The Gauntlet Reviews MiG

TG has posted a review of Made in Germany here. Short and to the point!

Flake's Pyro Show

Some bastard burned down Flake's barn...but, apparently, not his wonderful car collection. I am assuming this would be his personal collection, as opposed to the fleet he operates as a business in Berlin.

The Gauntlet and Richard

TG has posted content from his interview with Richard last month. It's from here that we had the first intimation that Rammstein might be heading back to the US, and this, an interview conducted in the US during the last LIFAD tour leg.

Listen to The Gauntlet's RZK Interview

TG has posted last night's interview with Richard. You have to hear this stuff to believe it, so listen.

TG & RZK

The Gauntlet Interviewing Rammstein

If you watch LILTwitter and/or @TheGauntlet you will have seen that he is about to interview Rammstein. As soon as he has recovered from the show and found the time to post that I'll link to it. Knowing TG it should be a goodie!

Rammstein US Dates

The Gauntlet has given the US & Canadian dates for Rammstein's continued LIFAD tour. They are as follows:

May 5 - New York, NY - Izod Center (E. Rutherford, NJ)
May 7 - Montreal, QC - Bell Centre
May 8 - Toronto, ON - Air Canada Centre
May 10 - Chicago, IL - Allstate Arena (Rosemount)
May 13 - Edmonton, AB - Rexall Place
May 15 - Seattle, WA - Tacoma Dome (Tacoma)
May 18 - Oakland, CA - Oracle Arena
May 20 - Los Angeles, CA - The Forum
May 21 - Las Vegas, NV - Thomas & Mack Center

See the TG link above for more information. Thanks for IBUA for the link!

Court Awards Rammstein Apocalyptica's Money

That headline sounds so much worse than it is. The Gauntlet linked to this article on anwalt24.de, reporting that Apocalyptica has been ordered to pay Rammstein €45,000 for trademark use. What it boils down to is that Apocalyptica's marketing team advertised the World's Collide album, which included a German version of Bowie's Heroes ('Helden') featuring Till Lindemann singing and Richard Kruspe on guitar, as 'Featuring Rammstein'. This use of the Rammstein trademark was unauthorised (and obviously unpaid for), so it is now being paid for:

Die Parteien einigten sich auf die Zahlung von 45.000 Euro als angemessene Lizenzgebühr.

The parties agreed to the payment of €45,000 as a reasonable royalty.

I've seen this excellent album touted as 'featuring Rammstein' myself, but it doesn't annoy me half as much as seeing the Puhdys track Wut will nicht sterben (also featuring the vocal talents of Till Lindemann) described as a Rammstein song. Rammstein don't describe it as such, but a lot of very silly Rammstein fans do. Stop it!

Update 20110111: Please see this post for the correction to this story.

OMG NYC MSG!

I imagine there is a large group of people in New York right now who are thoroughly over-excited. I have a couple of friends there: one will be exhausted, the other will be her usual awesome, rock'n'roll self, and will no doubt go back home with fantastic stories about her second Rammstein concert of the year. Love and strength to both of them, and big happies to the rest of the Rammstein-heads attending Madison Square Garden tonight. Stay warm in the queues and cool in the melee. I wish I could be with you!

Also, a shout-out to TheGauntlet's owner, who sold his own tickets for today's show when he realised attending would mean missing his little girl's birthday tomorrow. You're a good guy, TG.

Happy birthday on the morrow for The Gauntletlette!

Also, a big 'mwah!' to Combichrist, who are back, and playing MSG with Rammstein. w00!

TG has NY Tickets...for YOU

There's a ticket giveaway on The Gauntlet. If you're able to get to New York December 11 go and enter!

Rammstein Remarks USA

TG has comment from Rammstein regarding their single US show in December. You definitely need to read the whole article linked above, but here is a highlight:

...Everything for this show is perfect - the timing, the season. We are really pumped to return to the States to play Madison Square Garden – this is one of the most challenging shows for us in 10 years...
- Olli

So go on, America. Do anything to get to that show and show them it's worth booking more shows on another leg. Nobody wants another ten years to pass without any US shows.

You Guys Heard About Rammstein in GH, Right?

