Here comes Alex

	Chart positions ; Explanation of the data
	Singles
	Here comes Alex
	Here comes Alex (Unplugged)

Here comes Alex is a song by the band Die Toten Hosen from 1988. It is the first track on the album A Little Bit of Horror Show . The music is by Andreas Meurer , the text by Campino .

Alex is Alexander Delarge meant the protagonist in Anthony Burgess ' gloomy Science Fiction A Clockwork Orange from 1962. The book was a template for Stanley Kubrick's film A Clockwork Orange (dt. Titles Clockwork Orange ) from 1971. Alex is the leader of a violent youth gang that hunts down defenseless citizens every evening. He is obsessed with Ludwig van Beethoven's music, especially the 9th Symphony .

Emergence

The novel and film had achieved cult status in the punk scene the band came from. For this reason, Die Toten Hosen promised Bernd Schadewald in spring 1988 that he would write the incidental music for his production of “A Clockwork Orange” at the Kammerspiele in Bad Godesberg and at the same time take part in the performance as musicians and extras. A whole series of songs was created for this, which the band brought onto the market together with other pieces as the concept album A Little Bit of Horror Show in the late summer of 1988.

The single Here comes Alex was often played on the radio, thus reaching a wide audience and entering the German-language charts. The album took 7th place in Germany and Switzerland for several weeks. The fact that Here comes Alex was on the set list for the theater production was entirely thanks to the then manager of the band Trini Trimpop , who was enthusiastic about the play. The band themselves found it too slow, too rocky and inconsistent with punk music. Nevertheless, this song meant the financial breakthrough for Die Toten Hosen. They then sat on a “ UEFA Cup pitch ”, as the band puts it in football language.

The events in Bad Godesberg were also affected by the spontaneous success of the band. The last performance at the Bonner Theaterhaus was on October 23, 1988. Fans besieged the entrance to the house and tried to gain entry to the sold-out performance. Some penetrated through the windows on the second floor of the theater, significantly obstructing the performance.

Music and lyrics

Basic topic from Here comes Alex audio sample ^?^/ⁱ

It is preceded by the beginning of the second movement from Beethoven's 9th Symphony , played by a symphony orchestra. The crescendo of the classical sequence is overlaid by an extended, louder and then slowly fading scream, which Andreas von Holst performs. An electric guitar then begins to play a simple melody in D minor at a moderate pace , which is later repeated over and over again to accompany the vocals. The topic is taken up again at the end of the accompanying concept album A Little Bit of Horror Show in the song Bye, bye, Alex .

After a few bars, Campino steps in and sings the first verse:

"In a world where you only live so that you go robots every day, the greatest excitement there is is the television picture every evening."

Then it suddenly becomes loud and all the instruments kick in. The vocals also become more aggressive and reach their climax in the chorus:

“Hey, here comes Alex! Curtain up - for his horror show. Hey, here comes Alex! Curtain up - for a little bit of horror show. "

The text then describes what Alex's horror show consists of:

“Twenty against one until the blood comes out. Whether with sticks or stones, at some point every head will burst. "

His mercilessness is also reported:

"The next sacrifice is already on when you ask God: 'Why haven't you done anything, done nothing?'"

The fantasy language in which Alex and his clique, the "Droogs" (in German: Friends) converse, is the Nadsat developed in Burgess' novel , which is based on Russian. “Roboten” in the song is derived from “rabota” (in German: to work), “Horrorschau” corresponds to “horror show”, a play on the Russian word “хорошо [xaraˈʃɔ]” - “good”.

In the original version of the song from 1988, the instruments common in rock music are used. Michael Breitkopf and Andreas von Holst play the rhythm and melody part on the electric guitar, Andreas Meurer accompanies on the bass , and the drummer is Wolfgang Rohde . The melody is modified a little in some places, but there are no improvised solo parts. In order to capture the special acoustics of the hall, the title was recorded live together with other pieces from the album at the Schauspielhaus Bonn; but not in front of an audience, but between 1 a.m. and 6 a.m.

