HeLL-ZoNE e-zine > > FOTOGALERIEN > ENDLESS DANSE MACABRE Bochum 2005 |
A very special event was awaiting us this Friday night. Two record labels (Endless Records and Danse Macabre Records) were coming together to present a special little festival tour: Endless Danse Macabre - two bands of each label (“Ptyl” and “Das Ich” from the “Danse Macabre Label”; “The Eternal Afflict” and “The Invincible Spirit” from “Endless Promotion”) presenting old school and modern electronic music. ↑
It was a very nice combination for all the lovers of electronic music that love to dance.
Ptyl, born in 1977, is an Israeli musician. Since 1993 he has always been making music. Starting with an electric guitar he found out that he could never turn his ideas into music through this way. Turning towards electronic music, he found his way. First he begun recording songs into cassettes all made with 8 bit samples. Ptyl has been influenced by a lot of different musicians and styles such as American rock and grunge, “Depeche Mode”, “Nine Inch Nails”, “Coil”, early 80s Industrial etc. ↑
So his music is something between American rock guitars, a hard edge production like on “NIN´s” Broken EP, the sour -melodic atmosphere of the apocalyptic folk scene, the EBM grooves of “Front 242” or “Nitzer Ebb” and influences from the rave scene. His first band was “Failed Experiments” which recorded three albums.
In 1998 he started his solo project to realize the passions in his head. The first album “Spasm” was somehow really impressive combining different directions of music. But his goal, the clear representation of his true inner self through songs, was achieved only partly with this album he thought. More releases followed: “re:ptyl” and "triptyl: the 3rd complexion" (2002). Ptyl found himself re-inventing the industrial-ebm-goth genres in his head, into a version he could relate to the most. While he was forming a band called “PVC” and releasing an album in 2005, he still worked on his solo project.
2005 finally Ptyl was signed to “Danse Macabre Records” to release his album “Hell Sounds”. This album was recognized by German underground music press, and in 2005 Ptyl played for the first time live on European Ground at the Woodstage Festival. Now he was on the road again with some other famous bands at the “Endless Danse Macabre” festival tour.
Music
The show starts with a countdown “The show will start in T minus xxx seconds”. At minus 29 it was time for Ptyl to enter the stage to the sounds of a machine gun. Ptyl´s music is not easy to describe. The songs are like compositions, stretching endlessly. In some songs, the musical direction is changed every few seconds, spreading from gothic ballads to industrial punk rock, tekno-electro-rave, over trip-hop influences to EBM. One verse might be completely different than the previous one.
The recent album “Hell sounds” is somehow Ptyl´s best work so far with a strict approach: different songs shift between EBM, electro, industrial, rock or pop but with a very clear orientation in each song. You cannot put his music into a certain genre, but Ptyl has his own specific style. The main issue of the show was on the current album “Hell sounds” where from five of the seven songs were played. Furthermore a very new song from the forthcoming album “Loki” was presented too.
Performance
The performance was a pure one man show with his music running from tape and Ptyl behind the microphone entering the stage with a new and quite strange hair cut. For the first song he was chaining himself to the micro stand with some handcuffs.
For “The Dread” he was blindfolding with a white scarf. But the show was more than only one man behind his microphone. The music was underlined by videos shown on a screen in the back of the stage. The shown videos reminded a bit of “Skinny Puppy” or “Frontline Assembly” showing pictures of suffering and death, electric chairs, atom bomb explosions, beaten men… pictures just out of daily news somehow showing how cruel the world can be.
The video for “Hell sounds” started quite harmonically with kissing couples, live, marriage… but changing into dreadful grimaces and screaming people. Parts of the lyrics were shown besides that. Ptyl himself is very sunk into his music falling onto his knees… somehow like praying with his face to the screen.
