Rammstein on Film

I'm not a fan of music videos. They're generally tacky and seem to be used to make up for a lack of real imagery in the lyrics, i.e. I can't write lyrics for shit, so here's a little movie to make up for the horrible shortcomings of the song. They're sometimes great films in their own right and are let down by the accompanying song, or they're a bit crap, and detract from it. Now and then you get a really good one that harmonises with the song, but doesn't alter it, either for the better or the worse, but that's rare.

I've watched a few Rammstein videos today. The Du Hast video stands out for me. It has a fairly obvious message: The band is a unit. The woman maybe represents the fact that Rammstein will not be Yokoed (poor Yoko; she's going to die long before that [ab]use of her name fades away), or otherwise weakened by external influence. There's also a slightly sinister feel of conditioning or brainwashing, which naturally doesn't apply in reality, but does darken the story nicely.

It's also a beautiful piece of film. I'm seriously impressed. I've watched it over a few times to take in the detail, and kept enjoying it each time. The band get their message across, the filming is great, the chick in it rocks, and the song and the film work together, without the song being changed in any real way by seeing the video.

The message I've always got from the German song is 'you have me', as in "you've got me, so if you need anything here I am". A bond was implied. That's down to poor understanding of German. Then I worked out the message is a contradiction of that, with the refused marriage vows hammering it home. I like it in German. The puns rock, and the refusal amuses me.

On the other hand the English lyrics are a bit crap. They make no sense and don't sound as good. I've thought about doing my own translation of Du Hast, but can't decide if that would be stupid or not. I'd certainly like to wipe the English version of the song that has been recorded off all cover play-lists, ever. I don't want to match it with another bad idea though.

I'll think about this some more.

[discuss]