The GDR is still controversial, even if it is considered a closed chapter of German history. For many people, but it was a reality and thus a part of her biography. Historians question in this band of people from the former East Germany to their personal stories: What was life in the GDR? What motivated them to commit themselves for or against it or come to terms with it? As the collapse of the GDR was experienced? And how they see life and action in the GDR in retrospect?
deals with these questions, the interview tape "Lost time? DDR-life stories in retrospect. As an appetizer, an excerpt from the Interview with André Herzberg, singer of Pankow.
(...)
After the army, you then started to study music
.
I wanted to be a very long time musician, with 17 or
perhaps even earlier. It took even in the GDR for
all a glow. You could not just say yes:
"I do it now music." So I applied in Berlin
at the music school.
wanted to be famous as a rock star?
not unusual for a 17-year-old ...
(Laughs) I had an experience with 14 times since I
I sang a song with a band and've noticed
that works with the girls quite well. So, that is because
immediately viewed with different eyes. But what
is this world, the lives of pop stars as such,
have about 'I do not think that I did not
yes. There were indeed in the GDR did not
horizon. There was somehow the Puhdys, but the
I found quite corrosive. And all I have so admired
was actually in the West.
What music do you like to have heard back then?
An early album for example, was James Brown live
this ecstatic, what came over by this music,
that has fascinated me mad: about the music you could
express what you could get out because such a frenzy
leave, which was beyond language. So what
feel quite wild, internal, I thought maybe in my
. I think this has tickled me.
What should be tantamount to study music?
You got a professional card: Musician, classification,
and also how much money you get. And with the
could you go on stage. But I had
with other musicians is the problem that what I had so
in my head, actually has no interest
. At the time, was the most important thing for any musician:
Where can I get the equipment for the stage?
instruments, amplifiers and voice systems. Everything came
from the West. That is, among musicians, we have
not really talk about music but about
Get this or the tinkering. It was indeed a
developed incredible imagination to build things even themselves to
. When you were thinking about music, then
almost always the replay. Because the public wanted most of
International
get something enacted. If she could not hear the
originals, then the musicians should copy it
them as much as possible. But these were
Things that did not do that. That is, I needed
first a while before I had ever found
musicians who shared my ideas. I found what I was
then a guitarist who had studied together with
me, who wanted at least
write their own songs - and in German, which was
important to me. We have also enacted Nina Hagen
, Ian Dury - Start of New Wave,
foothills of punk. When I went to the stage that was always
such a form of dressing. To paint the eyes, put on any hat and
: - the
scare people, "Waah!". This has me a fabulous fun
made, and just about then you have to imagine this one years
juggler Rock Band, that same name was
the band. Really do with a scream on stage
and nonsense.
In 1981, then Pankow.
Exactly. Veronika Fischer, it was like a singer who
was already very popular in East Germany, went to the West.
This happened constantly, some people were great,
and eventually, if they were really grown up,
they went to the West. And so that was also because their
band then sought a replacement. In the situation - I was kicked out
degree at jugglers - have me
asked if I participate. Well, it was establishing
of Pankow.
How would you locate in the GDR because Pankow
music scene was something new?
Yes, back then it was at any rate understood by the people as something
new. Absolutely. I mean, we have started
Theatre Rock - which has existed in the GDR
definitely not before. In addition, the
music for DDR ratios very rocky, and the lyrics were
was very close to everyday life. We ourselves have - I have to say
- understood as an elite.
Pankow was a political band? I'm thinking of songs like
, boredom ' ...
I myself would always deny everything. I
actually always had the feeling that politics has entered my life
worlds. From outside.
First was the GDR as a country in which you could not turn up
left and right, without
've been that you do not somehow compelled to make a political statement
. So, you
was immediately politicized. And I think - Boredom ': It
I could not really care to make a political song
, in any way. I have tried to describe a feeling
. That this feeling will
also had a political component, yes, God, I have nothing against
.
It made an appearance at the Palace of Republic on 30
January 1983, where you have appeared in army uniform.
The occasion was 50 years to power of fascism.
So, this is again very well with my
Biography and ... yes, and together with my mother actually
, with their hatred of the collaborators ...
And then I had so deliberately, it gave us a song,
that is, I'm loving '. It works like this: "I am loving, I'm always
dear, the good Lord I give his, give the State
I his, if other whistle - and I dance ...",
so on and so forth. And from the song 'I
then developed a monologue: What has it been for reasons
to march with Hitler, and why you
marches in the war. And I have
then recited and me during which attracted a Wehrmacht uniform
. So that means I'm in
underwear appeared on stage and only at
putting on these uniforms - this army helmet,
the soldier's uniform, and so on - was clear who
Talking straight.
was felt to be the provocation?
The whole scene, and five minutes before, was totally
in question, "What do you want, what is all this "
And:" How do you mean "And so on and so on?.
was on the radio then spoke about my announcement about it
, there was a live broadcast of the concert
, and as they tried to censor the
in this way.
Why was censored?
Because they were afraid, I think. Maybe that is
follower 1933, the same as fellow travelers in 1983
the GDR, which also suggested that yes? I'm loving '
is actually a song that has dealt with the East German reality
. If you look purely
offset times in such a (laughs) Political culture SED functionary
could say yes, "How can one equate the
?" Or something.
Do you meant it?
The deliberate, no. How can I say? I felt the
to a settlement with the followers. That was dealing with the GDR
also what I had so not even
considered. So far I have not even had. Sometimes you have a
artistic idea, because you can not
say exactly what that is. It is simply a
first image, a mental image.
They did travel west in the mid 80s
the first time were in the West.
Yes ... (Laughs). As the visit to Mars.
What have you experienced as, mars-like '?
all. The smells ... Was all too much. So, that was
as if suddenly the light is turned on loud to
from gray to color, from soft. That was
very, very tiring, I must say. So just in
West Germany, I could enjoy the little.
because I always felt somehow as exhausting
have: What is that? What is this all? That's
not yet! It runs like breath, after I'm
sometimes walked through department stores, as
drowned as it were, and I think there's not yet: the one,
the one, the one that ... And at some point one is so
crazy, to say: "Now quickly back into the
zone. In my gray, gray in my world. "
you have never considered staying in the West?
got the question I asked me the other day again.
Well, I was there not at home. I mean, it was
indeed quite simple: In the East, I've earned my money
, as was my band, my family anyway.
I think that's not that simple.
(...)
Interview Cornelia Siebeck
This and other interviews conducted in the new book of interviews of the past Publishing: Siebeck, Cornelia / Schug, Alexander Thomas, Alexander (ed.), lost time? DDR-life stories, in retrospect - a collection of interviews, Berlin 2010.
www.vergangenheitsverlag.de
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