Total Eclipse (song)
| Total Eclipse | |
|---|---|
| Klaus Nomi | |
| publication | 1981 |
| length | 3:29 |
| Genre (s) | Synth pop |
| Author (s) | Kristian Hoffmann |
| Publisher (s) | Gothic Novelty Music |
| Label | RCA Records |
| album | Klaus Nomi |
| Cover versions | |
| 2000 | Rose pride |
| 2001 | Rosenstolz & Marc Almond |
Total Eclipse (German: "Total (Sonnen-) Finsternis") is a song from 1981 that the American musician Kristian Hoffman wrote for the German countertenor Klaus Nomi . In 2001, a cover version of the pop duo Rosenstolz hit the charts in Germany together with Marc Almond .
Creation and publication
Kristian Hoffmann was active in New York City with his band Mumps in the 1970s. In 1978 he appeared on a show called New Wave Vaudeville and met Klaus Nomi there. He suggested to Nomi the formation of a band, which developed into a sophisticated "Klaus Nomi Show". For this purpose, Hoffmann wrote several songs for Nomi, including Total Eclipse . However, it did not succeed in arousing the interest of the American record companies. After all, Total Eclipse found in the concert film Urgh! A Music War use for which Nomis Manager hired a professional band. It was not until the move to France in 1981 that the song could be recorded on the French branch of RCA Records for Nomi's debut album Klaus Nomi . The record was also released in Germany, as well as Total Eclipse as a single release together with Falling in Love Again . In 1982 Nomi sang Total Eclipse in the first edition of Thomas Gottschalk's show Na sowas! . Kristian Hoffmann later complained that his rights as a songwriter were never taken into account in European releases.
content
The author Hoffmann calls with the total solar eclipse ( total eclipse of the sun ) metaphorically the possible destruction of the earth in a nuclear war. His text uses with terms such as fallout ( fallout ), atomization ( we get atomized ) or nuclear holocaust ( making the planet so hot, hot as a holocaust ) the vocabulary of the last days of debate the NATO double-track decision of the 1979th
In 2008 Martine Hawkes attended a retrospective Nomi show in Berlin with a lot of death symbolism and noticed that the holocaust in Total Eclipse was replaced by the melismatic redundancy so-oooo hot . She notes: "By rewriting Nomi's text, it becomes evident that it is as impossible to talk about genocide without the Holocaust as it is to mix the Holocaust with other more mundane, inevitable and accessible forms of death."
The music author Gillian G. Gaar discussed the piece on the occasion of a re-release of the album in 2019. It was the best synthesis of the different musical styles Nomis. Although Nomi is looking forward to the “approaching apocalypse” and her own pulverization with “unabashed recklessness”, Total Eclipse with its marching rhythm sounds like an anthem with which soldiers are welcomed home after a victorious battle.
Cover version of Rosenstolz
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Both AnNa R. and Peter Plate von Rosenstolz are fans of Nomi, who died in 1983 and whom they identified as the "lowest common denominator" when they first met. Plate stated that when he was 15 he had the song in Na sowas! heard and he made him "totally crazy". The duo recorded the song for their 2000 album Kassengift .
Rosenstolz's cooperation with Marc Almond came about after the English singer received one of the pop duo's CDs from a journalist and contacted the duo a few days later. Almond also knew Nomi, whom he had met personally in New York. For the publication on a double maxi CD, the title was re-recorded with Almond. The disc, designated CD 1 , contained Total Eclipse with The Black Widow, a collaboration with Nina Hagen , Du breathes not a collaboration with the band 2raumwohnung and the title Enfants des nuits . CD 2 swaps the last two songs for the Rosenstolz songs Kassengift and Les Larmes de Septembre .
The single Total Eclipse reached number 22 in the single charts in Germany and was in the top 100 for a total of seven weeks. In addition to Rosenstolz and Almond, Nina Hagen was named as the duet partner of the second track Die Schwarze Witwe , which is why the single is also listed in discographies with chart entry is called. Rosenstolz reached the German single charts for the seventh time with Total Eclipse , Almond was already in the German single charts for the ninth time as a solo artist. In the review by laut.de , Total Eclipse was described as the "absolute cracker of the album", with the reasoning that "after the third and fourth listening, the song triggers a feeling that I actually never had when I played a song on the first Listening was terrible. You can't get that fat grin off your face when there is talk of fries between the opera babble and boom boom. " Rosenstolz and Marc Almond performed the joint version on March 2, 2001 in Hanover out of competition at the German ESC preliminary decision Countdown Grand Prix 2001 live on ARD .
More cover versions
Further cover versions are from Queen of Japan in 2001 and Superchunk in 2018 .
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c Andrew Horn: The Nomi song . Documentary. Palm Pictures 2004.
- ↑ Kristian Hoffmann Biography In: Official Kristian Hoffmann, accessed on July 4, 2020
- ↑ Klaus Nomi - Klaus Nomi . In: Discogs, accessed July 4, 2020.
- ^ Klaus Nomi - Falling in Live Again . In: Discogs, accessed July 5, 2020.
- ↑ Simon Broll: Vocal eccentric Klaus Nomi The singing space robot In: Mirror stories. August 5, 2013, accessed July 4, 2020.
- ^ Martine Hawkes: Archiving Loss: Holding Places for Difficult Memories . Taylor & Francis Ltd, Abingdon 2018, p. 81.
- ^ Gillian G. Gaar: Total Eclipse. Rediscovering Klaus Nomi . In: Rock & Roll Globe, June 29, 2019, accessed July 5, 2020.
- ↑ a b Rosenstolz - Marc Almond - Nina Hagen Total Eclipse. officialcharts.de, accessed on July 3, 2020 .
- ↑ a b c Michael Tschernek: Medial we don't exist , taz.de , 9 March 2001.
- ↑ a b Köhnlein, Stephan: Wir hassen Schlager , Rhein-Zeitung online , October 8, 2001.
- ↑ Total Eclipse In: Discogs, accessed July 4, 2020
- ↑ Cash poison . In: Laut.de, accessed on July 4, 2020.
- ^ Rosenstolz & Marc Almond - Total Eclipse (Eurovision) , YouTube
- ↑ Total Eclipse by Klaus Nomi . In: Second-hand songs, accessed July 5, 2020.