Of course there are
problems like those with the financial sector but I am so grateful that I can
move freely in the union. It was so amazing for me to see Germany grow together
again. As we all know, you can’t divide a culture forever, that’s impossible. I
think that North and South Korea will eventually be re-united. It might take 50
or even a 100 years but the border will open.
Sometimes it really heats up
on the net when Dero is holding court. Many conservative fans don’t approve of
his liberal views and some female fans attack each other out of jealousy. Can an internet addiction be as dangerous
as a physical one?
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Of course, all
addictions are and there are people who are on-line the whole time. They start
to take things too seriously and attack others. It’s also about cultural
differences and that many come from countries where you can’t criticize your
government. They think it’s not possible to express yourself against what they’ve
been taught by the media. The net is a good place to rehearse standing up for
your rights. There is still a certain amount of freedom there and we have to
try and keep it like that. As we know, there is no ultimate freedom because
that might mean you violate someone else’s. We have to be careful though,
because, as we know, there are always people in the background trying to push
us in one direction or the other. In the end it’s all about money. As we know,
nothing is free. Politics is not as complicated as they want us to believe,
because it’s all about territory and profit.
One of Oomph!’s songs “Wer
Schön Sein Muss Leiden” is about the insanity around plastic surgery and how
people are doing anything to try and stay young. Dero is indisputably a very
good looking man but he is now 45, so I wondered if there is any pressure on
him to stay young through surgery.
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I don’t want to
point the finger at those who do it. If they think it looks nice, it’s up to
them. Personally I don’t want to live in a world where everyone is doing the
same things because they feel pressured. I want to see old, young, ugly and
different faces. The world should be as varied and colourful as possible. Everyone
should be accepted and people should be allowed to age their way, not the way
society dictates. Of course, if you can’t stand getting older, you should be
able to do what you want about it. As we know though, they don’t look young but
ridiculous. It’s a part of life and would it be possible to look young at the
age of 90? It would be strange. You would look in the mirror and think “No, I
don’t want to die because I am looking young!” It’s kind of sick, because you
see yourself getting old and then you are fine with the fact that we are all
going to die. I don’t have anything against death, it shows us how precious
life is. Without death we would be like zombies or vampires who long for death.
The whole universe is full of counter parts and ambiguous stuff. It’s important
to have that balance between the two sides. It’s plus/minus, cold/hot,
light/dark and so on. Some think they can defeat death but that’s impossible
and ludicrous to even think so. Everything nowadays is so fixated on youth and
health. Society tries to tell us that if you are young and strong you are
successful. As we know, we are that just for a short amount of time. I think we
have to find a new way to relate to ageing. There used to be so many cultures
that adored old wise people. The oldest were the smartest, not like here where
they try to suggest that the youngest are. You need experience to get wise so a
twenty year old can’t be, in my eyes.
No labels
Dero also has a side project,
What About Bill?, with the producer Chris Wolff. They play swing jazz covers of
famous heavy metal songs dressed up in American police uniforms. This year it
has been on ice because of Chris’s health problems.
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He had a serious
disease but he was cured and is now recovering. The project is still alive even
though it’s just for fun. We want to shoot some more videos and try to play
some gigs but we’ll see what time will allow.
When we were talking about
different music genrés I asked Dero how he feels about some people crediting
Oomph! as the inventors of NDH.
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It’s really funny
to read and hear that because when we started there wasn’t anything called
that. I think it was after five or six years that we first started to hear that
we were the inventors of NDH. At that point we were no longer so “Neu” and not
really “Deutsch” either. We are bastards from all over Europe. People always
seem to want to label everything but if they are happy with it, why not?
A few years ago the Schlager
singer, Heino, did covers of Oomph!’s biggest hit, “Augen Auf”, and Rammstein’s
“Sonne”. Heino, at the age of 72, had such a big hit with this cover album that
he has now released one with heavy metal versions of his own songs. Dero’s
fellow band members Flux and Crap produced some of them.
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Ha ha, that was
their revenge! He did our song, so they did his. It was good to see that he has
a sense of humour.
Are there any new bands he likes?
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There are quite a
few, like Hozier for example, they are cool. I also like a lot of German bands
like Kraftklub or Deichkind. The latter have very funny lyrics and I appreciate
how they use the German language. Hip Hop and Rap write their texts in a
completely different way. These guys are really creative and invent new words.
Unzucht are also good. Their singer Daniel Schulz is doing a great job and he
is such a nice guy.
Dero is completely teetotal,
something that is very unusual in the rock world. He says he has no problems
with resisting temptation and that no one tries to pressure him to drink.
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I have grown out
of that stage in my life. My life is all about changes, so I am done with it.
It just became boring, that’s all.
When he is not playing Rock ‘n’
Roll and discussing politics he likes to go scuba diving. He has had a sports
diver’s license for 20 years but he also likes to go on more cultural trips to
places like Seville, Paris and Rome.
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There are so many
ancient, historical places with different cultures. I love to explore and it’s also important for
our own development to see how much they already knew back then. Even though we
think they were so dumb, they definitively weren’t. Without computers and
technology they managed to calculate and figure out how to shape their
societies. Hopefully we can learn from our past.
After having warmed up with a
few festivals such as Wacken Open Air over the summer, they will take the new
album out on tour. Gone are the camp sailors from the last one. Now it’s
serious with black leather instead. Will
they also have a big stage show?
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Yes, like the
Eurovision Song Contest! Congratulations to Sweden by the way. He really did a
cool performance. I like the idea with the video screens, it must have been
hard to create and stage. The song was also good even though it’s radio pop. I
am not completely against pop! Some of the best songs ever made are that, like
Soft Cell’s “Tainted Love” (Actually a cover). No seriously, we’re not going to
dance around with animated stick men. That belongs to the Eurovision. We are
mainly a Rock ‘n’ Roll live band and we don’t want the visuals to take over.
The focus should be on us and the music, or people will leave and say that the
show was great but they can’t remember the band. Rammstein do it but you can’t
compare us. We never had the intention of playing on German stereotypes and
clichés. They were big in America before Germany, because they delivered what
they wanted. I think it was Richard who said that Rammstein are not a band but
theatre. Which is perfectly ok and they do it very well but we won’t ever roll
with the “R’s” or play with fire.
Photos: Ronny Zeisberg
Live Photos: Maria Bergman
