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Rating: In any case, with inexplicable and jovial manner, like a child discovering their body in an inquisitive and exciting way, I remain majestically yet childishly fascinated by the beauty of this Opera.
Following the advice of many, I should exalt almost bordering on paganism albums like "Halber Mensch" (1985), talking about its structures, its ability to give the song form a passable tone in the most cocaine-sweaty disco-clubs, getting excited about it repeatedly.
This is not so.
But my opinion is skewed, as the denial I refer to is torn from me, like a decaying tooth headed for putrefaction. Diverted, with concentric sleights of hand, worthy of the best “pas-sens” that only leaden and cold oxidized sounds, like those subjected to the object, can be capable of materializing into fragments. Real and true, like tin shards deformed by the experimental thermal shock they are subjected to.
It's not about the money.
Nor easy success or any experimental-recommended opportunism.
I struggle to say it, because today I’d equate it with blasphemy, but I boldly pronounce it with pride: art. That’s what. Like Dadaism, as much as Expressionism or the most symbolic and virulent Decadentism ever conceived, "Zeichnungen des Patienten O. T" knows how to explode unlike any other, with apocalypses of the deepest tribalism, atonal, and in a way never mirrored before so straightforwardly, existentially and realistically. The ease with which it is possible to read, not listen to, the sounds that plaster every shade of the fifteen tracks called into question in unison is singular, and equally disarming. Singular, because equally singular are the minimalisms with which the percussions are proposed and laid bare like a ritual: any sort of refusal is not forgiven, from rigid plastic pipes to PVC, clear signs of an explanatory necessity to make resonate what can no longer be in a society interpreted like never before, prophetically and extremely, to the point of bordering the most incalculable reflective nihilism.
Secondly disarming, for the immediacy with which it is possible to glimpse in it post-apocalyptic landscapes blurred by what once wanted and had to mean survival. A wrench, a power generator, a barrel of oil. Elements that lose their sense in the present if understood as power to be applied to further work and/or office force. Instruments that, however, assume a completely different significance if conceived in function of what the modern world indirectly induces us to prophesize. Here in Einstürzende Neubauten, one catches what was never considered before, that grotesque manner worthy of an extreme and depraved reading of Brecht, for which reject-elements that consumerism soon declines to waste, become the primary tool, appropriate to strike with shamanic disposition the limbs of the corrupt and sick soul, fruit of its own discard. Not a sentence, nor a condemnation. Simply an indiscriminate and resigned accompaniment. The ferrying of the human being, cancerous from consumption, towards the chaos that animated the planet ten thousand years ago. A return to primitivism, as much social as mental. A unilateral abandonment towards the randomness of the senses, which, without indoctrination, navigate freely in rivers polluted by time and industrial oblivion, and therefore have become harsher. A journey towards a future that allows no differentiation whatsoever, noticeable in "Armenia" as in "Zeichnungen des Patienten O. T". The first animated by visionary sensations, the second dotted with irreversible glass shards. Screams full of purplish red capable of staining concrete and asbestos.
In conclusion, it is necessary to express the grandeur and impartiality with which every sound is recited. Absurd theatricality, which is what makes this artistic ensemble unique in its genre, but at the same time capable of influencing, precisely with this album, generations and generations of bands that will shape the last twenty years of contemporary music. Human beings even before artists or intellectuals. Able to clearly affirm what the mind finds difficult to materialize for taboo, what with difficulty enters scratching into the channels of thought.
From doubt, into nightmare.
Tracklist Lyrics and Videos
01 Vanadium-I-Ching (04:54)
Hoerst Du den Krach der schlagenden Herzen?
Siehst Du die Geier ueber dem Brand?
Das dach steht in Flammen solange schon
Siehst Du Hyaenen auf der Strasse?
Geliebte
Geliebte
Siehst Du die Geier ueber dem Brand?
Deine Seele ist entzuendet
Geliebte
Komm naeher geliebte
Sprich' zu mir in Seuchensprache
Siehst Du die Geier ueber dem Brand?
Aasfresser sind geduldig
Siehst Du Kadaver tanzen?
Geliebte
Geliebte
Komm naeher geliebte, ich steck' dich an
Geliebte
Siehst Du Kadaver tanzen?
Siehst Du die Geier ueber dem Brand?
[English translate:]
Do you hear the noise of the beating hearts?
Do you see the vultures over the fire?
The roof has been in flames for so long already
Do you see the hyenas in the street?
Beloved
Beloved
Do you see the vultures over the fire?
Your soul is inflamed
Beloved
Come closer, beloved
Speak to me in contagious words
Do you see the vultures over the fire?
Scavengers are patient
Do you see the cadaver dancing?
Beloved
Beloved
Come closer, beloved,
I inflame you
Beloved
Do you see the cadaver dancing?
Do you see the vultures over the fire?
03 Abfackeln! (03:29)
Laß' uns're Seelen vom Schimmel befreien!
...vom Pilzbewuchs befreien!
Im Aas sielen, im Aas sielen
Laß' uns're Schaedel
vom Pilzbewuchs befreien!
...und wenn die Stadt brennt...
Ja... es sind uns're Fackeln...
Laß' uns're Seelen abfackeln!
Laß' uns're Seelen abfackeln!
Laß' uns're Seelen
Abfackeln!
04 Neun Arme (02:36)
Neun Arme
Eigentlich hatte ich neun Arme
vertrocknet im Sonnenlicht
Eigentlich war'n Beine wie Tentakeln
verkümmert im Tageslicht
Eigentlich will ich in die Nacht
will meine Fangarme zurück
zurück!
09 Falschgeld (02:41)
So sicher wie Falschgeld (besser gedruckt)
Verbrannt mit Liebe
Verbrannt mit Liebe
Für die Ewigkeit
D.H.
Hab' Liebe benutzt
- um anzuzünden -
So sicher wie Falschgeld
Verbrannt mit Liebe
und Blei
und Blei
und Blei
So sicher wie Falschgeld
Verbrannt mit Liebe
leuchte Blei
Blei Blei Blei und Blei verbrennt Liebe
Liebe
11 Armenia (05:29)
Brennt auf den Nägeln eine Frage nur:
Sind die Vulkane noch tätig?
Sind die Vulkane noch tätig?
Bitte enttäusch' mich nicht!
Ich glaub' wieder an Voodoo
Steck' Nadeln ins Telefonbuch
Bitte enttäusch' mich nicht!
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Other reviews
By Rocky Marciano
The band delineates a deadly fusion between the synthetic textures of the rhythmic advancement and the work of the non-musicians with work tools.
'Zeichnungen Des Patienten O.T.' is a terrifying and imposing work — the drawings of a schizophrenic patient of an asylum come to life in nightmare sound frescos.
