1000 Tears Deep

When Blumfeld released "Tausend Tränen tief" and their third album "Old Nobody" in 1999 their fans went berzerk, but not in a good way. It was a bit like when KISS went disco, or as a commenter on Youtube puts it: "when this came out it was the end! We were almost a youth-culture, we had lived with "Ich Maschine" and "L´Etat et Moi" every day. With "Old Nobody" we felt like abused children!".

Nine years prior Blumfeld, along with a handful of other German bands were the heads of a new indie-rock movement that combined guitar feedback and intellectual, German lyrics. After an almost five year hiatus the release of this new record must have felt as if Blumfeld have grown up and grown old at the same time.


"Tausend Tränen Tief" could be mistaken as a German George Michael song and it became a great success for the band, bringing in new listeners via a radio-friendly, timeless love song. One to be played at future funerals.

The video is a stroke of genius! We see Helmut Berger, the notorious, forgotten world star getting dressed up in a hotel suite. In between, Jochen Distelmeyer, Blumfeld´s voaclist is sitting in a taxi, driving through the night. Fireworks illuminate the sky and finally the two meet in the lobby. Formal handshake, champagne is ready, Berger refuses to drink. They begin to talk, Distelmeyer makes Berger laugh, the ice is broken. Is it the first meeting to discuss the idea of the video we have just seen? Early morning, Berger walks alone along a foggy lake, he fades away. The end.

Watch and listen:

The stunt casting of Berger secured heavy rotation on all music channels and today "Tausend Tränen tief" is a classic of German pop music, a genre that still has not that many contenders.

Anyway, it has to be said that Berger really owns his part. The way he flips through the selection of his suits, the moments of inner turmoil as he is riding the elevator... A legendary person who happily enjoys being a legend for pay, for this one day.


As with most great songs, the lyrics are almost banal. I tried to translate the words as close as possible, including some awkward grammatical terms, trying to saty true to the ambivalence of the original lyrics.

"Thousand Tears Deep"
within me
thousand tears deep
sounds an old song
it could mean so much
into the day
it wants to be with you
it sings to you only
of new possibilities

come to me in the night
we hold each other tight
until the day awakes
kiss me then
as if it was the first time

with you
into a different blue
we share a dream
a picture from different times
like you are a part of me
I am a part of you
I can feel it
the way we touch

a song of two people
how love feels
we flow in rhythm
to the sun
everything is earthly
the world lies dark
we float as a whole
the night belongs to us

within me
thousand tears deep
sounds an old song
it could mean so much.

Decapitate your Mate!

"He´s behind you, he´s got swine flu!" Funny, clever and sexy Mike Skinner aka The Streets launched a great and biting viral comment on the swine flu paranoia. If you consider a mix of cleverly edited gory scenes from various horror films set to Mike´s rap as NSFW, you should probably watch it at home.

Dreamlando

As far as I can think back, I was always fascinated with Japan, amusement parks and tacky, mass-produced kitsch.

All of these obsessions seem to have met at "Nara Dreamland", or "Nara Dorīmurando" as the Japanese would say it.


clicking on pics increases the magic!

"Nara Dreamland" opened in 1961, near the city of Nara. It is always said that the Japanese like to copy things, while making them better in the process. "Dreamland" on the other hand just copied "Disneyland", there was nothing better about it.


Some parts of "Dreamland", like the entrance and train-station look like a carbon copy of its Californian inspiration. The whole layout of the park, the castle and most of the rides are also copied.


The fact that the park opened just six years after Disneyland shows what an impact Disney´s ideas must have had worldwide. Upon closer inspection "Dreamland" might have taken the ideas but certainly not the imagination and devotion that made Disney parks such a lasting success.


Where Disney´s imagineers went all the way to create convincing and immersive worlds, "Dreamland" used cardboard, concrete and plastic. This makes it so much more interesting for me.


Through the years, the park must have lost it´s artificial magic as the owners jusr added random rides and coasters without integrating them into the faux-Disney-look. With the opening of the immensely popular Tokyo Disneyland in 1983 the naive 20 year old forerunner in Nara must have appeared like an embryonic version from a parallel universe.


