Artist: Rammstein
Album: Zeit
Genre: Neue Deutsche Härte, Industrial
Country: Germany
Release date: 29th of April 2022
Released via: Universal Music
Rammstein has an important place in my musical development. Probably the most important next to Linkin Park. The first four albums, Herzeleid, Sehnsucht, Mutter and Reise Reise are still in my opinion high-tier albums and always welcomed in my musical rotation. Even if I haven’t listened to any Rammstein songs for some time, and for some reason I listen to for example “Engel”, “Mein Teil”, “Sonne“ or “Asche zu Asche” I am quickly falling back to some playlists only with Rammstein songs. I consumed nearly everything from this band, buying shirts, Live-DVDs and other stuff, even their Vodka.
I still have some great memories with this band being a part of it, my younger years with friends while we listen to our music which includes some of their songs, conversations with students from other countries who knew this band or an awesome visit of the Rammstein Paris Show in cinema where the guy behind the cinema projector thought that the best choice for the Dolby setting is full volume. Still a big thank you for that unknown guy from my side.
Why am I talking so much about this even before I start to write about Zeit? Because if I had a relationship status on social media with this band it would show “it’s complicated”. Rosenrot was not a good album in my opinion, maybe “Benzin” and “Mann gegen Mann” would get a place on my favourite Rammstein songs playlist. Liebe ist für Alle Da was okayish, got a lot of things quite better than Rosenrot. Of course, some songs were good, but not at this high rate compared to the years before.
After some years without many new songs, the band released an untitled Rammstein album which most of the people out there just called Rammstein. And I was angry. I am still a big fan of the song “Deutschland” which is still one of my all-time favourite songs of the band at all, “Radio” was good but the rest? Not really, most of the stuff I totally forgot shortly after the release. And then there are the parallel musical careers of Till Lindemann and Richard Kruspe, both of which would not be particularly worth mentioning for different reasons.
As Rammstein announced their eight-studio album, I wasn’t curious about it, more like “let us see what we will get”. Because of my latest experiences, I didn’t expect that much. I thought okay, the best 2-3 songs I will listen to before the album release as singles and then we will see, maybe some gems or personal favourites are possible like on Liebe ist für Alle Da.
And then came the single “Zeit”. I can’t deny that this is a good “calm” Rammstein song. But if you oppose it to other fist pre-release singles like “Pussy” or “Deutschland” it was a kind of underwhelming for me. The second pre-release single was “Zick Zack”, a song which is going more of the typical Rammstein way: a harder marching style of riffs and drums, more evil singing style of Till Lindemann and nice sarcastic lyrics – but still lack the status of a good single. Overall, it’s a good filler song for the album which is quite fun but nothing more than that. So, this wasn’t a good start overall.
But what about the rest of the album? Did they only choose the not-so-good-songs for my taste? To be frank – except for one song, no, they chose the better songs for their first singles (on release day they released the single “Angst”, which is the worst of the three songs pre-release singles).
I don’t really want to talk about much about every single song because I am so unhappy with most of it, it would make me too grumpy.
Most of the harder songs like “Armee der Tristen”, “Giftig”, “OK” or “Dicke Titten” are not good and are simply a low tier in my Rammstein favourite song lists. They are lacking everything you want to hear from this band. You have their typical characteristics in these songs, but they are all missing the force, the finesse and the fun of the songs which makes Rammstein this band.
Same goes for the softer song like “Meine Tränen”, “Lügen” and “Schwarz”. They are missing so much of what marks the quality of the band that I was kind of shocked after the first round of listening to this album. But what I liked about the song ”Lügen” was the increasing use of autotune. A nice critique against the usage of this device in a lot of genres.
But I said there is one song I like. Yes, it is, the only song, maybe “Zick Zack” too, I would listen often in the future: “Adieu”. It has negative points similar to the other songs I said before, but I like this song compared to the rest. It has a good overall hard playing style, harder riffs in the chorus and, for me, regarding most of the songs it sounds like one off the four first albums. It’s a good song to finish the album, it’s also a good song to end a live show and it’s a good song to say goodbye to all the fans and choose the retirement, if they will do it what is discussed in media since Liebe Ist Für Alle Da.
What does this album to me? It’s a good question that I can’t answer easily. Maybe I would say that my social media relationship status isn’t “it’s complicated” anymore and but its “split up”. I can’t feel the band anymore. For me Rammstein sound more like all the (German) bands who a lot of people said that they are trying to imitate the sound of Rammstein. I am missing something. But this feeling of missing I have been having since Rosenrot, yet with Zeit it reaches a new all-time high. Maybe my favourite song from the album “Adieu” is a kind of direct message to me from the band.
Adieu, Goodbye, Auf Wiedersehen; Den letzten Weg musst du alleine gehen; Ein letzes Lied, ein letzter Kuss; Kein Wunder wird geschehen; Adieu, Goodbye, Auf Wiedersehen; Die Zeit mit dir war schön
(Adieu, Goodbye, Auf Wiedersehen; The last way you must go alone; One last song, one last kiss; No miracle will happen; Adieu, Goodbye, Auf Wiedersehen; The time with you was beautiful)
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