In the relations of my home town Cologne, we are celebrating a big Songs of the Week anniversary with this edition. My 26th January 2024 post about new releases is nothing but the 111th posting of this series. More than two years of scanning music releases – and I somehow still don’t get the mechanisms behind release strategies. For example, the long list of new songs which I felt worth sharing was rather short already – after I reviewed it, there were even less songs left. A comparably small set of songs – with some nice gems in it.
Nicki – Bleib wie du bist
In the mid-1980’s (whose civil name is Dora Andre Hrda, by the way) was a darling of the German schlager and pop music scene. Several of her songs made it into the German and Austrian charts. She is still rather active and also releases songs from time to time. This new release (“Stay as you are”) is a really energetic one, criticizing the influence of social media and obsession with being beautiful. Really love what she is doing in here.
ADMT – North
ADMT sounds like some sort of band name, doesn’t it? Andy, Dan, Michael, Tom? Not at all – it is an abbreviation of the name of a British artist, Adam Taylor. In North, he is praising Northern England. Have you every been to Yorkshire? are the first words of this new release. I have been there – and this song makes me think about having another trip, indeed. There will be an EP this year as well.
Sobi – Happy At Last
Sobi is the artist name of Sobini Böhm. Se grew up in London, but her surname already suggest that she is having German background. Music has always been a big part of her life. While her 2020 single release Pearl comes with almost half a million streams on Spotify only, Happy At Last has a lot of potential for a viral listen as well. Would love to visit her tour through Germany in March 2024, indeed.
Allie Farris – Jenny
Nashville-based US artist is back from a baby break hiatus. The press kit describes the talented songwriter as mixture of Sheryl Crow and Brandi Carlie. After giving birth to her two kids, Lillie-Rose (born 2021) and Orson (2023), she is now back in the music business – and underlines the beauty of her songs with Jenny.
The Cumberland River Project – What You Said
Frank Renfordt and his The Cumberland River Project is more and more departing from country and heading towards pop music. This week, the Ruhrgebiet songwriter released the beautiful What You Said.
Eske – Du bist perfekt
Just 2:01 minutes – that’s all the duration a modern pop song nowadays needs in the short attention span of TikTok and reel consumers. Germany’s Eske does not only state Du bist perfekt (“You are perfect”); but also makes perfect use of this short bit of time. The message Du bist perfekt so wie Du bist – “You are perfect just as you are”. Another way of spreading the message Nicki gave in her leading song of this week as well. Love tune by the artist, who is originally from East Frisia.
Florian Künstler – Das größte Kompliment
Not just due to his fabulous first name, Florian Künstler gets more and more into my musical focus. Das grö0te Kompliment is another great, emotional pop song. His characteristic voice adds a lovely touch to it.
Mina Richman – Something to Rely On
No, this one is not a cover of Keane’s Somewhere Only We Know. The laid-back, groovy soul-pop song is a great feature song is a great teaser to her debut album Grown Up, which is scheduled for March 2024.
Nie und Nimmer – Kleines Pflaster
Nie und Nimmer are celebrating their tenth band anniversary this year. The Berlin duo combines pop, rock and hip hop elements. During the last years, they regularly released songs which attracted quite significant attention in the German music scene. I really enjoy this collaboration between singer Hayat and rapper Mo.
Bruce Dickinson – Rain on the Graves
Bruce Dickinson fans look forward to a great year 2024 with their star. His solo album The Mandrake Project is about to be released in just a few weeks (1st March 2024), followed by a huge world tour which kicks off in Mexico in mid-April 2024 and (according to the plans so far) finishes in Greece in late July 2024. This song is another appetizer to all these events.
Vlad in Tears – Broken Bones
I got a bit of confused about this act. Vlad in Tears, dark rock band, used to be based in Italy, but now they are located in GErmany. Their new album Relapse just takes a few more weeks to be released, coming with a tour through Germany in March.
Serpents – The Void
The closing song this week comes from Sweden. The black metal band Serpents released their new song The Void this year. I love the wide range of piano and fiddle parts on the one hand and really energetic powerful guitar parts on the other. Nice.
Songs of The Week – The Playlist
You may also listen to my Songs Of The Week and songs selected in some of the previous weeks on this Spotify playlist:
Germany – The Very Northwest
Here are all my postings related to the Emsland or the East Frisia region:
This week's Songs of the Week are quite diverse. Big names and newcomers, songs from all kinds of genres - that's ...
After a lot of floorball on Flyctory.com the last days, it is already time to head back into music reviews ...
