Ohrenschmaus

This is from the same year as the Gun Club song before. Besides that there aren’t too many connections I can think of. Not quite true, they sing in English too. Whenever I hear something by this band I immediately get the feeling that the music comes from a different planet which is actually not totally wrong: They are from the other side of the earth. It sounds so fresh, so naive, so innocent, so light-hearted, so breezy. The place this music comes from must be a sunny place near the sea without too much rain and without dark, long winters. And it is. The name of the group is the name of a small, cute mammal with relatively big eyes native to the region where the band comes from. The internet does not know a lot about them. They have a myspace site though. Why they never broke through is one of the huge mysteries of popular music for me. All they ever released were a couple of singles and a compilation made from them where I got the track from.

He was from LA, CA but the music he and his band made always had more of a dark aspect to it which contrasted with the bright Californian sun. There was something obsessed about him and his music. As if he was trying to exorcise the devil from his own body with his shouting. The name of his band described something very American and it fit quite well with the music. With their first album they immediately broke through. They did not become famous or rich but they had established a new name on the map of rock’n’roll. They fused punk and blues to a style some people called psychobilly. Their songs were blasting of energy, he seemed to be delivering his soul while singing. He spent ten years in London before he returned to the US. Like many other rock musicians he fought with drugs and in the end he lost the battle. He died 37 old years old, the alcohol had taken its toll on his body. The song from above is from his last album. Which has a completely different vibe than the others, it is very calm and relaxed, as if he had already made peace with the world.