More German Music

Trivial Knowledge suggested the following:

Tocotronic - fun, electronic rock. A good beat, you can dance to it! On iTunes, so you can get it legally for yourself.

Blumfeld - I like it! Also on iTunes, so you can check them out there.

The Notwist - Trivial Knowledge describes them as "Moody, gorgeous electronic pop" and I agree, having listened to the little bits on iTunes. The iTunes description of their album Neon Golden begins: "Neon Golden was a subtle rewiring of the Notwist's long-established baroque hip-hop post-rock fetishist technique." Intriguing ...

Danke, danke für die Vorschläge, Trivial!!

Taking students abroad?

Here's an excellent resource - an online training module by the University of the Pacific.

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.

Back from Berlin

I was in Berlin over Spring Break, putting together a course I'll be teaching there this summer on the history and culture of Berlin --- starting back with the slavic tribes who initially settled the area, all the way to the present day. In five weeks. My own insanity aside, here are a few images from the trip:






View from the Reichstag dome down into the chamber.




View from hotel room over the city of Berlin-Spandau, where we were staying.

Margrave Joachim II., the first of the Brandenburg Margraves to convert to Protestantism. No one is really sure where he first took communion "with both the bread and wine", but the Nikolai church in Spandau jumped at the chance to claim the honor by putting up a statue. Oh, this was in 1539 (the 95 Theses were posted in Wittenberg in 1517).

The Pergamon Museum!!

Pericles ... in the Pergamon Museum, with a rather large assortment of other heads, famous and othewise.

And who might this be?

Poor guy lost his hands in some sort of a mishap. Well, he's better off than some of the other statues I saw.

No, wait ... THIS is Caesar. Who's that other guy?



Sorry about the expressionist effect ... but I couldn't leave Nefertiti out of the line-up!

And this, of course, is the famous "Berlin Goddess" -- no one knows if she was a goddess, or just some girl who died. But a very cool statue, nonetheless. One of very few to retain some of the original paint, because she was encased in lead.

Umm, I don't really see the pomegranate...

Hair in scallops ... check.

Sandals .. check.

More famous bits at the Pergamon.








And why do these look so familiar? Oh, yeah ... that new movie: 300.

Nikolaikirche in the Nikolaiviertel -- site of the original city of Berlin, right across the river from Cölln. This church was originally built in the 13th Century, but has been rebuilt / refurbished a number of times. Extensive bombing will do that.

Part of the medieval wall --- right next to the oldest Kneipe - "Zur Letzten Instanz".

A rather more recent wall - the rest of the 1961-1989 Berlin wall. Ironic that it was built right over the ruins of the Prinz Albrecht Strasse building that once housed the Gestapo. This picture looks at the back of the wall, which is right over the cellars of the Prinz Albrecht building, which is now an exhibit called, "Die Topographie des Terrors".

Zur Letzten Instanz. Not quite sure how it got it's name ... last chance to drink before heading out of the city? Because the courts of justice were nearby? The Bar of Last Resort? We found out the hard way that it's best to reserve if you plan on eating dinner there....

My travelling companions:

Andy

Brad

On the Cölln side of the river:

I took a picture of this just for the Cute One and the Engineer. Can you name that embassy?






This is the Märkisches Museum. It houses the history of the Mark Brandenburg, but primarily focuses on the history of Berlin. There are prehistoric remains, but also incredible evidence from the daily lives and homes of Berliners throughout the centuries. And they have fantastic little models of the city that show the development throughout.







Pictures of Berlin wouldn't be complete without a little graffiti. It says, "Jesus lives in the [people's] heads, and Elvis lives in my cellar." -- I think the second part was added by a different artiste, but I'm not certain.

Art and life

James Nachtwey is one of the best photographers working today. He has a way of capturing the essence of a person, of a moment.