Acoustic version

Basic topic from Here comes Alex - unplugged audio sample ^?^/ⁱ

In 2005, the song was rearranged by the Düsseldorf producer Hans Steingen for a performance by the band in the Vienna Burgtheater , in the MTV Unplugged series . The song was designed for acoustic instruments and transposed a semitone lower. In this version, the piece begins with the first bars of Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata and then moves on to the actual intro, both played by Esther Kim on the piano. Another guest musician is Raphael Zweifel am Cello . Campino takes on the vocal part, Vom Ritchie sits on the drums, and the acoustic guitars are played by Andreas Meurer, Michael Breitkopf and Andreas von Holst, with the latter singing along in the chorus.

Publications

song

Here comes Alex first appeared on the album A Little Bit of Horror Show in 1988 and was released as a single shortly afterwards. The single doesn't contain the classical music or the scream at the beginning. The cover of the single, designed by Michael Roman , shows several faces twisted into grimaces in black, white and red.

In 1994 an English version of the song was released on the album Love, Peace & Money with the title The Return of Alex . Englishman Matt Dangerfield from The Boys was involved in translating the text into English. Melody and intro are identical to the German single version. The English text, however, focuses on describing the world in which Alex mutated into a brutal human. A warning is given of Alex's return and his renewed horror show, if nothing changes in his environment. The promo single The Return of Alex was produced in small numbers and exclusively for Great Britain.

Die Toten Hosen play the song Here comes Alex at almost every one of their concerts. An example of this can be found on the 1996 live album On behalf of the Lord . The piece was released as an acoustic version on Nur zu Visiting and on the single Hier geht Alex (unplugged) , both of which were released in 2005. A newer live version of the piece appeared on the album Machmalauter Live in 2009, in 2012 on the DVD Noches como Estas - Live in Buenos Aires , on the double album Der Krach der Republik from 2013 and on the album Das Laune der Natour -Finale from 2019. A rocking acoustic version, based on the style of ZZ Top , was released on the album Alles ohne Strom in 2019.

Music videos

In the video for Here Comes Alex from 1988, the band plays on a scrap heap, in an empty factory floor and on the roof of a warehouse. In between, short excerpts from the play in Bad Godesberg are shown. The film was shot in half an hour on the site of a former industrial area in Düsseldorf. Wrecking ball and bulldozer had previously been used there because a new industrial park was to be built. Walter Knofel was commissioned for the video . The band had known him since a production for the Austrian television program X-Large .

A garish black and white film with fast moving images was made for The Return of Alex in 1994 in the studio of director René Eller in Amsterdam. Flickering TV screens are faded in and strange-looking close-ups of the band members are shown.

Cover versions

Samsa's dream with her singer Alexander Kaschte released a cover of the song in 2001. Another interpretation appeared in 2005 on the album Limitless by Scala & Kolacny Brothers . The 60-piece girls' choir sings. Here comes Alex in a classic version. An English language cover version of the song entitled Here Comes Alex was released in 1993 by the UK Subs on the album Normal Service Resumed . The metalcore band Callejon released another version of Hier geht Alex on their album Man speaks German in January 2013 . In June 2020 the band Feuerschwanz released a cover version on their album The Eleventh Commandment .

The rights to Here comes Alex had already transferred the Toten Hosen to Ralph Siegel in 1990 in order to be able to terminate the contract with the publisher early in return. At the end of the 1980s, you committed yourself to the Siegel publishing house for five years due to a financial bottleneck.

Reactions

Before the song was released, Die Toten Hosen were only known to insider circles. This changed suddenly afterwards. The media described them as demanding rock musicians who would have set themselves apart from amateurish punk music. The music of the Toten Hosen was written exclusively as a transition from the scenes in Schadewald's production. She was supposed to replace the narrator from Stanley Kubrick's film. The theme and the political message of the song were given. Campino commented on this in the specialist journal Musikmagazin , May 1989 edition: “The success of the horror show should not be understood as a convulsive increase in level. The record only reflects what we experienced in the theater in Bonn. ”However, the singer considers the topic itself to be more topical than ever today:“ You can still deal with the problem that 'Clockwork Orange' is about today have: youngsters rioting for no reason. "

The song became the figurehead of the Toten Hosen and was constantly played by popular radio stations. Thus achieved here comes Alex in the charts Top 2000 D to 16th place. In this joint action by SDR 3 and DT64 , the listeners chose their 2000 favorite songs. All the tracks were then sent over the airwaves day and night, in sequence, for over a week. The event ended on August 25, 1990 with a closing ceremony on the Cannstatter Wasen , which was broadcast live on television and at which Die Toten Hosen appeared as surprise guests.

