Documentary about Einstürzende Neubauten planned
The Berlin-based film maker Uli Schueppel is planning a documentary about Einstürzende Neubauten’s first concert which took place on December 21st, 1989 in what was then East Berlin. This should be really interesting to see when it’s completed, but for now Uli is in search of anyone who attended that concert and who can provide some additional information for his documentary. Anyone who can help should contact him at info@schueppel-films.de.

Diary Of Dreams has a clothing collection
I don’t know how old this news is, but it caught me by surprise as I was browsing Infrarot.de. Apparently Diary Of Dreams has launched a clothing line in association with the gothic clothing company Aderlass. They have several different styles of jackets, trench coats, pants and skirts available. You can see them all on Infrarot.de here, but I have to warn you, they are pretty expensive. The prices range from €89.90 to €239.90.

Lacrimosa begins work on new album
Lacrimosa, the Swiss gothic metal band headed up by Tilo Wolff, has begun working on their next album. This will be the band’s 10th studio album since they formed in 1990, and their first major release since their 2007 live album Lichtjahre. If you’re in Europe, be sure to catch one of their upcoming concerts or the Blackfield Festival in Gelsenkirchen where they will be headlining.

There’s still some time before any major releases in March, so I’m actually going to tell you about a few of the other interesting February releases that I missed…

Down Below - Sand In Meiner Hand MCD and Sinfony 23 re-release
Down Below is a relatively new gothic pop-rock band that started out in 2003. After gaining some popularity with their first 2 albums, they entered the 2008 Bundesvision Song Contest with their new single “Sand In Meiner Hand”. It was the band’s first German-language song, everything else they have done so far has been in English. When the contest was held on February 14th, Down Below only came in 3rd place (Subway To Sally won), but nevertheless the new single was released the next day on the 15th. Their latest album, 2007’s Sinfony 23, was also re-released on the same day with “Sand In Meiner Hand” and a few extra remixes added as bonus tracks. You can find the new single either on DownBelow.de or the band’s MySpace page, along with several other songs from Sinfony 23.

Die Apokalyptischen Reiter - Tobsucht-Reitermania over Wacken & Party.San
Die Apokalyptischen Reiter released a live album on the 1st of February. As the full name suggests, Tobsucht sports footage from the band’s performances at the Wacken Open Air festival and the Party.San festival and is available in 3 versions. There is an audio version with 2 CDs containing 90 minutes of live music, there is a DVD version with 180 minutes of concert footage, and there is a combined version with both of the CDs and the DVD plus a special booklet and packaging. Die Apokalyptischen Reiter have 2 songs from this live album on their MySpace page. Check it out if you’re into some crazy thrash metal.

I recently did an interview with 2 of the members of Beloved Enemy. Peter, who is the band’s main contributor, was previously in Fiddler’s Green before venturing into darker and heavier styles of music. Eddy is the band’s live bassist and also writes for Laut.de. Beloved Enemy’s singer, Ski, and their drummer, Dog, were unavailable for comment.

The interview is fairly long, so I hid it under the cut. (more…)

Hidden somewhere between the borders of Switzerland and Austria is the tiny country of Liechtenstein. It measures only 62 square miles (that’s much smaller than the town I live in), but there are actually a few really good bands that call Liechtenstein their home. The gothic metal band Elis is one of them.

The release of Elis’s new maxi single called “Show Me The Way” is a very important moment for the band because it signifies the merging of two eras, each defined by their vocalists. The band’s former singer Sabine collapsed during a rehearsal performance in July 2006 after suffering a cerebral hemorrhage, and tragically died a day later. Now Sandra Schleret has stepped up to the microphone to sing for Elis. This single brings both singers together on the same release. There are 3 songs that didn’t make it onto their current album Griefshire, plus two versions of “Show Me The Way” with newly recorded vocals by Sandra. It is both a fitting tribute to Sabine’s work with the band and a nice introduction to the new voice of Elis, Sandra.

“Show Me The Way” was released in Europe yesterday on Napalm Records. The single will also be released in the USA this coming Tuesday, November 6th. Elis’s MySpace page has several full-length songs you can listen to, including the original version of “Show Me The Way” from the album Griefshire.

If you’re in Germany, be sure to catch Elis on tour with ASP!

Elis - “Show Me The Way” single tracklist:
1. Show me the way (new single version)
2. Salvation (non-album track)
3. These days are gone (non-album track)
4. In einem verlassenen Zimmer (non-album track)
5. Show me the way (new version)

Mantus was a fabulous gothic metal band that sadly disbanded after their last album Zeit Muss Enden was released in 2005. Shortly thereafter, the remains of Mantus were sorted out and rejoined to form the new band Sepia. They released their debut album Goodbye Tristesse on October 19th on Rough Trade Records, and I feel obligated to tell you just how awesome it is.

The music is really great, I love the deep guitars and the dark gothic electronic overtones. But the thing that surprised me the most was the vocals. Normally, I’m not a big fan of female singers, but Tina has a really wonderful voice that fits the music so perfectly. Plus, the way the songs are mixed allows her vocals to blend in beautifully with the music, rather than stand out above it like most female-fronted bands tend to do.

You can listen to 2 full length songs and 2 longish samples on Sepia’s MySpace page. Amazon.de also has short samples of every song on the Goodbye Tristesse album. But I recommend watching the “Keine Worte” music video right here, as your first introduction to this fantastic band. The video is a bit trippy, but I like it. And the music is just great!

