Back

Metal Hammer – December 2005 - Rosenrot Review

Rammstein
Rosenrot
(Universal)

German industrial excellence once more.
Great as it is, the new System of a Down album ‘Hypnotise’ is really just half an album, a part of one body of work that also includes its predecessor ‘Mezmerize’. That’s sort of what we expected this Rammstein album to be: a slightly poor second half with some cast-offs from ‘Reise, Reise’. Rubbing groves with a few hastily recorded newbies to pad it out. But how wrong can you be?

‘Rosenrot’, particularly the first half of the record, is very much a companion to their 2004 album ‘Reise, Reise’. But when considered as a whole, it’s an album that stands independently, a collection of songs that is complete in itself.

The opener ‘Benzin’ is the perfect Rammstein song: snaky and sleazy enough to be considered sexy (in a darkly S&M sort of way) but also brutal and pulverising enough (also in a darkly S&M sort of way) to ignite the world’s moshpits. Typically, Rammstein’s music could function equally well as the soundtrack to a cheap East European porno flick or as psychological warfare: imagine hearing one of the strongest tracks is ‘Zerstören’ (‘Destroy’), Rammstein’s response on the global situation pumping from the speakers of your tank as you roll through Baghdad (or Washington DC).

The first four tracks – ‘Benzin’, ‘Mann gegen Mann’ (‘Man against Man’), ‘Rosenrot’ (‘Rose Red’), ‘Spring’ (‘Jump’) – stick rigidly to this paradigm. The album opens out with the achingly sad near-ballad ‘Wo Bist Du’ (‘Where are you’) before delivering the most obvious mainstream hit single ever ‘Stirb Nicht Vor Mir’ / ‘Don’t die before I do’, wherein Till Lindemann duets with Sharleen Spiteri from Scottish 80s pop band Texas. An unusual partnership to say the least. Till’s Teutonic rasp plays off against Sharleen’s honeyed, white soul vox in a song about doomed obsessive love. As if Rammstein know of any other kind. It may or may not be the duet that they once planned to do with Madonna, but given how much Mrs Ritchie’s star has waned recently, Sharleen may be a better partner to take them to the ‘real’ world of tabloid celebrity and daytime radio.

There are other oddities, like the cod-mariachi ‘Te Quiero Puta’ (‘I love you, Whore’) which opens woth spaghetti western samples and is liverally peppered with bad Mex-cliches and synthetic brass. It’s actually funny. Who says the Jerries have no sense of humour?

In the past Rammstein’s albums have always been slightly unsatisfactory, both underproduced and poorly planned: their real power lied in the live shows. With ‘Reise, Reise’ and ‘Rosenrot’ however they have delivered world class work without compromising on the heavy-duty industrial crunch of the music or on the German language. Hopefully they will kick open the doors and give other bands the confidence to sing in their own tongues. Rammstein wouldn’t really make sense if they sang in English: the fact that they have become an internationally successful act without making any concessions to the Anglo-American domination of popular culture says a lot about the potency of their music.
Here’s to world domination. (8)
Tommy Udo

Influenced by:
Ministry, Nine Inch Nails, Laibach.
Also try:
Die Krups ‘Odyssey of the Mind’ (Cleopatra, 1991)
KMFDM ‘Godlike’ (TVT, 1991)
Einstürzende Neubauten ‘Strategies Against Architecture ’80-‘83’ (Mute, 1995).

© 2005 Sue Lindemann