Especially in summer, East Frisia and the East Frisian Islands on the German North Sea coast are very popular tourist ...
I love small regional air service like the Essential Air Service in the USA or flights to small and rather ...
After the volume of songs in the last two weeks has been rather thin, this week's Songs of the Week comes with ...
As I told you in previous postings, I initially gather candidates for my Songs of the Week, before I narrow the ...
Despite the album name Hamburg, the German indie-pop band North West is in fact from the very North West of Germany, ...
The last three months of the year are about to start. Traditionally, the focus is rather on well-known artists, their ...
The OFD (Ostrfriesischer Flug-Dienst) is a regional airline, which is specialized in connection the German North Sea islands. Being part ...
During the Nazi regency in Germany, the Emslandlager (Emsland Camps) was a group of concentration and detention camps in the Emsland region, ...
Greetsiel is one of the popular villages in East Frisia, right at North Sea. Especially the picturesque harbor area is ...
During a trip to the German North Sea shore in later 2021, we also visited the Automobil- & Spielzeugmuseum Nordsee. The ...
Inhabitants of East Frisia drink ten times more tea than the average German - with their consumption of the hot ...
Ten years of happiness (and all the other times) with my wife - we originally intended to celebrate this very ...
The Aquarium is one of the attractions of Wilhelmshaven. During a visit in summer 2021 under Covid-19 conditions, I visited ...
The Nationalpark Wattenmeer (Wadden Sea Conservation Area) is one of the most popular natural reserves in Germany. However, many young seals ...
Summer feels to be over - Fall 2021 is coming. Finally, I had much more - and better - trips ...
A lonely place with North Sea view (or, at least, a bit of that) - doesn't sound too bad, does ...
15 meters of total height, thereof a the height of the light itself at eleven meters - the Pilsum Light ...
Northern Germany, especially the East Frisia (Ostfriesland) region in model scale? This is exactly what the Leeraner Miniaturland (liternally: Leer Model Land) ...
The sound of Razz feels very international - but in fact they are from the Emsland, a Northwest region in ...
Magnetic levitation is such a fascinating technology - and even though the German Transrapid project is no longer followed, it still ...
Papenburg has some more interesting places other than the famous Meyer Werft. At the opposite part of the town, my ...
The history of Emsflower started as Kwekerij Kuipers founded by Jan Kuipers in De Lutte in the Netherlands. Not too far ...
Despite the limited travel situation in Germany due to Covid-19, there are some quite interesting virtual airline projects in Germany ...
With Flyctory.com growing on the musical side, I have the opportunity to have access to more and more interesting releases ...
Even though I could likely never have a maritime life (I would feel too locked away on a ship), I ...
The Meyer Werft in Papenburg is one of the most iconic plants of German engineering, indeed. The site is manufacturing ...
Doing some local attractions in the Papenburg region like the huge Meyer Werft shipyard, the Dat Otto Huus in Emden or ...
During an October 2020 trip to the East Frisia (Ostfriesland) region, I just could not prevent myself to have a ...
Reviews – German Schlager Top Pick!s
Here are all my Media Reviews related to German schlager, which lead to a Top Pick! rating:
As I am connected to German promotion platforms, I typically get quite a lot of new schlager releases. I filter ...
Melissa Naschenweng is an Austrian artist, who is mixing traditional folk, schlager, pop and rock elements in her music. Because ...
Sometimes, when I scan new music releases, I run into songs or albums, which simply make me smile. One of ...
Even though the soil in Monheim was quite muddy, the Ben Zucker concert I had there in July was definitely ...
The Geschwister Hofmann (namely: "Hofman Siblings") have been a German schlager duo of two sisters. From their first stage appearances ...
Tom Astor is likely the most important living artist of the German country music scene. In 2023, he did not ...
Her song I steh auf Bergbauernbuam ("I love male mountain farmer boys") has been streamed some 8.5 million times on Spotify and ...
The studio album Perspektiven is actually my second album review of a Roland Kaiser release. After the Christmas album Weihnachtszeit, Kaiser is back ...
Matthias Reim is one of the big names in the German schlager-rock scene. After some rather difficult times, he came ...
One of the German schlager artists I honor most is definitely Roland Kaiser. He is active since decades and is ...
In December 2019, I praised the album 2084 by the Pete Wolf Band. The artist behind that project is Wolfgang ...
From a TV talent show to the top of the charts: Beatrice Egli definitely took profit of winning the tenth ...
Nino de Angelo is one of my favorite German artists. I will definitely tell you about a very special concert ...