(Edited to fix the links.)
So I have a new obsession: the German band Versengold. It's odd, I listened to d'Artagnan (also German, also Mittelalter-Rock or thereabouts) solidly for three years to the exclusion of almost any other band, but I never went past the music, whereas with Versengold somehow it's easier to get interested in the people. (If I continue posting about them it's going to become fairly obvious which people in particular...)
I've left my notes in present tense although this happened a day or two back now.
Anyway, today I'm posting about a song from Schandmaul which I heard for the first time only a few days ago, although it was first released in 2016. I was randomly scrolling through Versengold videos on youtube and came across one called "Tjark Evers (Schandmaul Cover) auf plattdeutsch". (WARNING - the song is based on a true story, a tragedy. I woke up in the middle of last night trying not to think about it.) I had a look through the comments before listening and many of them said this was a rare example of a cover version being much better than the original. I generally prefer whichever version I hear first, but I also prefer Versengold to Schandmaul, so I decided to balance things by listening to the original first.
Schandmaul - Tjark Evers (Official Musicvideo)
So I’m starting with Schandmaul’s version. At the time of writing it has 18K views and 24 comments, and it utilises the video Die Zigarrenkiste. There are subtitles, so as I’ve read Tjark’s story on Wikipedia and I can read a bit of German, I can broadly follow what’s going on and I’m crying. It's a really good song and tells the story beautifully. I particularly like the repetition of "Ich bin Tjark Evers, von Baltrum," because all he has left is to tell people who he was.
Now I’m not sure whether to go straight to Versengold’s version or what seems from the thumbnail to be a live version from Schandmaul with Malte (Hoyer) singing in.
Going for the Versengold version which is in plattdeutsch. So I don’t suppose the youtube subtitles will make any sense at all. (In fact not available.)
Versengold - Tjark Evers (Schandmaul Cover) | auf plattdeutsch
This one has 265K views, 127 comments, which would seem to confirm that it actually is generally acknowledged to be better than the original. The pianist has his back to the camera but it looks like Sean (Lang). Yup. Not sure who they’ve got on percussion at the back. This version didn’t have quite the immediate hit for me that the Schandmaul version had - probably for two reasons: it’s not the first time I’ve heard it, and there’s no video to do the job of visualising it for me.
This is the first time I’ve seen Malte reading his words, but of course I don’t know whether that’s because he didn’t have time to learn them or he can’t learn them. I like the use of the piano almost as an alarm, like ringing the bell on Winterflut 1717. I always enjoy Malte's singing, but on a big stage with a jumping crowd there's honestly a limit to how much you can milk the emotion of the words of any song, it's simply the wrong forum for that, but here he absolutely nails it. You'd think from watching him that he's living it himself. Wonderful.
And finally, the live version - not yet sure what I’m going to get here.
Schandmaul - Tjark Evers - Live aus der Kölner Lanxess Arena, 2018
OK, so this is clearly a Schandmaul concert, and we have Thomas (Lindner) on the piano for this one. The fact that Malte is guesting seems to suggest quite strongly that Schandmaul themselves like what he's done with it. (The bit where Thomas introduces the song and Malte starts at 4:14 here at the end of the previous song.) Malte is again singing in platt but this time without the words in front of him. He’s also - obviously enough - singing to Schandmaul’s tempo which to me is slightly faster and very even, almost clockwork, and although he's doing a wonderful job, for me there is nothing like the amount of feeling here as there is in Versengold's own cover version. But the audience applaud very enthusiastically as soon as he finishes singing, not even waiting for the music to finish.
I have to say, I’m not a fan of random noodly music whether it’s on the guitar, piano or violin, and I honestly think this song would work even better - more dramatic, more poignant - if the music just stopped dead halfway through the last line, leaving the last "von Baltrum" unaccompanied. But hey, I've only ever written two songs in my life, I'm going to assume Thomas and the rest of Schandmaul know what they're doing.
TL;DR: I like Schandmaul, and the song itself is excellent, but having now listened to three different versions, I am in agreement with those who say that Versengold's version is better. The piano is more subtle, bringing out the "alarm bells" aspect, and I like the more emotional feeling and slightly slower tempo of it.