JETZT!

In the artist's words:

"Können Lieder Freunde sein?" is the second regular album by the great un-ironic Michael Girke and his project JETZT!, the "best forgotten German band" (Tagesspiegel). On his new album, produced by Thomas Wenzel (Die Goldenen Zitronen, Die Sterne), Style Council and Franz-Josef Degenhardt, Weimar and Herford, pop and politics as well as life and death come together. Songs such as "Hilf dem Widerstand" or "Ein Hoch der Distanz" reaffirm the verdict that Spiegel Online made about Girke's previous work: "Michael Girke's music and lyrics are of a radiant intelligence"

NOW!

When JETZT! released their first 'proper' album "Wie es war" in 2019, the band led by Michael Girke from Herford had already been one of the most important unknown groups in the country for more than two decades. Today, JETZT! is regarded as a pioneer of the Hamburg School, which was largely co-founded by Girke's Westphalian companions - Frank Spilker (Die Sterne), Jochen Distelmeyer (Blumfeld), Bernadette La Hengst and Bernd Begemann.

After "Liebe in GROSSEN Städten", the compilation of old JETZT! songs, caused a sensation five years ago and made Girke's songs known beyond the circle of cassette label archaeologists, JETZT! is now releasing the second album of the "modern era" with "Können Lieder Freunde sein?

As with its predecessor, Girke, in collaboration with Thomas Wenzel (Die Goldenen Zitronen, Die Sterne), once again succeeds in spanning a broad musical, cultural and political spectrum. Songs such as "Hilf dem Widerstand" or "Lass uns ein Gespräch sein" are East Westphalian soul, breathing the spirit of everything from Stax to Style Council.

When Girke sings about Rosa Luxemburg and her imprisonment in the fight for peace in "Rosa", on the other hand, associations with Franz-Josef Degenhardt's "Sacco & Vanzetti" do not go amiss.

"Im alten Berlin", on the other hand, allows the string arrangements to tilt into the atonal and tells of the Weimar Republic, of Berlin in the 1920s. The song takes the perspective of someone who was no longer wanted in Germany (such as the songwriter Friedrich Holländer, whom Herford greatly admired) and who was driven out during the Nazi era.

"Can songs be friends?" tells a story of states of consciousness, of existential situations, of moments of hopelessness and asks what one can nevertheless draw confidence from. In doing so, Michael Girke also deals with topics that pop music on this side of Leonard Cohen too often represses: in "Dein Name sei Trost" and "Ich rede oft mit meinen Toten" about growing old and one's own mortality, in "Hilf dem Widerstand" the question of the extent to which the wild romanticism of the young "Nieder mit den Umständen!" outcry can be translated into an attitude in later life and cynicism can be avoided.

It is therefore no coincidence that the cover image of the album is taken from Alexander Kluge's film "Abschied von Gestern" (1966 winner of the Venice Film Festival). When the familiar world collapses and nothing is as it was - what can you hold on to? Where does your path on the bridge of life lead?

Decades after Girke sang "Kommst du mit in den Alltag?", he is still asking the important questions.

Can songs really be friends? Probably not all of them, but these ones can.

(Carsten Friedrichs)

This content has been machine translated.