Schnitz & Giggles

[S1E6] Swimming in Soup with Albanian Mozarts

• edelwisecrackers • Season 1 • Episode 6

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How well do you know Austrian German? The edelwisecrackers discover how the simplicity of a soup can stir thoughts on life and laughter, and why understanding these idiomatic gems is key to truly embracing the Austrian way. Some sayings will improve your view of a culture. Na, no, na, net. 

The conversation dances through the city's musical heritage, from the masters of classical composition to the modern-day maestros in powdered wigs selling concert tickets. Our hosts then address one of the stranger questions: What's up with the Austrian devotion to the soundtrack of decades past? 

As the notes of our cultural exploration fade, we spotlight the Austrian music industry's evolution, cueing up the birth of Austropop and the anthems that have transcended generations. From Wolfgang Ambros to Falco, we delve into the tunes that shaped a nation and reflect on the role of music during pivotal political moments. 

And because every great mixtape needs a surprise track, you'll be introduced to the rising Austrian ensemble, the Sandstorm Unicorns, as well as Electro Swing or the German-singing Beatles. Even though you won't hear Mr. Giggles or Dr. Schnitzel sing, it's still an auditory adventure that harmonizes the influences of music and language, setting the stage for your next playlist addition.

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Mr. Giggles:

Welcome to the Schnitz and Giggles podcast. I'm one of your hosts, michael. I'm Lukas, and what do we got today? Luky, you've come prepared.

Dr. Schnitzel:

Guten hallo, guten hallo. Once again, we've got plenty of stuff for today. Okay, good, plenty of stuff. Is that good English, maybe? Maybe we have a lot of things prepared Based on what you have prepared today.

Mr. Giggles:

I'm not going to judge you on your English.

Dr. Schnitzel:

Well, the English language is interesting enough, but the German language has its perks as well, of course. Sure, I was just thinking before we started recording today. I was thinking about you know, some people learn German, some do, some even accomplish some level of German. But I've made two experiences and I think you kind of know what I'm talking about because you've seen it all as well, that when people move here to austria and I've seen a lot, with americans, I have to say, but also with other nations, but as you are american, to be fair, you probably hang out with more americans than any other nationality I'll probably hang out with more americans than I should.

Dr. Schnitzel:

That's positive.

Mr. Giggles:

Yeah, well, that's that should go without saying, yeah, but we said it.

Dr. Schnitzel:

But yeah, we said it's not. So. There's basically two kinds of americans that move here, and so some really dig into language and really try to study it even before they come here, or as they move here. They spend just one year on language learning only before they even start anything else, sure. And there's the other group of people who come here and say, well, I'm going to speak english to everyone because they probably won't understand me anyway. I think there's a happy medium somewhere between as well, no, there's only black and white. All right, okay, all right, yeah, of course there's a medium. There's some people who want to learn a language and they give up because they realize English is good enough, that's where I fall.

Dr. Schnitzel:

However, the common realization that I've also noticed is that the group of people who learn a language and a group of people who do not learn language. They end up saying all the same, which is once they move here. They say I cannot understand the people, the austrians, I cannot understand them. Yeah, which is especially frustrating if you've been spending three years learning german.

Mr. Giggles:

Yeah, german, german major in college or something, and you get here, right, yeah, you think you you can't come in the thing is that your german language learning wasn't in vain.

Dr. Schnitzel:

It's just most of those phrases you learn might be more based in Germany. Yeah, and so Austrian German is slightly different, although the grammar and everything all the rules are more or less the same. But then of course, the major thing is the pronunciation plus the dialects that we speak. I mean, there's many dialects in Germany as well. If you go to the north and the south, people speak very different German in Germany, and the same goes for Austria, east to west. I have a hard time understanding the people in the west of Austria. Vienna is based in the east, obviously. So since we're here together and you want to learn the German language desperately, I thought I'll bring you some very Austrian like, maybe some idioms or some sayings or some proverbs that are very much used in Vienna and maybe in Eastern Austria, or some might even apply to all the German speaking countries. So you, like the listeners, don't see that I brought some papers with me today. I can confirm.