Neglect and dwindling visitor numbers took its toll on "Dreamland". Throughout the late nineties and early 00s the park was almost looking abandoned. By the end of august 2006 the "Dreamland" closed its doors forever.


Here you can witness "Nara Dreamland" on opening day in 1961. The resemblance the park had to Disneyland in this early phase is uncanny and amazing. The second video is even longer and shows more of original rides like the "Jungle Cruise".


The last video shows bits of Dreamland in its later days, when the crowds have gone and only a handful of school-children are stumbling across the cracked concrete.


A bizarre photo-trip to Dreamland, shortly before it was closed can be enjoyed here.

Tripping Round The Acid House

Here is a very interesting British TV feature, "A Trip Round Acid House" that mainly focusses on the media reaction (from demonization to exploitation) towards the exploding youth culture of the late 1980´s.


Part two and part three.

Memorabilia

Lyric excerpt "Memorabilia" by Soft Cell

Counterpoint

Not much is known about Delphic, apart from the fact that they are from Manchester.

Their first single "Counterpoint" is released on Belgian R&S records (go figure) and it sounds like the inevitable "crosspoint" of recent indie-dance productions like Cut Copy, Friendly Fires, more upbeat Junior Boys and fellow Manchester legends New Order and Section 25.


The Sequencer is back in poppy dance rock and "Counterpoint" hits straight on the twelve. The video, on the other hand, is a bit shitty.

Remember

1 City | 2 Lives | 3 Reasons | 4 Nights
Remember | Remember Me | This Way


Lyric excerpt "Remember" by John Foxx/Nation 12

Andy Time

Some pictures taken from TIME Magazine, showing Andy Warhol at various social gatherings. I feel that I have been to almost all those parties, since he told his diary about where he had been, who had been there and how much he had paid for the taxi to get there. Sometimes, when he was hanging with someone really rich, they would have a private limousine and Andy would be very happy.

Bob Guccione, Pia Zadora, Andy Warhol, Meshulam Riklis

Andy Treat: Andy and the delicious Treat Williams

Shooting Pia Zadora

When I visited the USA for the first time in 1990 I pretty soon found out that renting a limousine wouldn´t cost us much more than taking a taxi. I thought that Andy was such a child...

Andy walks with Nicki De Saint Phalle

with Laurie Anderson and something ugly on the wall

Andy was right, of course. Today it has become the ultimate tourist attraction to ride around with your small-town friends in a rented stretch limo (preferably a ridiculous, 12 meter Hummer). You can feel as v.i.p as you like as long as you don´t leave the car. After that you still have to queue up for the club and you´ll never know if they let you in. Feeling special because you ride in a limousine is still very, very childish...but you´ll always look better on photos.

Bette, Balloons, Ashtray

Barbie & Andy

Rip Up My Passion Pit

Inspired by the urban chiffre of finger thick layered, half ripped-off posters and flyers, Passion Pit´s new video "The Reeling" tries to create this decayed and frayed look. According to the production company Humble, the process of destroying and re-creating the footage took about a month.
Looking cheap was never easy!

Fashion Pack

It was night and suddenly I felt like dancing.
I took a cab to show me to the disco scene.

He said: "O.k., you wanna see those crazy people, hustling at the door to get into Studio 54?!"


When I was in, everybody was travolting!
The fashion queens, the models and the movie stars.
Andy snapping, Margeaux dancing with Scavullo. Liza dancing on the floor and Bianca walking through the door.

Who is In?
Who is out?
Tell me, tell me, tell me!

Who is in?
Who is out?
Famous and trendy?!


"In-People" always have to smile in "Vogue".
They only travel by Concorde.
Doing things YOU can´t afford!


They are the fashion pack. The people you see in the magazines.
They are the fashion pack. They are always smiling in their limousines.

They only come out after dark, got to keep on their trendy tracks.
They are the fashion pack.

Rockstars sniffing, while Marisa is posing.
Bianca counting her paintings, the models of Zoli´s flirting...


Hey! what's your name?
Didn't I see you in "Interview" last month, or was it the "Ritz"?
Gee, You're so famous!
May I have your autograph?
Thanks! I will keep it forever!!!



Lyrics excerpt "The Fashion Pack", lyrics by Amanda Lear, 1979