20 Shades of Province
Around 1981, provincial Germany was an excellent breeding ground for abstruse concepts such as
those of Autofick (an offshoot of the group Zimt), whose training cassette Pogo: Ein Praktischer
Leitfaden included sound examples such as the song “Eiscafé”, which contains a compact analysis
of youth in Tübingen and is the third best German punk song. Carambolage, on the other hand,
made music in Ton Steine Scherben’s North Frisian band commune that didn’t sound like Neue
Deutsche Welle (NDW – meaning New German Wave), but more like obscure British DIY bands, for
whom punk simply meant the downward redistribution of pop culture.
At the same time, a handful of musicians in Limburg an der Lahn founded a couple of bands, which
Alfred Hilsberg brought to the people as “Limburger Pest”, a record package consisting of singles by
The Wirtschaftswunder and Die Radierer and the flexidisc “Wo ist der Dom?” by Siluetes 61, a
project by Tom Dokupil (who was also in all the other bands), which (like “Bauernlife” by The
Wirtschaftswunder) processed life in the cathedral city with its invisible cathedral into a lively anti-art
song. Hanover, on the other hand, was large enough to have a proper punk scene, which gradually
transformed teenage rebellion into an eternal stag party against an end-time backdrop, which Hans-
A-Plast could not miss recording for posterity as early as 1981. The fact that the only queer hits in
the otherwise largely heteronormative scene – “Tagebuch” by Bärchen und Die Milchbubis and
“Samen im Darm” by the Cretins – emerged in Hanover of all places is one of those likeable
contradictions that characterize the early phase of punk.
Ziggy XY nevertheless turned his back on the city, and the unwieldy strangeness of his project
Kosmonautentraum can certainly be understood as an objection to the unambiguousness of the
dawning “Deutschpunk”. The second LP (with the anti-hit “Abschied”) at latest caught up with
Holger Hiller, who in turn pushed NDW avant-garde to the point of high cultural maturity on his own
records and as the singer of Palais Schaumburg. In one way or another, his records could have
been created at the other end of a modernity that had not been interrupted by the Nazis. Thanks to
their classical vocal training, the brothers Udo and Gerd Scheuerpflug, alias Die Zwei from
Neuendettelsau in Franconia, ventured into similar realms. Their a cappella single was played by
John Peel and was released on the label of the pioneering Berlin record shop Zensor, which also
had a hand in the self-released single by Konstantin, with which Max Goldt and Gerd Pasemann
bridged the time while they were not allowed to use the name Foyer Des Arts for contractual
reasons. Düsseldorf has been studied so thoroughly that I will limit myself here to Family 5 and
Male, but I don’t want to withhold them because “Tagein – Tagaus” is the best lyric Peter Hein has
written to date, and Male was the first “first German punk band” to produce real punk hits.
Rassemenschen helfen armen Menschen stole the second best band name of the NDW from the
poster of a Viennese cat-breeding exhibition (for charitable purposes) and their singles, which are
quite rightly no longer to be found, are far too far out to be left out here.
In Marburg (an der Lahn), Ludger Andreas alias Exo Neutrino tried to recreate Limburg conditions
by recording cassettes single-handedly under crazy, changing names. His only single (as Lustige
Mutanten) was actually produced in Limburg by Tom Dokupil. Just like “Tagesschau” by Freiwillige
Selbstkontrolle (or F.S.K.), which tried to reinvent the deadly serious media criticism popular
among German left-wingers as cheerful pop criticism. Neues Deutschland from Kassel left behind
only a concept album about the German-German division, on which “Muskulatur” is a little out of the
ordinary, because thematically it is actually more of an F.S.K. song.
TRACKLIST
A1) Autofick Eiscafé
A2) Carambolage Gehirnwäsche
A3) Siluetes 61 Wo ist der Dom?
A4) Hans-A-Plast Lemminger Punks
A5) Kosmonautentraum Abschied
A6) Holger Hiller Ein Hoch auf das Bügeln
A7) Die Zwei Wir bleiben hier
A8) Family 5 Tagein – Tagaus
A9) Rassemenschen helfen armen Menschen Alles ist mir recht
A10) Lustige Mutanten Spiel ums Leben
B1) Freiwillige Selbstkontrolle Tagesschau
B2) Neues Deutschland Muskulatur
B3) Die Egozentrischen 2 Gegensätze
B4) Male Risikofaktor 1:X
B5) Bärchen und die Milchbubis Tagebuch
B6) Die Zimmermänner Keiner ruft Cornelia an
B7) The Wirtschaftswunder Bauernlife
B8) Palais Schaumburg Kinder der Tod
B9) Cretins Samen im Darm
B10) Konstantin Sing mir ein kleines Arbeiterkampflied
