Artist: Rammstein
Label: Universal Music Group
Release: 2009
Length: 46:06
Rating: 3.5/5
Hear the new Rammstein album, their sixth in a row, “Liebe Ist Für Alle Da”, and you can hardly believe four whole years have passed since its predecessor “Rosenrot” (2005). Which tells you right away that Rammstein haven’t changed by so much as a hair in that time.
“Liebe Ist Für Alle Da” carries all the trademark Rammstein hallmarks too, the very ones that earned the guys such huge, mass popularity. Especially in their native Germany and the surrounding countries. Teutonic nature! No brakes. Morbid, dark mood. A kind of savage humor backed by flying sawdust from proper Swabian “lumberjacks”. A primitive approach, but one that always hits the nail dead center on the head and gets the job done.
A massive wall of sound made of snarling riffs that grabs the listener by the ears and shakes them in an instant, fitted with ambient keyboards and simple rhythms, often reinforced with rhythmic patterns that dictate perfect precision. Careful! Germans are behind all this, and Germans always like the hands on their wristwatches set just right. Over all of it creeps a one-dimensional baritone drone, recitation, dictation, in German of course. Using any other language over the kind of musical arrangement Rammstein are known for would only lead to a washed-out, watered-down version of all of the band’s trademarks. The vocal delivery is, of course, once again the element that earns the band its winning points for recognizability and interest, and it grabs all the attention on the album.
Rammstein remain minimalists who stingily and deliberately ration their tonalities. Anything more would soften their general oath to the dominance of riff-turning. An important factor that breaks up this stinginess, albeit with a stinginess of its own, is the use of keyboards. Here you can notice a minimal sonic shift compared to previous albums. The keyboards offer the most variety of their entire Rammstein career. Though they work in favor of the tight economy of minimalist tricks, you can notice different approaches from song to song. More than ever. But none of it delivers a revolutionary turning point in the band’s sound and style. In Haifisch, for example, a symphonic arrangement component is strongly noticeable, while in the easy-to-fall-for escapade Pussy the synth curtain is clearly expressed, owing a debt to the new wave era of the eighties. The latter, with its arena-style chorus, fully achieves its purpose as a manufactured hit that burrows straight under the skin and into the listener’s mind.
Since Rammstein have never counted among the good musicians, especially when you put their technical skill under the microscope, their music depends heavily on the success they must achieve by creating that characteristic, recognizable mood. So the arrangements don’t always manage to serve the optimal payoff of creating that atmosphere. That’s why the songs on the new album fluctuate in quality, too. Roter Sand is especially shallow in this respect, where the added whistling, an effect that annoys more than it thrills, is a reminder that German approaches to minimalism can sometimes be downright “hillbilly” shallow. The morbid humor of savage satire, achieved for instance by the piercing baritone growl in B********, Mehr or Wiener Blut, skillfully plays the trump card of shock, which covers up the sloppy arranging of individual lead motifs. Then again, the winners are here too, songs where the mighty pounding and pulsing of giant steel factory pistons rattling in their stirrups creates that typical biting, grabby touch that gives you goosebumps. Such is, for example, the opener Rammleid, backed by the follow-up Ich Tu Dir Weg and especially Waidmanns Heil (a hugely intense run at the start of the album). Plus the already mentioned Pussy, with its mockingly used English verses seen through the prism of a German recital. Imagine the “Terminator” with Schwarzenegger’s voice matrix chip built in growing a functional robotic sexual organ (a proper “porn lug”, in other words). The band manages to keep this high-intensity momentum going also with the aggressively schizophrenic assault of the title track.
Rammstein remain genuine pranksters who draw the bulk of their creative inspiration from the perversions of a rich sexual imagination, and with the new album they come out of this story as winners again. The shock element is once more optimally implanted and, as the main creator of that massive morbid atmosphere, effectively overcomes the holes in the arrangements and the approaches that minimalism can occasionally bring. Rammstein stay faithful to their sermon with the new album too, not straying from the energy of “Mutter” (2001), “Reise, Reise” (2004) or “Rosenrot” (2005). And that’s how their loyal fanbase likes them best. So the band’s approach stays fresh on “Liebe Ist Für Alle Da” too, since it’s a one-of-a-kind that belongs only to them. By that logic, it shouldn’t change much in the future either.
Lineup
Till Lindemann – vocals
Richard Z. Kruspe – guitar, backing vocals
Paul Landers – guitar, backing vocals Christian Lorenz – keyboards, programmed samples
Oliver Riedel – bass guitar
Christoph Schneider – drums, percussion
Production
Jacob Hellner & Rammstein
Track list
1. Rammlied (5:20)
2. Ich tu dir weh (5:02)
3. Waidmanns Heil (3:33)
4. Haifisch (3:45)
5. B******** (Bückstabü) (4:15)
6. Frühling in Paris (4:45)
7. Wiener Blut (3:53)
8. Pussy (4:00)
9. Liebe ist für alle da (3:26)
10. Mehr (4:09)
11. Roter Sand (3:59)