Do I need to post the details? Nah, I'll just link to TG's story about it from a few days back.

The Gauntlet Hits Puberty

Our friend, The Gauntlet, has turned 14. Hair, voice, smell, and giblets will all be in a state of rather messy flux. It's a tumultuous and confusing time for any website, but I'm sure TG will get through it okay, and without developing a mono-brow (I hope).

Love you, TG <3

Haifisch Single US Track-list

The Gauntlet has this up this morning. Note the changes...

Haifisch Single

The Gauntlet has confirmed the tracklist:

1 Haifisch (Single edit)
2 Haifisch (Haiswing remix by Olsen Involtini)
3 Rammlied (Hurts Remix)
4 Ich tu dir weh (Schwefelgelb Remix)

w00!

Confirmation for Haifisch

The video premiers this Friday on MySpace, and the single is coming in May (date to be confirmed soon on The Gauntlet). Obviously this one is not an R18 video...

Haifisch? Bless You

Soon, right? It can't be far off. A small hint, possibly about how and where, has come from The Gauntlet. He's queried Herzeleid users as to how many have MySpace accounts. Yeah, I know, it's obscure, but possibly very useful information.

My Website Has More Tweet-Cred' Than me

Okay, so we're in a slow Rammstein news period. They're between live legs (yeah, I really posted that), work-demands have left me limp, and I haven't had a lot to say. Apparently The Gauntlet will be getting some news very soon, but this place has been idle for a few days, and I need to stay up late to sort out a client's MX, so I thought I'd ruminate a little.

I signed up with Twitter 'as me' before I created The LILTwitter, and I never use it. I don't use it for chat or really have anything to say that I think those following my personal account give two shits about, so all my bombast ends up here, going out via LILTrammstein. As a result, the site's account has way more followers, is listed, and generally generates traffic, while my personal account languishes in obscurity.

The same goes for my Facebook accounts. I have two of them also. One for me individually, and another for this site. Attached to both is the LILTrammstein page. As with Twitter, the FB site profile is the one I am almost always logged in as, and to top that off almost all of my FB activity is on the page, rather than either profile.

I also signed up for MySpace, since it seems such a musically oriented SN site, but I don't log in.

I'm a Social Networking retard. Note the capitalisation there. I network socially as readily as I breathe. I just don't do it as I am probably supposed to.

I've decided there is a very simple reason for this: I don't share my personal life. This isn't a bad thing, but for someone whose main avenue of communication is the internet, both professionally and personally, I had expected that Twitter would possibly eat into my time, Facebook would hold my attention, and that I would probably waste far too much energy and effort with both. This has not happened. I am someone who networks fairly well, but I do it via email and forums. Given that my own forum is a small, dusty ghost town there is a certain level of strangeness to this.

I have to wonder why it is that the media designed for doing what I do fairly well don't capture my attention nearly so much as the basic, old school dinosaurs of internet technology. The original concept of BBSs is as old as the hills, as is the idea of email. I'm not old enough (shut up) yet to be stuck in my ways. I make very good use of both FB and Twitter...for the site. LILT definitely has way more use for the newer methods of communication though.

Bored yet? Okay, I'll put a plug in it. I wouldn't want to become one of those self-indulgent, self-involved bloggers who thinks people care about my life ;)

By the way, I will post whatever it is The Gauntlet serves up as soon as I get out of bed in the morning...

Next Single: Ignore Rumours

After sites have posted so-called confirmed release dates for the next Rammstein single the word has come down via The Gauntlet:

The single / video has no official date. But they are actually meeting with label peeps this week to hammer it all out. So all rumors you have heard on a date being confirmed are just speculation although April is the month from what I have been told. No asking anymore questions as I know whats next and I can't say, it is for the band to announce. The new single isn't indexed so the official site will be able to promote and post news when they are ready.

There you go. Never mind the bollocks.

LIFAD Bonus Disc Review

Hey, will you look at that. I wrote a review. It has my 'understand no evil' stamp on it, and at some point I will review the entire album, bonus disc included, with the meanings in mind. At some point I will also finish the ITDW video review I started at Christmas. Go me, working at the pace of a snail...