RIDLEY ON KRAUTROCK
Each week, NICHOLAS RIDLEY, ex-Cabinet Minister, gives his frank and outspoken views on the current state of the German rock scene, from pop to the avant-garde.
EINSTURZENDE NEUBAUTEN
WELL, what the devil’s that supposed to mean? Sounds like so much Bosch tommy-rot to me. Ah. “Collapsing New Buildings”. Well, that figures. If they’d availed of good old British know-how then their damned towerblocks wouldn’t crumple in a heap when the first gust of wind came along. Butthat’s Fritz for you. Headstrong. Insular. Dashed dreadful racket. Sounds like a division of Panzer tanks rumbling over a tin bridge en route to annexing Poland. Singer sounds a dashed belligerent fellow. Bit of a “sour Kraut”, I say, what? Get it? Perhaps he’s grumbling because some enterprising British fellow beat him to the best place on the beach with his bathtowel. Come 1992 this is the sort of bilge we’ll be forcefed all day long. You won’t be able to get a Dame Vera Lynn record for all the Deutschmarks you can fit in a suitcase.
PROPAGANDA
YES, well, of course, this is something Jerry knows from soup to nuts. Remember Dr Josef Goebbels, Minister for Propaganda? They said he topped himself with a phial of cyanide, didn’t they? Well, think again. Who d’you think came up with that infernal “Vorsprung Durch Technik” slogan if not Herr Doktor himself? Fellow’s living high on the hog out Bolivia way. Wouldn’t surprise me in the least if he was the brains behind this bunch. I’ll tell you this much, if you play track two side two of this squad’s latest vinyl platter backwards, I’d stake my reputation you can hear them chanting typically Teutonic slogans —