Dec 22, 2018
I remember when you were a soldier,
Now all you do is growing older.
- Allan Align, Drangsal
seen from Malaysia
seen from Singapore
seen from United States
seen from United States
seen from Malaysia
seen from Türkiye
seen from Sweden
seen from China
seen from New Zealand
seen from United States
seen from Sweden
seen from United States
seen from Sweden
seen from Malaysia
seen from Malaysia
seen from Malaysia
seen from Malaysia
seen from Sweden
seen from China
seen from Lithuania
I remember when you were a soldier,
Now all you do is growing older.
- Allan Align, Drangsal
Your time is running away You got to get going now Life, it will not wait
Allan Align//Drangsal
Life it will not wait
DRANGSAL – Allan Align (Official Video)
Drangsal - Allan Align
Ever listened to German music? Yeah, you probably love Rammstein. Or classic Krautrock bands. But did you know some 2% of contemporary German musicians make listenable music too? One of them is small-town boy Max Gruber aka Drangsal. His mixture of 80s synth sounds, post punk vibes and dark lyrics is not as cheesy as it sounds - it’s ironic, it’s catchy and it’s just really good.
The Woman Machine interviewed the young musician at a recent festival in Essen, Germany. Despite his edgy Berghain aesthetic (he’s close friends with Iceage’s Elias Bender Rønnenfelt, after all!), he’s about the sweetest person we ever interviewed. He loves to cry watching Dirty Dancing. He thinks musicians should pay equal attention to musical and visual aspects (a thing German indie musicians rarely do, it’s considered inauthentic to wear anything else but beat-up Converse from 2005). And he dearly, genuinely loves Morrissey. Having grown up in a small south-German town and recently moved to Berlin, he assumes the position of the edgy, ironically pretentious outsider. Very Moz-esque. Very not German. Listen to his debut single Allan Align below:
Photo credits: The Woman Machine, 2016.