But not everyone was positive about the music of the Toten Hosen. When in 1988 the band's live performance in front of the Beethoven House in Bonn was to be broadcast worldwide on the Olympic video show on WDR television, snubbed Beethoven fans sabotaged the transmission by pulling two transmission cables apart. Then a banner was unrolled with the inscription: "We protest against this bad taste!"

In the 90s , Alex often appeared in sports programs on German television when it came to the coach Aleksandar Ristić from Fortuna Düsseldorf . The artist Nam June Paik used the song in 2000 for one of his exhibitions at New York's Guggenheim Museum .

The star reported on the value of the song in music therapy in 1993 after a concert by the Toten Hosen in the 5th Psychiatric Department of the General Hospital Hamburg-Ochsenzoll :

“When the pants start, most patients sit apathetically on the floor. They watch skeptically as the guitarists Breiti and Kuddel grab the strings, Andi plucks the bass, Wölli hits the skins and Campino screams his soul out. They are only separated from the band by a white line on the floor, but the barrier seems insurmountable. Until Campino leaves the room and continues singing her song from the play 'Clockwork Orange' in the hallway: 'Hey, hey, hey, here comes Alex.' For a moment, all the psychoses and neuroses are forgotten, patients and punks overcome their fear of contact. For senior physician Birger Dulz, 41, a therapeutic effect that should not be underestimated. Like good friends, the Toten Hosen are finally adopted by the patients. 'Don't you want to', asks one of the Ochsenzoller, 'to check into our anger group?' "

On October 3, 2007, the listeners of WDR2 voted on “the best album of all time” on the WDR 200 program and chose their favorite tracks from it. Here comes Alex reached number 75. In the USA, the song was recorded in 2007 as a bonus track for the computer game Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock .

Individual evidence

↑ ^a ^b Bertram Job : Until the Bitter End ... Die Toten Hosen tell their story. Kiepenheuer & Witsch, Cologne 1996, ISBN 3-462-02532-5 , page 197.
↑ ^a ^b Die Toten Hosen: Rock Sensation presents magazine for the tour “People, Animals, Sensations 1992” , Universa Medien Verlags GmbH, Dortmund, page 65.
↑ ^a ^b Jan Weiler : Children, how time flies… Die Toten Hosen tell - Jan Weiler listens to 1982-2007 . Booklet for the new edition 2007, episode 6: A little bit of horror show .
^ Stanley Edgar Hyman : Nadsat Dictionary. soomka.com, 1963, accessed November 27, 2013 .
↑ Booklet for the album A little bit of horror show .
↑ Notes on the notation, Hans Steingen , Chrome Musik, Chappel & Co.
↑ Charts DE Charts AT Charts CH
^ Dpa: "With timpani and trumpets": Die Toten Hosen cover Rammstein. Süddeutsche Zeitung , July 14, 2019, accessed on October 26, 2019 .
↑ ^a ^b DVD Reich & sexy II , their most successful videos , comments by the band.
↑ Samsa's dream : End station Eden , Trisol, 2001 B00020X21W.
^ Official homepage of Scala & Kolacny Brothers
↑ Official Argentinian homepage of Die Toten Hosen , text of the cover version Here Comes Alex from the UK Subs including live video.
↑ Toni Hinnig: As much depth as a shot glass. laut.de , June 26, 2020, accessed on July 1, 2020 .
↑ Bertram Job: Until the Bitter End ... Die Toten Hosen tell their story . Kiepenheuer & Witsch, Cologne 1996. ISBN 3-462-02532-5 , page 156.
↑ Benjamin Maack : 40 years "A Clockwork Orange". We felt: this is our film. Spiegel Online, June 21, 2011, accessed February 20, 2015 .
↑ Jürgen Seibold , VIP music: Die Toten Hosen . Paul Zsolnay Verlag , Vienna 1992, ISBN 3-552-05005-1 . P. 41.
↑ Stefan Siller , Thomas Schmidt : Top 2000 D . Factor Verlag, Stuttgart 1990, ISBN 3-925860-27-4 .
^ Article in the TAZ , September 12, 1988, Nachrichten ( dpa ).
↑ Hollow Skai : The Dead Pants . Hannibal, A-Höfen 2007, ISBN 978-3-85445-281-2 , page 129.
↑ Stern , issue 28/1993.