Setlist
00. Intro (the countdown)
01. The mercy seat (a cover version to nick cave from the current album “hell sounds”)
02. Infernal citizen (from the current album)
03. The dread (from the current album)
04. Hand of our kin (from the forthcoming album “loki”)
05. Possessed (from the previous album “triptyl”)
06. Hell sounds (from the current album)
07. Dragon (from the current album)
After the electro band “The Eternal Afflict” split up at the end of 1994 at the top of its career they left a big gap in the electronic music genre. But things changed and no one did expect it but it happened: 2003 got together again and released the MCD “Godless”. The following album “Katharsis” exceeded all expectations and completed a unique comeback. End of 2004, the EP “Black Heritage” was released and was dealing with the band’s love for the colour black. The recent album “Euphoric and Demonic” was released in spring 2005 and contained a lot of potential club hits. Especially the song “Venustrap” is to mention: it’s a duet between Sara Noxx and Cyan.
↑
Music
With “The Eternal Afflict” one of the big EBM-heroes entered the stage.
There is no one of all the EBM-lovers who does not know their hit “San Diego”. As female vocals, Linda Mathews was joining the band for the “Endless Danse Macabre” tour. And let me one thing mention: The old Eternal Afflict are back. After seeing them a while ago and being a bit disappointed, this time they spread their old charm. Fresh on stage with their up tempo sound and two good voices they made people dance to their hits. So “We libanon you” was announced with the words “Are you ready to rock?” And yes, we were ready! Even though it was pure electronic music, they made the people to rock their asses.
For “Tranceworld” Cyan was supported on the microphone by one of his keyboarders.
Performance
Somehow the show was a typical performance of an electro band. But somehow it was not. There were of course the two keyboarders behind their instruments and a singer making the show in front of them. But there was more: a long haired keyboarder getting ecstatic behind his instrument and Linda adding the female note with her appearance. The show was very nice underlined by the light show. Cyan was spreading real EBM feeling on stage pushing up the audience too.
The encore was announced with: “You want this one ultimate song? Then you should get it”. Then the long awaited “San Diego” started as the final of the show.
Setlist
00. Intro
01. Babylon
02. We libanon you
03. Euphoric & Demonic
04. Trauma Rouge
05. Godless
06. Door to my pain
07. Childhood
08. Agony, I Like
09. Tranceworld
-----------------------
10. San Diego
1984. “The Invisible limits” were founded by mastermind Thomas Lüdke (Vocals, Keyboards), Ralf Schauf (Bass), Andreas (Drums, Keyboards) and Marion Küchenmeister (Vocals). With the early singles Love Is A Kind Of Mystery" and "Devil Dance" they gained a lot of fame right from the start. Thomas left the band and re-named to the now known “The Invincible Spirit”. The absolute EBM cult hit “Push” was released followed by the “The Invincible Spirit” debut CD “Current news” which included hits like “Make a device” and “Provoke you”. 1988 saw the release of another hit “Contact” as well as a re-release of the “The Invisible Limits” song “Devil Dance” in a harder style. The early 90ies saw some more releases but after “Showdown” the band disappeared in 1994. ↑
Six years later the band started to play live again and released the EP “Faster Life”. 2003´s “Wave Gotik Treffen” in Leipzig/Germany proofed that the fans want the band back.
As cooperation with label mates “The Fair Sex”, a mini album under the name “The Invincible Sex” was released in 2004 as well as a compilation called “Anthology”. At the moment the band is working on a new album.
The current line-up consists of Thomas Lüdke (voc), Hardy Z. (key) and Lydia N. (bass).
Music
Thomas Lüdke belongs to the few artist that created timeless classics with two bands – “The Invisible Limits” and “The Invincible Spirit”. The show started with the song “Alphasex” with its lively punk attitude which is hard to find within all the clean Future Pop acts nowadays. The main issue of the set was on the big hits such as “Contact”, “Devil Dance”, “Make a Device” and of course “Push”. But also some songs out of the collaboration with “The Fair Sex” shouldn’t be missed.
With “Your god in me” a calmer song was presented while “Deeper” is a real crashing old school EBM hit. Different to many of the other electro bands “The Invincible Spirit” added a bass as a “real” instrument.
