What would I do without NPR?

It's how I wake up every morning, listening to the WBHM morning show. I even keep listening during all of the pledge week rambling. On Saturday mornings, I listen to "Car Talk" and "Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me" almost religiously, and on Sunday mornings I try to figure out the riddles by Will Shortz before whoever is playing the Quiz game. It's how I keep in touch with what's happening in the world, because I don't have time to peruse newspapers every day, and because I don't really have patience for the local news. It's not that I don't like knowing what's happening here, but there's just so much fluff.

But more than that, it always gets me thinking. Especially the "StoryCorps" and "This I Believe" segments. And it almost invariably leads me to new music and musicians. This morning they featured Susan Werner, and I'm going to see if her music is available on i-tunes. I love the way she sings about church and about faith, without being trite.

There was also a cool new novel presented, with an excerpt read by the author: Foaling Season by Aryn Kyle. It's the little things like having an author read her work that make the difference.

And they also featured a Swedish band, "Peter Bjorn and John", who recently sang at SXSW in Austin. Of course, they did say that it's easier for a Swedish band to be accepted in the U.S. than "a German band, which is almost too foreign", because Sweden is so influenced by what we do. I don't know if I agree with that, entirely. Although there are certainly more Swedish bands famous here than German bands. We'd be hard-pressed to make the argument that Germans are NOT influenced by U.S. culture, and there are a number who only sing in English. What I love, though, is that there is now a movement in German music to actually sing in German. Here are some German bands and German music you might enjoy:

Silbermond - go to the audio section and listen to clips from their new album

Fettes Brot - a little harder than what I usually like, but great texts.

Roger Cicero - fabulous crooner, if that's what you go for. And funny texts. Here's a video!! And here's Germany's 2007 Eurovision entry. I don't think it will win, but the song's ok. The comments prove the general ignorance of a deplorably large number of people.

Juli - best website of all of them. And great music! Happy to help translate the lyrics, just let me know...

Wir sind Helden - probably the best known or one of the best known in this group. But I couldn't get the music to play on their website. Someone else might have more luck, or know where to find it?

Nina Hagen - not new music, really, but I love her stuff. Here's my favorite video. It always makes me think of Berlin ... and the movie "Sonnenallee".

Xavier Naidoo - he's pretty. Check out the vidoes.

Ararat - very cool site; they actually provide the lyrics and the whole song. German Christian music.

Wolf Biermann - read this article about his take on the recent Stasi movie, "The Lives of Others"

There are surely more excellent German bands out there. If you know of someone I should check out, I'd love to hear about them.