I’ve never visited Berlin; Hamburg yes, many times, but Berlin always seemed to be a tad too Eastern Block for me despite what happened in November 1989.
But having heard several tracks now by Rasmus Weirup which do a better job of promoting the place than the Berlin Tourismusverband probably ever could do, I’ll forsake Puerto Banus for Unter den Linden the next time I’m at the travel agents. Just for the edginess of it all.
Rasmus Weirup is a clever writer as well as musician. In ‘Bar Voyage’, a single which is also a track on his new EP, ‘Fehrbelliner Platz’, he envisages a murder after a chance encounter at a bar close to his home, which I described as a short story set to music that might have featured in The Twilight Zone.
And in ‘After Ecstasy’, which sounds like it might be the name of a metal band, it is topped off by an extended litany that might belong in the Masked Ball ritual scene from Stanley Kubrick’s ‘Eyes Wide Shut’.
Most of Rasmus’ work derives from experiences in and around Fehrbelliner Platz itself; a microcosm of the entire Berlin scene by all accounts and a place where you really should expect the unexpected.
Ich bin ein Fehrbelliner might be his shibboleth.
The EP was written and recorded during an intense year spent in Berlin and the lyrics were scribbled down in the U-Bahn, in parks, at bars, in club bathrooms, and everything was recorded in a small rented room near that prominent public square in the Wilmersdorf district of Berlin
The music is partly inspired by the techno, electroclash, EBM, and industrial music he spent many nights dancing to, and equally as much by the melancholy quietude of the early hours.
I selected ‘Wilmersdorfer Techno’ as the sample EP track, “a techno song paying tribute to the quietest and least festive part of Berlin” as he describes it. Is there such a place? One gets the impression that it’s ’24 hour party city’.
But not on this track, which sounds like there’s a bit of Devil worship going down in the Berliner Vororte. It’s as dark as a moonless night in January with 100% cloud cover, suggesting a perfect soundtrack for that part of ‘Rosemary’s Baby’ in which Beelzebub has his way with Mia Farrow, or even, again, that orgy scene in ‘Eyes Wide Shut’.
And it’s all to a mesmerising drum beat that you just can’t shake off. Jungle drums, war drums, sacrifice drums, take your pick.
He’s unusual for sure, but at the apex of inventiveness.
Oh, and also on the EP you’ll find an electro-ballad (my phrase), ‘Need You Now’, written by a gaggle of other artists – Hillary Scott, Charles Kelley, Dave Haywood, and Josh Kear – and ‘Ruhe, meine seele, Op. 27. No. 1’, which was composed by Richard Strauss with lyrics added by Karl Henckell and will probably have the German composer turning in his grave.
Also sprach Weirup, one might say.
Find him on:
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/rasmusweirup/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/rasmus.weirup.7/
Bandcamp: https://rasmusweirup.bandcamp.com/