Mr. Giggles:

You can confirm he does have papers.

Dr. Schnitzel:

I have paper yeah, old school paper, and I printed some Austrian sayings on them, and on the one side it has the Austrian way of saying it. On the back side it has the more like standard German equivalent and I'd like you to try to pronounce it at first Great, and then you can try either the Austrian or the. Actually, you should try both. I'll give you this one here. What does it say Auf der Nudelsuppe daheischwommen, that's pretty good. Auf der Nudelsuppe, da hecht woman does it make any sense to you?

Mr. Giggles:

swimming in noodle soup, that's pretty close.

Dr. Schnitzel:

Okay, we're swimming in soup. Yeah, it's auf der Nudelsuppe, oh yeah, but but you're okay, your standard German.

Mr. Giggles:

You flip it around, it's almost the same here and this is like the more this is, the this would be like a no, no, this.

Dr. Schnitzel:

This would be like the standard German.

Mr. Giggles:

This is standard. Oh, okay, so I was in dialect.

Dr. Schnitzel:

You were reading a dialect first, daher geschwommen. So I would say it that's a Auf der Nudelsuppe, daher geschwommen.

Mr. Giggles:

Oh, daher geschwommen, that's how I would pronounce it Okay, the standard Deutsch, auf der Nudelsuppe hier herrgeschwommen sein.

Dr. Schnitzel:

So you caught the swimming part, yeah, and the noodle soup, and the noodle soup and the noodle soup, yeah. It's just a real saying, and people often use it in a negative term. They say ich bin, ich bin nicht wo. Ich bin nicht auf der noodlesuppe hinterher geschwommen. Okay, it's a very interesting metaphor, because noodle soup is obviously not a very special meal. I mean, to some people it might be, yes, sure, but like from austria pretty standard pretty standard school time, exactly.

Dr. Schnitzel:

So the idea behind that saying is noodle soup has very cheap ingredients. Basically, yeah, the question is, what group of people would use cheap ingredients for their meals? Cheap people? Cheap people, people who don't have a lot of money. Poor people, poor people yeah, that's it so and the idea is it's a very old saying.

Dr. Schnitzel:

Usually it's still true all around the world that poor people often do not have a lot of education. That's what I was going to get at. So people who cook a lot of noodle soup are the ones that don't have a lot of education, meaning they're not very smart in that educated way. They might be street smart, of course, but that's kind of the idea behind the whole thing. So when you tell me that you didn't swim here on the noodle soup or in the noodle soup, what you're telling me is I'm not kind of, I'm not an idiot. My, my origin is not like a poor family. That's uneducated. Basically what you're saying I'm not an idiot, yeah. So if I ask you, I don't swim in the noodle soup, yes, ain't that dumb. So if there's a situation where, for example, I would assume that you did something stupid or something and you possible it might have happened.

Mr. Giggles:

yeah, whatever you do like, if you go by some go to the supermarket, for example, and you don't know how to pay for your groceries or anything, then so this, this I could use in moments when people look at me like I'm a dummy yes, which may or may not happen regularly, you say hey, man, I didn't swim in the noodle soup, although you have to be careful, because we say in the noodle soup, like swimming in the soup, it's different, because this implies it's such a weird saying.

Dr. Schnitzel:

It's more like you come swimming across the noodle soup from A to B, it's more like a downhill river. I didn't come through the noodle soup. Yes, because if you're just swimming in the noodle soup Then you are an idiot. Well, no, no, no. Well, you're pre-everything, because that implies you're still in the womb. Oh, like that kind of noodle soup. That's the noodle soup, that's the noodle soup. Interesting. So if you said like you swim in the noodle soup, you're actually calling yourself an embryo or like a fetus or something like that. So you be careful.

Dr. Schnitzel:

Thank you for telling me that the herrschwamme is don't do that, because then the hack from is like like the head means like I came from one place and came to this place. That's like from here to there, so I didn't come here. So imagine more like it's a lake and you're like on the other side of the shore and like you're implying over there is idiot village, yeah, across the, across the lake, and you didn't come. Like swimming from over there got you and that's kind of the soup, okay, good well good, I'll uh memorize that.

Mr. Giggles:

Yeah, I got to memorize that, okay, okay, next one.

Dr. Schnitzel:

This one is medium, I think Medium difficult. Oh boy Boy.

Mr. Giggles:

Bost, a boy ned kent ist a ned. Yeah, that's very nice, actually Super.

Dr. Schnitzel:

Great, you can say things without even knowing what you're saying.

Mr. Giggles:

Yeah, I can read apparently.

Dr. Schnitzel:

Yeah, makes sense. You need the standard German, because I think the standard German.

Mr. Giggles:

You think I'll get it with the standard.

Dr. Schnitzel:

You might figure out the thing with the standard.

Mr. Giggles:

German Was der Bauer nicht kennt, ist er nicht. Yeah, I'm not sure, if I know, what the word Bauer is. So Bauer, bauer is the farmer, farmer.

Dr. Schnitzel:

So it was the Bauer net can't.

Mr. Giggles:

Easter net. So what the farmer can't do, it can't be done, well what?

Dr. Schnitzel:

the farmer doesn't know, he won't eat. Oh okay, east, it's the East.

Mr. Giggles:

There's East and East. This is me.

Dr. Schnitzel:

Not studying German recently? Yeah, like you, I didn't prepare you for that. Yeah, no, exactly Okay. So what the farmer doesn't make, he doesn't eat. You would say that even to people who are not farmers. There are some people who would just say I don't know this kind of dish, I don't know this food, I'm not even going to touch it.

Dr. Schnitzel:

That's why you wouldn't try my cornitas earlier. You should have used that. Yeah, stefan can't eat that. So if you just give me like a weird looking bowl full of pork, like you just did earlier today, I mean actually, oh, thank you some would have been very honored by me presenting a bowl.

Mr. Giggles:

Well then, save it for those people. I could think of a few friends this would be good for. We will not call them out on the phone, all right. Next one, what if it was me? No, not ned, no, not ned, no, not ned. That's a weird one. I don't know what ned is or who ned is. Who's that? Who's that?

Dr. Schnitzel:

there's not truly.

Mr. Giggles:

Can you naturally this is the basic, or no?

Dr. Schnitzel:

transition.

Dr. Schnitzel:

So this is kind of or obviously no obviously this is kind of the the mother of negation here. Is this phrase no, not it, yeah, it's just like as many kind of forms of no you can think of. There's another form like what is it called? Sometimes people say, yeah, sounds like a popular 80s pop song. Well, but you use it whenever you feel someone came here swimming in a noodle soup. Well, if you kind of, if you state the obvious yeah, but it's so obvious to you that you feel like the fact that you've been saying it shows what an idiot you really are.

Mr. Giggles:

Yeah so, uh, would this be said in response to somebody or after you said something?

Dr. Schnitzel:

well, if you, for example, if you told me uh, the grass is green, yeah, it's like you just walk, we're walking around like hey, look, the grass is green, I would say no, not it. Oh, it's like, isn't it that obvious? Yeah, that grass is green, I mean, no, duh, it's like the english duh yeah, like this expression yeah, no duh, but the more words you add to it, the more the other people feel.

Mr. Giggles:

The other people feel I really shouldn't have said that I feel like this one this one will be a little bit easier for me to to slide in and it's easy to pronounce yeah, but I can guarantee you you won't find it in any of the german textbooks, at least not the ones that I have encountered in my lifetime.

Dr. Schnitzel:

Sounds like you need to write a textbook. Yeah, I found so many, but there's one more I'd like to present for you. And then we're over with today. Try to say that one Durchspült die Musik, yeah, durchspült die Musik. I mean, you won't see that from just reading it. Probably the emphasis will be on the Dor Durchspült die Musik, musik, something about music. Yeah. So Musik is short for Musik in this case. Yeah, they don't know. We'll flip it around. Maybe you know the standard German Flip it around. Again. It's upside down Hier spielt die Musik, hier spielt die Musik.

Dr. Schnitzel:

Or playing the music, yes, but it's not really about music. Although the saying includes the word music, it's more the idea. When you want to draw some people's attention, you tell them here's the music. You will tell them. Or a classroom situation yeah, the teacher is in the classroom, but the students are doing something anything other than paying attention. The teacher in viennese might say like here's the music. Yeah, meaning like let's all focus, so here's the music would be just any way of saying this to there could be any situation where people are not paying attention. You want them to pay attention to a certain thing, or yourself, or someone. Let's get down to business.

Mr. Giggles:

Let's get down to business, good, which I guess it would make sense that that music, or the playing of music, would be something that is kind of like in the common phraseology, because music's pretty important here vienna still calls itself the capital city of music.

Mr. Giggles:

Yeah, at least the classical music, yeah, no, obviously the birthplace of many famous posers, and even more have died here. Yeah, a lot of them have died here because they have been born. Well, everybody wants to come learn and make their money. A lot of places you go to concerts always dudes dressed up like mozart out in front of uh stefan's dome trying to get you, trying to get you to a free concert is it a scam?

Dr. Schnitzel:

well, some of them are, yes. How do you know they actually? Well, they actually trying to find for, like the most tourist looking people and sell them some special offer which really is not a very special offer. Yeah, so it's kind of a gray area with them.

Mr. Giggles:

You'd rather be careful. I'm sure if you do some research ahead of time and buy a concert ticket, you're in a better situation than just buying it off the air and wearing a powdered wig Exactly you should wearing a powdered wig Exactly it should be suspicious. Anybody with a powdered wig running after you, don't trust them. Interesting fact about those fellows I found out that most of them are of albanian descent or from albania. Yeah, they're not even austrian. Yeah, and they're the company or whatever is an albany hires out.

Mr. Giggles:

They just hire some the friends and the friends and the friends, yeah and so once I got that little tidbit of information, now, when anybody, when any of those guys ask me, apparently I'm always looking like a tourist, with my backpack, with visitors in tow, I guess I respond to them in albania, oh yeah, and then they kind of look at me and then I'm gone by then it gives me that little bit of space, a little bit of space where they it saves everybody else around them.

Dr. Schnitzel:

So you can say albanian things are telling them like what are you saying?

Mr. Giggles:

I'm just saying no, thank you. I'm saying no, if I'm okay. I thought you were saying bad things to them and they were like no I would never do such a thing.

Mr. Giggles:

No, never I would never do such a thing. So a little little tip, or you know you get the following after you, because they're wondering why you're speaking albanian. That hasn't happened yet. Yeah, but music is an important thing. Yes, music, um music, and I don't know if it's, if it's changed time. I feel like when we first moved here, the stuff that was being played on the radio was always like a couple of years behind of what was being played in the States. I remember you saying that, yes, and maybe that's just. I mean, it's part of it. It takes longer for the radio waves to get here, I guess.

Dr. Schnitzel:

Or maybe back in the days when they would carry over their records on ships.

Mr. Giggles:

Yeah, it took so long for the music to get here. Yeah, it took a while, but there's this the sense that the old music is important.

Dr. Schnitzel:

Yeah, I think you answer something here. I can confirm that a lot of radios play lots of old music, and I guess let's define old music. Yeah, because we're not talking about classical music per se, right, because 80s?

Mr. Giggles:

music, like stuff that I haven't heard in decades, even when you were living in the states yeah, living in the states. You know, if I'm just like flipping around on the radio channels, I don't necessarily hear it, and yet radio station here will go from something very popular to something that I haven't heard in such a long time. Yeah, and it doesn't seem like it's just a random, like that's just part of the regular playlist is is this kind of it's?

Dr. Schnitzel:

part of the regular rotation? Yeah, that's true. So of course austria is kind of aware of the latest music that's out there and that's released been released in the states or the uk or elsewhere. But you will still hear some bon jovi yeah, on the radio, and or you listen to eye of the tiger yeah, queen and Queen and Michael Jackson and so many others being played on a regular basis.

Mr. Giggles:

Yeah, like, really like that late 70s, 80s 80s and maybe early 90s. How does that stuff stick so much better Like? Why is it that Austrians are listening to more old music?

Dr. Schnitzel:

Yeah well, the relationship between Austrian music is a very special one, especially because music is so special it's, I'm kind of some.

Dr. Schnitzel:

I call it circular reasoning, or yeah, no, but uh, since you grew up with this heritage of mozart and schubert and haydn and even like arnold trinberg and others, and then you have also have the other side of austrian music, as in the yodeling, the kind of the polka-like, folk-like music. So those are the two major branches. I would say that often people from outside of Austria would associate with Austrian music. Sure, because think of the lederhosen and the yodeling and the mountains, and of course, modern music is so much more.

Dr. Schnitzel:

So, in a way, the Austrian music scene that we have in the 21st century is everything shaped by history, as you would know as a history teacher, where at least one thing I hope that there's something here.

Dr. Schnitzel:

Well, I think I would say, starting off, I would go back again to the post-war years, past 1945, because, you know, in a sense we are, maybe we're still traumatized, like as austrians, collectively sure. What I'm saying is and you as a history teacher would know that that the great war, like world war one and world war two, they changed the world so much in so many ways that we are not even aware of it anymore, unless we really dig deeper and like we can't even imagine the way the world was before world war two. Right for world war one, especially here in vienna, especially in vienna, of course, if you've been a major, like a centerpiece of the of the war, right the wars. So what I'm saying is, of course you, you've, you've heard that the nazis also had the preferences in music. They tried to make the music as german as possible and like to promote that kind of music. So when obviously the war was lost, that kind of ideology for some of you was some of the wars still going?

Mr. Giggles:

on. No, some of us won.

Dr. Schnitzel:

Oh, at this table one I always thought and you, as a history teacher should know that that there's no winners in the war. That's right there. So there are no winners. There are no winners, yeah, so there are no winners, but we are the winners. We're still here. We're the losers. You're a winner or you lose. A post-war, post-war dramatic. What I'm saying is there were two forces at play, I would say. One was people did not like the previous German kind of music because it would be associated with Nazis. Second thing is thanks to the Allies, you're welcome. Thank you as a representative.

Dr. Schnitzel:

As a representative. So, general Michael, here, generally, generally speaking, generally speaking, what the Allies brought us was music from outside of the German Reich. Yeah, and music like jazz was forbidden under the Nazis, like what they would call it. I mean, they would call it like all kinds of music.

Mr. Giggles:

We probably don't need to repeat what they would call it.

Dr. Schnitzel:

Yeah, so it's not politically correct anymore, or was it ever?

Mr. Giggles:

It wasn't ever. That's the question.

Dr. Schnitzel:

Yeah. Yeah, I don't think it ever really should have been.

Mr. Giggles:

Let's accept it now.

Dr. Schnitzel:

When politics like the Nazi politics, it was politically correct. That's what I was trying to say. Anyway, american music came into our realms and so, going into the 50s and 60s, there were two major, maybe also two major branches. One was like the American music was very much appreciated, and also there was some new kind of German music we would call schlager yeah, like a music, and it was more like very I would call very cheesy type of music.

Mr. Giggles:

Yeah, that's kind of a mix of like polka and yodeling in a way.

Dr. Schnitzel:

Maybe not, yeah, not yodeling, but, uh, lots of happy music. It's all sunshine and so like very light-hearted, yeah, better days are. Better days are ahead because, of course, like I said, traumatized by the war, and so that generation is also long gone already. So what? What happened is that in the 50s, 60s, you had a lot of, even into the 70s, you had lots of these musicians that were competing quite well against the international music. But then, of course, we had the 60s and the revolution like the rock revolution and pop culture revolution with the Beatles and so on. They also tried to get into the German market, because the German market was very much German speaking. Yeah, but I don't know if you knew that the Beatles even recorded some songs in German, did they? Yes, I didn't know.

Mr. Giggles:

How am I just learning this? Yes, how have you not played any of those? Because you've played Beatles songs at like school talent shows and things like that. Right, how have you not broken out the?

Dr. Schnitzel:

German versions, Because you wouldn't understand the German versions.

Dr. Schnitzel:

Oh but it would be wonderful it would be wonderful, yes, yeah, so there's only I think there's only two, or three of the early singles because the British were thinking, okay, we with the german market, the music market there. So they actually went back and recorded the song like I want to hold your hands, for example. Yeah, it's john, paul and george. They're singing all these songs in german with great accents and I'm sure it's actually it feels like you're listening to, like it's like a parallel universe.

Dr. Schnitzel:

Yeah, what if the Beatles were german, like to begin with? I'm pretty confident we'll be looking those up right afterward yeah, you should, without a doubt.

Dr. Schnitzel:

It's really. It's worth it anyway. They realized that the German people, like German and Austrians and Swiss they really didn't care so much about. They would even listen to the English songs of the Beatles, so they stopped doing them in German as well. So lots of English music flooded the markets in the 60s. The one thing that was obvious is that the identity of German-speaking music in general it's almost non-existent. But it's really hard to define because there's not just yeah, Falco.

Dr. Schnitzel:

Yes, we have Falco, for example. That's the jump into the 80s, where there is a new thing that started in the 70s and we call it Austropop. So Austropop were people who were different from the Schlager people from the 50s or 60s. They started singing in dialect and even like using the sound was more rough, it was really like. Also, the things they would sing about was like even some not so happy themes and topics. There's one guy who basically became famous. His name is Wolfgang Ambrose. He became famous by singing about. The whole song is about a story where somebody killed a guy and everyone's wondering who did it and they accuse each other, like in vienna.

Mr. Giggles:

They, you know, point fingers at each other. That's kind of the song he became famous for man. He shot a mandarin. I just watched him die.

Dr. Schnitzel:

Yeah, I mean, it seems like it's right along there in this. Yeah, like the same. Like they were influenced by bob dylan and many other of these yeah, the popular artists back then, but with an austrian. But they translated into the austrian culture not just, you know, just those songs. They were really writing their own and so the whole songs in dialect were really popular up until, I'd say, the 90s. And so there was Falco, who actually didn't really sing in. He had a very special niche, so he would sing basically in dialect, but also he changed it to English-German mix, a blend of English and German. It's really fascinating. Did you know that he actually was the first German-speaking rapper? Really, yes, the first time this German-speaking rap was.

Mr. Giggles:

Falco, I guess I should buy my tickets for the musical so I can learn some of these things.

Dr. Schnitzel:

Yes, it's worth it, probably sold out.

Dr. Schnitzel:

So Falco is kind of the one superstar that Austria ever had, because he was number one in well, which no one else has ever achieved, like with a german-speaking song. Yeah, it was rock, for the record, that's right great song. And then I'd say what happened afterwards? I would call it the big void, because these austrian dialect songs sort of lost their popularity in the later 90s, I'd say, and then you would hardly hear any german-speaking music on the radio, like in the late 90s and going into 2000s. There were some. Of course there were always austrian musicians and austrian artists, but if the austrian listeners, I would say they were kind of embarrassed by them, they just wouldn't get any momentum.

Mr. Giggles:

It seems like it kind of overlaps with what we talked about in a recent episode, with the scandal of like, not wanting to associate with the things of the past, like it's happening at the same time.

Dr. Schnitzel:

Yes, the something affair, the wild time affair yeah, the president's yeah it's happening at the same time, right yes, and I think you, as a history teacher, that you can separate, for example, music and art from politics. Yeah, of course not. Yeah, they all, of course, musician make their music and art just make the art while political developments happen. Yeah, it's a response, it's like a response to politics, and politics often respond also to cultural movements. So it's always, uh, it's a give and take and, and so I'd say it's a very smart observation that you just thank you as has been mentioned, I am a history guy going on.

Dr. Schnitzel:

So that's your first question why do people also still like listening to the 80s? Yeah, so much, and I feel perhaps one part of the answer. It's not the entire answer and it's not definite, but I would say maybe it reminds them of those days, that those better days in the sense of before let me use the term before Austria lost its innocence that was not really an innocence to begin with, but as in they played the victims for 40 years. They said we weren't pro-Hitler, we were the first victim of the Nazis. And so they rebuilt the country. In those years they did very well economically, beginning of the socialist paradise.

Dr. Schnitzel:

The socialist paradise I've been living in Austria in the 70s and in the 80s was really really, really great compared to other countries, and it still is to this day. You have to add that. But I think they were still living in this kind of illusion. Yeah, let's not talk about the past, not even think about the past. Maybe we'll just make it yeah with, not without looking back. And so that's what we talked about the other day with the wild time affair. Yeah, when you want to elect a former nazi as a president, then maybe some people are going to rattle a cage, yeah, and so austria had to face those shadows from from the past, and the music back then was still music that might remind them of the better days, because after that the austins had to face their responsibility in many ways.

Mr. Giggles:

Yeah, I know that there's. There's a concept that, like the music that you listen to in high school is like the music that sticks with you. Sticks with you for a lifetime, for the rest of your life, so exactly. So maybe there's some of that at play. But I think, like the, the interest in like the 80s music is something that kind of goes cross generations, like it's not just a bunch of 50 year olds right in austria it's not just the people who were in high school back in the 80s.

Mr. Giggles:

Right, there's younger generations that will also, and again, some of that's because it's being played. So it does become the music they're listening to in high school if they're listening to the radio, but it does seem like it's something that's somewhat unique.

Dr. Schnitzel:

That's it to austria kind of that, I think, because when germany rebuilt itself after the war they kind of were proud to be germans again. And yeah, so they would. That would even also reflect in culture and in music and the arts. But with austria they kind of had to lean on something and they didn't want to make this mistake again to say, let's import all the music from Germany Because we don't want to import it from Germany anymore. And then you end up getting David Hasselhoff as well. Yes, that is a German-American. Well, I don't know what he is. He's one of a kind yeah the Hoff, don't hassle the Hoff, don't hassle the Hoff we. He's one of a kind yeah, he's the.

Dr. Schnitzel:

Hoff, don't hassle the Hoff, don't hassle the Hoff. We have to talk about the Berlin Wall and David Hasselhoff one time. Yeah, maybe, but my point is thanks for bringing in the Hoff.

Dr. Schnitzel:

Sorry, a little teaser maybe it threw me Hoff, sorry. Since the Austrians weren't big enough to come up with their own industry of music, except for those local dialect artists, yeah, they had to very much rely on the non-german music that was being produced, which was big, coming from the uk and the us. Yeah, and that's the main reason why I think we love maybe we love the international english-speaking music more than the germans do, sure. So we love the austrian music. We like, I have to say, when I called it the big void before, in the recent years more and more austrian artists have stepped up and become more popular, even back to sing like songs in dialect, and there are a lot of austrian artists that have become very popular in germany. If they're not too big on the dialect, on the austrian dialect, people in germany can understand them. They even have like a market there, which is really nice for them, and they also get some airplay on the radio. Yeah, a lot these days.

Dr. Schnitzel:

So it has changed for the better for the music industry in austria. But, like I said, it's still from an austrian perspective and to wrap this up maybe at some point here, from an austrian perspective, singing in german is not really cool. Sometimes singing german lyrics can be so cheesy, yeah, and especially if they sound very, very german, then austrians don't want to listen to it, because there's a big rap scene, for example in germany, like there's lots of german rappers, but the sound of the german rap is just not something that that's not really pleasing to the austrian ear. I would say like, as I mean, there's lots of austrians who like german rap, I'm sure, and we can appreciate that, of course but it comes pretty hard.

Dr. Schnitzel:

German rap is, it's not, it's never gonna make it big in austria. That's what I'm predicting here. Making music in german sound really good to the austrian ear is a very, very hard task. Yeah, and those who have accomplished I mean, they deserve a lot of respect and and all the golden records, and that's why, still, if you have an english speaking artist, austrians would love to hear from them, because it's just more appealing to them.

Dr. Schnitzel:

As a matter of fact, I came across an artist. I don't know if you ever heard of parov stela. No, he's kind of one of the pioneers of electronic swing, oh okay. So I mean, you think of the thing of electronic music, but it's, it's really swingy. All right, there's a word. Yeah, I listened to jimmy's gang and clap your hands. Okay, take notes of that. So if you want to listen to jimmy's gang, clap your hands and I have a whole afternoon of music listening yes, it's again.

Dr. Schnitzel:

It's like the happy sound of the 50s, like the post war years again. No, but it seems like he's very popular all around the world and there are some musicians that, let's say, we don't even know they're Austrian and like they're having some business with international musicians and you might come across one or two Austrians well, I do know that you know, going to going to shows here in Vienna, like a lot of times an opening band will be a local band and there's very few of them that have German songs.

Mr. Giggles:

I think to what you're saying, right, an American band will come over, play a concert all in English, and so everybody who's there knows those songs in English. So it makes sense that the local artists would find that common denominator of the language being an entry point into the bigger market exactly. Oh coming music podcast here.

Dr. Schnitzel:

so so big shout out to uh part of stella out of stella, yeah, and there's a music group called vanda. That's a very popular band, that's I think they only have german-speaking songs. I don't think they have any english-speaking songs, I wouldn't know exactly. There's some duos like cylon speer. Those are very popular artists here in austria, but of course they produce songs in german only, and I think the only band that has accomplished to become world famous with german songs only is the german band ramstein. Yeah, because anyone else who tries to become famous with just german songs only has failed so far.

Mr. Giggles:

It seems like you have to be that extra special good yeah, musically.

Dr. Schnitzel:

For them it's probably the whole appearance in the show, that's like the whole image that made them popular. Yeah, but as a matter of fact, I've heard that many people started learning german because they were listening to rammstein in the first place, and which they've become?

Mr. Giggles:

they've become a bit of a of a touchy subject of touchy subject yeah, because it's not all not a happy world there either it seems. Yeah, it turns out. Hard rock bands say offensive things.

Dr. Schnitzel:

Yes, weird and do offensive things sometimes. All right, yeah, well, that's a good kind of.

Mr. Giggles:

Obviously we like talking about music. Maybe, uh, in future episodes we'll talk some more about music. Talk a little bit more about some of these local Austrian bands yeah, yes, you should support them.

Dr. Schnitzel:

I mean, yeah, they produce high quality music by international standards. They're not falling behind.

Mr. Giggles:

Yeah, well, I know that there's the Sandstorm. Unicorns is an up and coming band that we're going to have to talk about in the future.

Dr. Schnitzel:

We have to talk about band names. That's an actual band name. Yes, I know there's some weird band names out there.

Mr. Giggles:

That's what I'm trying to say here yeah, we have a band name episode, all right. Well, I think it.

People on this episode

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Lukas Marsak (Dr. Schnitzel)

Host
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Michael Johnstone (Mr. Giggles)

Host