TRÄNEN

In the organizer's words:

Experience the newcomer band TRÄNEN at the Zelt-Musik-Festival Sommer 2024!

January 2023, Leipzig. The city seems to have been bathed in shadow for months; the lack of sunshine is replaced at most by the flicker of trashy neon signs and the flash of penetrating car headlights. Gwen Dolyn and Steffen Israel walk in the freezing semi-darkness across muddy, barren open spaces, past archaic factory buildings and faded black and chrome graffiti. The two of them soak up the atmosphere - the dirty weather, the desolate hustle and bustle, the dismissive looks from the late-night sales clerk, the persistent smell of dreariness - before hastily fleeing back to the comfort of home.

More precisely: to producer Simon Freidhöfer's studio, which is lined with old carpets. In this setting, the self-consciousness of a band called TRÄNEN grows piece by piece and, after months of gallant secrecy, releases its first piece of music into the world on June 30, 2023 with "Stures dummes Herz".

TRÄNEN have been playing hide and seek with the German indie scene since the beginning of the year. In January, a mysterious Instagram profile made the rounds - all that could be seen at the time was an animated "TRÄNEN" lettering, flickering, wavy, on a black background. No text underneath, just mysterious emojis. Shortly afterwards, a series of analogue photos went online - instead of people, they showed synthesizers, guitar necks and a frosty, dystopian sunset.

A few weeks later, finally, albeit blurred: Faces. In a constellation that no one would have expected. On the left: Gwen Dolyn, who has been stirring up the German-language progressive pop underground with a punk attitude since 2020 and, accompanied by her band Toyboys, has long since become the poster girl of "NNDW". On the other side: Steffen Israel, guitarist of the Chemnitz band Kraftklub.

Gwen Dolyn and Steffen Israel must have been surprised by the size of their project TRÄNEN themselves at first - initially it was just Gwen's idea to reinterpret the German punk classic "Duell der Letzten" by Chaos Z. Steffen was keen to get involved. Steffen was keen to get involved and they met in the studio. Within a very short time, a classic punk cover version grew into a more innovative reprise: a modern "Duell der Letzten" that sounds jagged and yet dreamy, pounding and yet harmonious, disgusted and yet wistful. Amazingly organic, improvised, almost headless, an independent sound aesthetic was found, carried by a sinister new wave aura, beautiful pop passages, reverberating vocals, 80's-esque synth pads and dominant guitar runs. So why not write a second song, or even a third?

Let's keep it short: at the end of a creative journey lasting around a year, "Haare eines Hundes" is now a complete TRÄNEN album including a sophisticated cinematic accompanying work. The sound and image reflect the wintry monotony described at the beginning, but at the same time also the determined rage against this very monotony, the breakout momentum of collective resignation: "Haare eines Hundes" lives from a retro aura and a grayish play of colors, from the courage to be dirty, from bizarre timing and simultaneous symphonic fullness.

Choral episodes and sonorous earworm moments atomize in blurred breaks, epochality and snottiness are only millimetres apart, knotted together between tempo richness and small moments of winking. The binding element in the fireworks: Gwen Dolyn's voice. And, of course, those unmistakable lyrics, full of approachable gloom and resourceful mind games, sometimes reminiscent of Wir sind Helden, sometimes of Hans-A-Plast and sometimes of Ideal - "do you love me more when riot is just a word for surrender?"

"Stures dummes Herz", the very first single in TRÄNEN's history, is a prime example of Gwen's irregular writing and Steffen's solitary understanding of melody. What superficially suggests a euphoric love song actually turns out to be the exact opposite. Is "Stubborn Stupid Heart" perhaps a self-analytical soliloquy? It seems to be a complex dispute in the eye of desolate emotional constructs, an ode to complication with a conciliatory ending: "the kick goes straight to the gut, but with you I can take it". The song constantly rebuilds itself into a multi-tracked, pulsating backdrop, before undergoing the next change of scenery in a playful way and blossoming anthemically in each new chorus.

Price information:

Standing room