Sepia - “Keine Worte” video:

SEPIA - Keine Worte

Sepia - Goodbye Tristesse tracklist:
01. Ich Lebe
02. Keine Worte
03. Kalt
04. Moloch
05. Himmel
06. Goodbye Tristesse
07. Königin
08. Paradies
09. Melancholie
10. Allein
11. Kein Morgen
12. Was Bleibt

The German gothic rock band Unheilig is currently planning the release of a new album. The band’s newsletter just announced that it will be called Puppenspiel, and it will be released on February 22nd, 2008. That’s just slightly over 2 years after the release of their current full-length album, Moderne Zeiten, which hit stores in January of 2006. However, they did have 2 smaller EPs that were released since then, so the band certainly hasn’t been sitting around doing nothing all this time. You can hear a few songs from those on Unheilig’s MySpace page.

I’m looking forward to hearing more news about Puppenspiel as February gets closer, and I’ll be sure to post it here for you. Stay tuned!

Thanks to Paul for pointing this out.

Rozencrantz is a new name in the German gothic rock scene. Although the band was formed in 2003 which seems like a long time ago, they have only released one demo so far. They have remained pretty much under the radar since then, but I have a feeling this band is going to have some success. Bruno Kramm at Danse Macabre has done a wonderful job developing Rozencrantz and producing their debut album which will finally be released this Friday, October 12th.

The album is called Salvation and features 13 songs, with the last 2 being remixes of “In These Arms”. The music has a nice mixture of guitars and electronics, as well as some piano and other instruments coming through to give it a bit of a gothic edge. Throughout the album, the members of Rozencrantz have been assisted by guest musicians including Eve Cooper, Carsten Klatte, Matthias Lohmöller, and of course Bruno Kramm, all adding to the already great sound. You can listen to 4 songs from Salvation on the Rozencrantz MySpace page. Be sure to check out the 2 music videos on their website, too.

Rozencrantz - Salvation tracklist:
01. Forsaken
02. Decision
03. Her Walk Gets Slower
04. Bound To You
05. In These Arms
06. 1000 Knights
07. Severed Dreams
08. Lively Waters
09. Dissolve
10. Sweet Desire
11. Fareza
12. In These Arms (Acretongue remix)
13. In These Arms (Eurocide remix)

ASP has announced their next release, Nie Mehr, a single that was taken from their current album Requiembryo. But unlike a traditional single (or any release for that matter), Nie Mehr will not be physically distributed to music stores and online retailers. Instead, the single will be sold exclusively at ASP concerts and in their own webshop, that’s it. I imagine this would mean that there is no official release date. The closest thing to a release date would be the first day of their upcoming tour which is November 2nd in Leipzig.

Anyone lucky enough to attend an ASP show over in Europe will certainly appreciate the effort the band went to in creating this new single. It’s actually much more than a single, it’s more like a maxi of album-ic proportions. Not only is there a reworked version of “Nie Mehr” with a new ending and several other remixes of the song, but you will also find 2 live recordings and four brand new songs, for a grand total of 10 tracks. A 10-song maxi? Really, that’s just insane, but these über singles are becoming more and more popular it seems.

Check out some of ASP’s music on their MySpace page if you haven’t heard them already. One last note: If you actually want to buy Nie Mehr, you will have to go to the German-language side of ASP’s website because the English side says the shop is closed until June 28th… even though it’s already October now. I hope they open the English shop soon.

The exact tracklist has not been announced yet.

Umbra Et Imago is releasing a CD called Gott Will Es on November 9th, but I have no idea what it is. The official band website doesn’t have any recent news as usual, and their MySpace page doesn’t help much, either. I just see it listed in a few internet retailers like Infrarot.de and Amazon.de, but none of them say whether it’s an album or a single as far as I can tell. Judging by the price of it on both of those sites compared to other Umbra Et Imago CDs, it looks like it could be an album. But then German Wikipedia has it listed under “Singles and Live” so it could be a single, although Wikipedia is getting notorious for having misleading CD information prior to the release date. Maybe a live album? A live album usually comes with more goodies and a DVD, though. I sent an email to the band asking about it, so I’ll let you know what they say. For now, all I can tell you is that something is coming.

Compulsory Skin is a new band from the German capital, Berlin. Their debut album called Naked to the Bones will be coming out on October 5th. Thirteen tracks of electronic and metal are fronted by a female singer. She sounds very familiar but I can’t think of the name of who she sounds like. The music is good, almost very good. There are plenty of guitars and synths which I like, and even some nice gothic and classical influences. My only real complaint, and it’s a big one, is that a lot of the songs are a bit on the slow side for me. I felt kind of like I was trudging along with concrete-filled boots when I should have been walking at least somewhat briskly. Some more noticeable changes in tempo and volume throughout the album would be nice. Some periods of time where “VampirVampy” (whatever kind of name that is) stops singing and lets the music speak for itself would be greatly appreciated, too. Overall, Compulsory Skin has created a nice debut album and they have a lot of potential to develop into something really great over time.

My absolute favorite thing about Compulsory Skin is that they understand the modern music environment and have placed their entire album on their website for potential fans to listen. Having enough music to listen to (MP3 downloads, streaming, or otherwise) is extremely important, especially for a new band that is trying to develop a fanbase. Go over to their media page and listen to the entire Naked to the Bones album. This is an excellent way for Compulsory Skin to make a first impression.

Compulsory Skin - Naked to the Bones tracklist:
01. The World In Me
02. All You Can Eat
03. Twisted
04. Sexshow
05. Naked To The Bones
06. Consensual Motors
07. Mammon Me
08. Broken Skin
09. Expelled
10. Bones Of The Past
11. Smeared
12. Luscious
13. Stained