Am I the only one who first read the OP as: “German Music Bites”?
Ok, The Butterfly’s Ghost noticed that there wasn’t any Westernhagen posted yet, one of the other old warhorses of German rock, who started as a German answer to the Stones, the low-down, honest, sweaty rocker, but morphed into a Gucci wearing dandy in the last 25 years somehow. Here’s my favorite song, from when he was still the champion of the common man, Geiler is’ schon. My favorite blues song in the German tongue:
Marius Müller Westernhagen (that’s his proper name, isn’t it great) - Geiler is’ schon
I like Herbert Gronemayer as well, especially “Bochum”… an anthem for the Ruhrpott. His most famous song is probably “Der Weg”.
I’m sure you’re right 
I was thinking more along the lines that there are EN records that are abrasive and German (closer to Rammstein) and others that are ethereal and calm and German (closer to Kraftwerk). I guess my larger point was that somebody who likes both Rammstein and Kraftwerk would have a good chance of enjoying Einsturzende Neubauten.
I’m looking forward to checking out all your suggestions in more depth. Sadly, I’m at work and have to at least pretend to be working.
Oh, and I’m perfectly happy with stuff that isn’t hard rock/metal. My tastes are quite eclectic, so if you think it’s good, please do suggest it.
Anybody know any streaming radio stations that have mostly German-language songs? We used to listen to a station out of Germany at an old job - great mix of music, but maybe only 1 in 10 songs was in German.
Udo Lindenberg! I had a professor in college who did everything in his power to get us to listen to Udo Lindenberg - except actually lend us some tapes or something. So we never did hear him. I’ll have to take a listen.
He’s a legendary figure, maybe the most beloved elder statesman of German rock, recently (since his 2008 comeback album, a kind of Santana’s Supernatural affair, playing with popular young contemporary stars who all adore him and refreshed his music) also embraced by the younger generations.
He even played a small, but not so unimportant part in East/West German relations. The story is longer and reaches further back (at least to his 1973 song Mädchen aus Ost-Berlin (Girl from East Berlin)), but it culminated 1983 with Udo inviting himself to play the DDR, personally addressing Erich Honecker (or, Honni, respectively :)), with his own version of Chattanooga Choo-Choo, Sonderzug Nach Pankow. It was a big hit in West Germany, but the direct, public and first of all very flippant approach shocked the East German officials. Honni was not amused, to say the least. After much back and forth in the following months, they finally accepted to let him play at a peace festival in the Palast Der Republik in East-Berlin, but that was a party event and seated exclusively with cadres, so the real fans had to stay outside, harassed by the Stasi and Vopos, so it was a sour victory for Udo. There’s a great documentary with footage of the whole festival line-up ending the concert with We Shall Overcome (I remember Harry Belafonte as one participant), with Udo looking sad and disillusioned sitting behind the drums (he was originally a Jazz drummer by trade before he started singing).
The strange relationship between Udo Lindenberg and Erich Honecker lasted til 1989, in 1987 he even gave Erich a leather jacket.
So that was my Udo Lindenberg anecdote of the day, sorry to have been taken away a bit ;). I only wanted to stress how important that man and his music is here. Carry on.
Heino, Heino, Heino.
Heino.Try some of Ute Lemper’s Berlin cabaret songs.
I like Marteria´s Kids (Zwei Finger an den Kopf)
Marteria - Kids (2 Finger an den Kopf) [Offizielles Video] - YouTube[/ url]
[url=Marteria - Kids (2 Finger an den Kopf) [Offizielles Video] - YouTube]Kids 2 Finger an den Kopf[ /url]
and Bengalische Tiger
Marteria - Bengalische Tiger (Offizielles Video) - YouTube[/ url]
ETA Well, evidently I haven´t figured out how to link a URL properly. Es tut mir leid!
