2010-06-10

Rammstein Ruling Information

Thanks so much to Susanne for passing this on to me. Here is a GLT translation to English.

The upshot is this. 'They', probably being UMG or Pilgrim, filed for suspension of the indexing May 31 and it was granted. This was because the court found that the BPjM provided insufficient evidence for the reasons for the indexing that it gave. Nor has it taken into the account the nature of Rammstein's work and its artistic value, nor all of the content*. Note that this is the finding of the Cologne Administrative Court, rather than my speculation and wishful thinking, so you can savour this a little.

The ruling has much more detail, but all I can provide is a precis based on German legal-speak translated by a machine with no legal training, so I can't actually do much better without becoming proficient in German legalese.

I can tell you that the onus now appears to be on the BPjM to back up its original finding with more data, to take the artistic style and standing of the band into account, and to assess based on the entire text of the song. It seems to me that the photo of Richard has been entirely let off the hook by the court, but I'm not 100 % certain about that.

Whatever the finer points I think we can be optimistic. The BPjM has a job to do, and we will know nothing, ultimately, until it completes the task set before it or concedes the ruling.

* Here the ruling refers to the fifth stanza. I can only assume this refers to the line 'Wünsch dir was ich sag nicht nein', which has always struck me as rather sweet, especially in that context, as well as highly sinister.

Update 2010.06.10: Official site post about this here (German) and here (English).

No comments:

Post a Comment