Even the cover leaves no questions unanswered: a design straight from the graphic studio of the Communist Party of China. The track list also shows where the left has buried its ideals: Brecht/Eisler’s “United Front Song”, Heine’s “The Silesian Weavers” and “Bruder zur Sonne”. David Julian Kirchner, who transformed the crisis of capitalism into art with the staged bankruptcy of the imaginary Kirchner Hochtief group, is now taking the direct route with IG-POP.
The Mannheim artist forms the current soundtrack for the class struggle from old political hits and a few of his own songs, and as befits real agitprop, he does not proceed in a disguised manner, but always straight to the point. “Germany is a country of paperwork,” he sings, and lets Ata Canani, the first so-called guest worker to sing in German, who was only rediscovered in recent years, comment: “Identify yourself, otherwise we will evict you.” And so it happily continues: In the anthemic title track, he calls for rebellion and a stop to the machines, and Ernst Busch’s “Der heimliche Aufmarsch” becomes a cool wave piece complete with a saxophone solo.
Where Peter Licht tore the old concepts, especially capitalism, the old rascal, out of the old-fashioned contexts in order to give them a new relevance, Kirchner rather plays with the old formulations, as if trying to see if they still work. He rewrites “The Internationale” but does not touch the style of the original. The shifts take place more on a musical level, when he adds another level of meaning to the classic, which has been hummed to death by countless SPD party conferences, as dream pop that has faded away. The dream of revolution, it’s alive.
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