Performance
The show was somehow very typical for an electro band. The impressive singer at the front while the other musicians stood more in the back.
Also the light show was quite reduced flooding the stage with red and blue lights combined with a lot of smoke. Too much smoke for my taste. Very attractive bass player Lydia was hard to see. Even though the smoke made it from time to time hard to see the band it was very good to hear creating a dance party for the audience.
One hit after another made everybody dance and applause. Great that good EBM isn’t dead!
Setlist
01. Alphasex
02. Love is a kind of Mystery
03. Contact
04. No Escape
05. Devil Dance
06. Your god in me (Invincible Sex)
07. Push
08. Deeper (Invincible Sex)
09. Make a device
10. The Invincible Rat
After a lot of musical experiments Bruno Kramm (Instruments, music, production) and Stefan Ackermann (vocals, lyrics) decided to form the band “Das Ich” in 1989.
The debut album “Die Propheten” was released at Bruno´s own label “Danse Macabre”. Soon the band got its status as an innovative and experimental electronic band. Several albums and tours as well as collaborations with other artists (“Atrocity” i.e.) or a soundtrack for a movie followed.
After many successful years the band released their double album “LAVA:glut” and “LAVA:asche” in 2004. The concept of the album is quite new. Starting with the basic composition of each song, the arrangement on “LAVA:glut” provides a huge variety of styles expanding to symphonic height and abysmal depth while “LAVA:asche” pushes the songs into a dance floor direction.
Music
“Das Ich“ know how to combine electronic, symphonic and early industrial elements to an explosive cocktail.
The mixture of Electro, Classic and Avant-garde together with Stefan’s screamed out lyrics seems unrestrained, sometimes even infamy and vulgar. The songs are controversial and shocking but always with a balanced sense for suspense between harmony and disharmony. The songs always link between filling up the dance floors and artistic profundity. The show in Bochum started with the well known hit “Die Propheten” from the first album. Other hits like “Kain und Abel” or the dance floor smash hit “Destillat” followed. “Das Ich” surely differ from other electro bands.
Yes, the use keyboards… but in a different way mounted on a movable metal construction. There is steady movement on stage, not only by singer Stefan but also by Bruno and Kain behind their keyboards.
Performance
The stage performance of “Das Ich” is something special.
Apart from the constructions for the keyboards and the backdrop in the well known background, there is some kind of metal cross made for Stefan’s microphone.
Trademark of Stefan is his red body painting combined with red pants and gym shoes. This time he had a new hair cut too. Stefan is surely an impressive person on stage. Additionally to his outfit, his eccentric dance style is the most important thing to mention. While Bruno and Kain are staying behind their instruments, he is moving flexible like gummy on the rim of the stage. The audience is steadily pushed forward: “Bochum, we want to hear you all!” For the first encore “Destillat” Stefan receives a stuffed animal which gets its place on stage. Highlight of the show was surely “Gottes Tod” which was moved into a medley of “Gottes Tod” by “Das Ich”, “Push” by “The Invincible Spirit” and “San Diego” by “The Eternal Afflict”. First Myk Jung of “The Fair Sex” joined Stefan on stage to sing with him. At the end all bands besides Ptyl were on stage singing the medley. Really great! The audience had as much fun as all artists on stage. Stefan said how much it means to him to be on stage to perform with these other bands.
Bruno was impressed by the audience too: “There should anyone say that Goths cannot party!” After all bands had left the stage, people made big noise for getting “Das Ich” back. The audience still wasn’t satisfied so the band had to return afterwards for a last encore: “Luegen und das Ich”.
Setlist
01. Die Propheten
02. Der Schrei
03. Kain und Abel
04. Sodom und Gomorra
05. Garten Eden
06. Krieg im Paradies
07. Engel
08. Kindgott
-------------
09. Destillat
10. Push Gott to San Diego Medley
-----------
11. Luegen und Das Ich
| Übersicht Photogalerien |