There are certain German cultural traditions that should not be missed:
You’ve probably already heard this but just in case:
Apocalyptica’s (Finnish cello-metal band) German-language cover of David Bowie’s Heroes sung by Rammstein’s Till Lindemann:
I thought that I was the only one who appreciated Heino. Nice to have company.
Nina Hagen’s “Zarah” is in German, some singing and some talking. The first 30 seconds is a tribute to German singer Zarah Leander’s song “Ich Weiss Es Wird Einmal Ein Wunder Geschehn” from the 1942 movie Die Grosse Liebe, then Nina’s contemporary version with a beat kicks into pure '80’s psychedelia with the absolute latest in video effects!
Nina’s song “New York New York” is best known by the English version, but there’s a German version too.
Nina covering “Ave Maria” in German (fairly straightforward too, for Nina!)
Nina’s fairly normal version of “Der Wind” is a cover of the Zarah Leander song “Der Wind hat mir ein Lied erzählt” from the 1937 movie La Habanera. Nina really likes Zarah.
My favorite of Nina’s German songs is “Erfurt & Gera.” I have no idea what the song is about (my German is limited to counting to 10 and a few random words even though a grandmother was born there) but it seems so much fun once the song kicks in. It’s probably about some major tragedy but damn, I can jump around like crazy when listening to it.
Just a suggestion: Max Raabe und Palast Orchester.
Wizo is a fun punk band that’s been around a long time. This song is a good encapsulation of their style: Raum Der Zeit.
When I was 14 I got money from my parents to buy 2 CDs from a shop in Germany. I picked two more or less at random:
In Extremo is metal, but they incorporate medieval instruments into their songs. Vollmond is one of their songs in German. They have some songs in Latin too, like Omnia Sol Temperat. I like Rammstein and these guys.
Afrob and Samy Deluxe are Black German rappers and they collaborated as ASD and came out with an eponymous CD. Is’ wie’s is’, Sneak Preview, and Yagayaa are some of their songs.
Humpe Humpe - “Geschrien Im Schlaf” (This is by two German sisters, Inga and Annette Humpe. I have a few records by them and adore almost all the songs. Most of their songs are in English though. However, the first song I ever heard by them and fell in love with was in…uh…well…um…Japanese. Sort of. “Yahma-Ha”)
Annette and Inga - “Ein Herz kann man nicht reparieren”
Annette Humpe solo - “Ich küsse Ihren Mann”
How funny, when I was looking for Humpe links, I found this clip obviously from a television show/feature/documentary(??) with Max Raabe and Annette Humpe. I don’t know what it’s about, but I thought it was an interesting coincidence.
For something completely different, this video of Nana Mouskouri singing “Stille Nacht (Silent Night)” in German has the German lyrics on the screen.
Sorry to nitpick, but Zarah Leander was Swedish, though it’s an easy mistake to make cause she had her greatest success in Germany with German songs. She used to be Goebbels’ substitute for Marlene Dietrich, an interesting story in itself.
My favorite Nina Hagen song is TV-Glotzer, her version of the Tubes’ White Punks On Dope, which totally beats the original IMHO. Her band later became Spliff, one of the best bands of the Neue Deutsche Welle aka German New Wave, here’s their Dejà Vue: https://youtu.be/5zObokRhLL4.
And because Anette Humpe was posted above, here are two great songs of her NDW band Ideal:
Blaue Augen: https://youtu.be/-D52CqyYpHw
Berlin: https://youtu.be/tYyZaoVT3WA
No love for Eimsturzende Neubaten?
Beat me to it; she also made Punishing Kiss, an English language album with the likes of Nick Cave and Tom Waits: this is her on Kurt Weill’s Tango Ballad with Neil Hannon from The Divine Comedy.
Yes! Heino all the way!
For the purpose of learning the language, Heino is a very good choice since he sings/speaks very articulate standard German (“High German”). By the way, Heino has covered songs by Rammstein (and other bands) and he has joined them on stage, for instance at at the Wacken rock festival in 2013: