Farin Urlaub

Farin Vacation 2012

Farin Urlaub (* 27 October 1963 than in January cousin in West Berlin ) is a German rock musician , singer , guitarist and photographer . He became known as a founding member of the rock band Die Doctors , and since 2001 he has also appeared as a solo artist and head of the band Farin Urlaub Racing Team .

Life

youth

Up to the age of seven he lived with his mother in a shared apartment in the Berlin district of Moabit . Then he grew up in the suburb of Frohnau until the age of 18 . Since his mother often played albums from the Beatles , he came into contact with music at an early age.

At the age of nine he decided to take guitar lessons from an elderly lady who taught him classical standards. From then on he played guitar at several holiday camps in which he took part. His later music teacher, however, advised him to “do nothing with music later”. After attending the Victor-Gollancz-Grundschule in Berlin-Frohnau, Urlaub received the recommendation for a secondary school, but passed the trial half-year at the Georg-Herwegh-Gymnasium in Berlin-Hermsdorf , which he then attended until he finished school. At the age of 16 he went on a school trip to London , had his hair cut and bleached there and returned to Berlin as a punk . After high school in 1981 he started at the Free University of Berlin an archeology -Studies, but he soon gave up again in favor of his music career.

Musician career

Farin Urlaub at a concert in 2013

“I now have a good command of rhythm guitar, but that also took 30 years; Bass works like that (12 years), drums (one month) with great effort, otherwise I can't do anything. "

- Farin Urlaub : FAQ of his website (2009)

In 1981 Urlaub met Dirk Felsenheimer (later Bela B) in Ballhaus Spandau and joined his band Soilent Grün after the previous guitarist of the band had been stolen. When Soilent Grün dissolved in 1982, he founded Die Ärzte with Bela B. and Sahnie . When it came time to come up with a stage name in connection with the first record deal, he remembered his favorite hobby, traveling; He simply pulled the phrase “go on vacation” together to “Farin Urlaub”.

In 1988, at the height of the band history of the "Doctors" at that time, he proposed the separation of the band, which actually took place in the same year. The following year Urlaub founded the band King Køng . In addition to him, drummer Uwe Hoffmann , the producer of "Doctors", was there. Since Urlaub wanted to distance himself from his time with the “doctors”, he called himself “Jan” again during his time with King Køng. However, due to lack of success, the band stopped their activities; Farin Urlaub declared it dissolved in 1999. Since 1993 he has been playing again with the “Doctors”, who founded themselves again on his impetus.

Since he did not trust the youth magazine Bravo , he claimed in the first interview that his real surname was “Vetter-Marciniak”, to see who really knew him or who just pretended to know him. Whenever he got fan mail, for a while he consistently threw away the letters that had "Vetter-Marciniak" on them.

In 1998 the "Doctors" decided not to work with the Bravo any more, as they increasingly asked for stories from the private life of the band. The magazine then launched a smear campaign against Farin Urlaub. She claimed, for example, that he had rammed the car of a Bravo paparazzo , beat up fans and that he generally acted according to the motto of "incapacitating the enemy". Urlaub responded with counter notifications on the "Doctors" homepage. Although the responsible editors of the Bravo were then dismissed, the "doctors" never worked with the magazine again.

Farin Urlaub started a solo career in 2001, from which the studio albums Endlich Urlaub! (2001), At the End of the Sun (2005), The Truth About Lies (2008) and Fascination Space (2014). In 2006 the live album of Death , which was recorded during the Sunflower of Death tour in 2005, was also released. The live album Let it look like an accident with live recordings from the Krachgarten tour 2009 did not come about in the planned form as a live DVD because soundtracks were deleted or could not be found again.

"[...] in an unbelievable but true chain of unfortunate circumstances, the actually excellent recording material of the 'Krachgarten Tour 2009' lost its adequate tone."

- Farin Urlaub : Interview with the Motor Music label

Due to the mishap, the recordings came out as a free download from April 2010. Make it look like an accident; the music film was made under the direction of Norbert Heitker .

While he was finally on vacation! and Am Ende der Sonne mostly produced alone, he brought his Farin Urlaub Racing Team, which until then had only performed live, into the studio for the recording of the third solo album The Truth About Lies .

Music genre

Farin vacation 2003 in Spain

He has been particularly influenced by the Beatles and Frank Zappa since childhood . He also listens to Johnny Cash , Depeche Mode and "pretty much everything except free jazz and techno ". Other bands he valued are the Foo Fighters , the Kaiser Chiefs and The Cure . His favorite German bands include the Berlin Beatsteaks and Muff Potter .

Urlaub does not consider himself a good guitarist, as he often plays "unclean" chords and has not been able to read notes to this day, which, however, has never prevented him from making music.

According to him, the difference between his solo songs and the “Doctors” songs he wrote is that his solo pieces have a more personal and current reference. For the “Doctors” he tries to write pieces that are as “timeless” and funny as possible. Many of his songs are about problems with the partner (too late, because of you, like the first day, come back, never said, close your eyes, nothing in the world, howling) or are nonsense (Madonna's colon, Buddy Holly's glasses, Aliens, WAMMW, My Ex (plodged girlfriend)) . Since the doctors reunion, however, he has also been writing socially critical and political songs (upside down in hell, cry for love , rubbish song, the misanthropist, rebel, a summer just for me, grotesque song, your guilt, not alone, seen nothing, let redn) .

While many pieces on the first solo album had very satirical texts (On the Beach, 1000 Years of Bad Sex, Wonderful) , At the End of the Sun mainly deals with more serious topics such as politics, social criticism and personal matters (Still, No Back, Sun, Porcelain) and stands thus in direct contrast to the previous album. In some solo pieces he also shows slight tendencies towards Ska-Punk (Dermitder, Wunderbar) . At the end of the sun, so vacation, he wrote "on the body" for the racing team , during Finally vacation! rather remind me of the "doctors". It is a rumor that the album mainly contains unused B-sides by the “Ärzten” - in reality only three tracks were originally intended for the “Ärzte”. Vacation favorite solo song is OK from his debut album Endlich Urlaub! .

His willingness to experiment with different musical styles is also evident in his solo work The Truth About Lies , where you can find ska as well as reggae and dancehall pieces. On this album, too, Urlaub hits some socially critical tones again (strange, war, too hot) .

Farin Urlaub Racing Team

→ Main article : Farin Urlaub Racing Team

The FURT live

The “Farin Urlaub Racing Team” (“FURT” for short) is the band with which Urlaub plays his solo projects. So far he has completed four tours with the band. He describes the difference between the "Doctors" and the "FURT" as follows:

"With the doctors, there is pure anarchy on stage, while with the racing team you have an orchestra full of dynamite."

- Fritz interview on March 29, 2005

Farin Vacation in the movie

• 1985: Richy Guitar , feature film by Michael Laux
• 2015: B-Movie: Lust & Sound in West Berlin 1979–1989 , documentary with Mark Reeder , directed by Jörg A. Hoppe , Klaus Maeck , Heiko Lange and Alexander von Sturmfeder, 92 min.

Farin Urlaub as a photographer

So far, he has published four illustrated books from the images that Farin Urlaub created on some of his trips . In 2007 Unterwegs 1 - India & Bhutan and in 2011 the first German-language photo book about East Timor ( Unterwegs 2 - Australien & Osttimor ) was published. The proceeds from the sale of the first illustrated book went to the organization Doctors Without Borders , and from the second to a hospital in East Timor. In 2015 the two volumes Unterwegs 3 and Unterwegs 4 appeared with photos of his trips to Africa .

Urlaub began taking serious photographs in 2004. He photographs both analog and digital .

Commitment and worldview

• Farin Urlaub is a non- alcoholic , non-smoker and pescetarian since 1987 .
• In his private life he supports organizations such as Greenpeace , Attac , Amnesty International and Menschen gegen Mines through donations.
• While he has almost always been wearing black T-shirts with a gray border at "Doctors" appearances for several years, he wears long-sleeved black shirts for racing team appearances. He wanted to openly oppose the “identity out of the can” and prove that you can become a rock star even if you always wear the same clothes.

Others

• Farin Urlaub mainly plays guitars made according to his wishes by the Hamburg guitar maker Thomas Harm from Cyanguitars . These include: Black Hawk, FU Signature, Red Hawk, TwoTone and Westerland, a guitar in the shape of Sylt . The White Hawk that was previously played , the Topspin tennis racket guitar and the guitars that were played before the "Ärzte" was founded were auctioned for a good cause some time ago. The proceeds went to the organizations Amnesty International , Doctors Without Borders , the German Disabled Sports Association and the Von Bodelschwinghschen Anstalten Bethel . He recently started playing guitars made by the Italian manufacturer Italia Guitars .
• Farin Urlaub died eleven times in his music video clips for singles by the "Doctors" or from his solo albums. In the clip for A Pig Called Men he, Bela B and Rodrigo González are killed by Lara Croft , while in the video for Yoko Ono he crashes in an elevator with his colleagues, in the video Your Guilt he dies in a natural disaster In the clip for the song shower from his solo album he is finally murdered by his shower, in the video for Sonne he ends up committing suicide and in the video for Happy he is drowned with concrete on his feet by a criminal organization. In the video to the 2007 released "doctors" single boy he is killed at the end of a horde of zombies. In the video of his solo single Nichimgriff , he dies with his entire racing team when a gas station explodes. In the video for his solo single Herz? Lost in 2014, he dies after having his heart operated on while fully conscious. In the video for the single AWG , he dies of natural causes. In the video for the single iDisco he is lying on a chair in the background with a knife in his head. According to Farin, Norbert Heitker, his preferred video director, stirs up latent aggression against him, which is why he kills him at least in videos.
• His declared aim in life is to have traveled to all countries in the world. In 2011 it reached 117 countries.
• Farin Urlaub is a big fan of Japan , which is why reminiscences of this country appear in various songs (Sumisu, Pakistan, Nichimgriff) . The video for Sonne even shows him as a samurai , whose lover is killed in a robbery, and how he first takes revenge on the robbers before he ends up committing seppuku .
• The group LiLi from Cologne wrote a song about vacation with the title Farin U.

Discography

→ Main article : Farin Urlaub / Discography

Studio albums

year	Title pseudonym	Top ranking, total weeks, awardChart placementsChart placements (Year, title, pseudonym , rankings, weeks, awards, notes)			Remarks
		DE	AT	CH
2001	Finally holidays! Farin Urlaub	DE3 gold (33 weeks)DE	AT28 (4 weeks) AT	CH85 (2 weeks) CH	First published: October 22, 2001 Sales: + 150,000
2005	At the end of the sun Farin vacation	DE1 gold (24 weeks)DE	AT2 (23 weeks) AT	CH20 (9 weeks) CH	First published: April 5, 2005 Sales: + 100,000
2008	The Truth About Lies Farin Urlaub Racing Team	DE2 gold (19 weeks)DE	AT5 (12 weeks) AT	CH12 (3 weeks) CH	First published: October 31, 2008 Sales: + 100,000
2014	Fascination Space Farin Urlaub Racing Team	DE1 gold (24 weeks)DE	AT3 (6 weeks) AT	CH6 (4 weeks) CH	First published: October 17, 2014 Sales: + 100,000

literature

• Farin Urlaub: On the Road 1 - India & Bhutan . Illustrated book, Schwarzkopf & Schwarzkopf, Berlin 2007, ISBN 978-3-89602-779-5 .
• Farin Urlaub: On the Road 2 - Australia & East Timor. Illustrated book, Schwarzkopf & Schwarzkopf, Berlin 2011, ISBN 978-3-86265-062-0 .
• Farin Urlaub: On the way 3 - Africa: From the Mediterranean to the Gulf of Guinea . Illustrated book, Schwarzkopf & Schwarzkopf, Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-86265-527-4 .
• Farin Urlaub: On the way 4 - Africa: From the Gulf of Guinea to Zanzibar . Illustrated book, Schwarzkopf & Schwarzkopf, Berlin 2015, ISBN 978-3-86265-528-1 .
• Farin Urlaub Racing Team: The Return of the Skateboarding Legend. FURT Songbook. Bosworth Edition, 2009, ISBN 978-3-86543-419-7 .
• Markus Karg: The Doctors - An oversized guinea pig is eating the earth . Schwarzkopf & Schwarzkopf, Berlin 2001, ISBN 3-89602-369-1 .
• Stefan Üblacker: The book - The biography authorized by the doctors. Schwarzkopf & Schwarzkopf, Berlin 2016, ISBN 978-3-86265-585-4 .

Web links

• Literature by and about Farin Urlaub in the catalog of the German National Library
• Farin vacation in the Internet Movie Database (English)
• Official website
• Farin Urlaub at laut.de
• Farin Urlaub at Discogs (English)

Individual evidence

1. ↑ ^{a b c d e f g} An oversized guinea pig eats the earth. Pp. 70-71.
2. ↑ An oversized guinea pig is eating the earth. P. 74.
3. ↑ An oversized guinea pig is eating the earth. P. 72.
4. ↑ FAQ on Farin Urlaub website.
5. ↑ An oversized guinea pig is eating the earth. P. 4.
6. ↑ An oversized guinea pig is eating the earth. P. 5.
7. ↑ An oversized guinea pig is eating the earth. P. 84.
8. ↑ Farin Urlaub in an interview with the “Motor Music” label. (No longer available online.) In: motor.de. Archived from the original on April 9, 2010 ; accessed on May 31, 2015 . 
9. ↑ Saskia Weneit: Farin Urlaub is on vacation from the doctors. In: tagesspiegel.de . July 6, 2009, accessed May 31, 2015 . 
10. ↑ ^{a b} Julia Stanek: Illustrated book of doctors-singer: Vacation trip to East Timor. In: Spiegel Online . September 22, 2011, accessed May 31, 2015 . 
11. ↑ Vacation with vacation: pictures of his travels. In: kurier.at. January 11, 2012, accessed May 31, 2015 . 
12. ↑ Farin Urlaub On: kuroboshi.de, accessed on June 24, 2013.
13. ↑ WORLD: "I am probably just a philistine" . In: THE WORLD . November 7, 2001 ( welt.de [accessed December 13, 2018]).
14. ↑ Sarah Engel: Interview with guitarist and singer: Farin Urlaub doesn't want to be a compulsive old man. Retrieved December 13, 2018 . 
15. ↑ Farin Urlaub likes it all in black. Retrieved December 13, 2018 . 
16. ↑ Farin Urlaub (Die Ärzte): The Singer's Fortune 2018. July 18, 2018, accessed on December 13, 2018 (German).