The Notwist – The Devil, You+Me (May 2, 2008)

German bands, especially in Indie, are not a common thing and The Notwist can be a real discovery for people like me who perceive Indie mainly in a British “package”! The first associations with Radiohead are misleading; despite the seeming similarity between the psychedelic art-electronic-rock combination the bands are very different in the songwriting technique and in the way the songs evolve, Markus‘ vocal is much more stable and calm than that of the Yorke’s. The Notwist songs are impossible to be predicted and you always fail in trying to repeat the melody in the beginning. But when you are getting familiar with their melody structure you already know that the Acher brothers will make the song rise until a certain top making you hold your breath and drop it down all of a sudden!
The song texts are generally minimalistic and concise without expressing a concrete meaning making you put any sense you feel like for any of the songs.

The Notwist latest album The Devil, you + me is a new experimental indie album birth expanding our musical horizons farther being so indie even among indie!
This album is a real chameleon suiting your mood perfectly: making you hope when you’re positive and put you in a deeper depression if you are sad.
Hands on us is one of the songs that will feed your depression with it’s monotone sighs and classical instruments playing on your inner nerves…

Boneless is a very light sounding, catchy song with it’s infecting chorus you want to repeat all the time: “Booooone-less!” It is perfect to express the feelings of people in mess who want to run away from everything that surround them that is so fake!

Gone, Gone, Gone is a kind and lovely ballad you always have warm feelings while listening to. Consisting purely from guitar in the beginning it then stays minimalistic as well and can serve as a wonderful lullaby… It’s the shortest and simplest but still a great song!

Good lies is one of the album best songs different from the rest if for no other reason than this deep philosophical note “let’s just imitate the real until we find a better one…” sometimes it’s better to live with good lies as it is a better reality that the one we have!..

Gloomy Planets is so cosmic with its space sounds singing of the cars on New York streets and the gloomy planets staying always, anyway no matter how locked up we are…
Aggressive drums and a suddenly huge electric guitar solo chokes you and after a while the percussion comes and all this in one song! Alphabet!…it’s really a crazy song…!!!

Gravity begins very mysteriously taking you away from gravity to fly to the moon and stars while The Notwist prays for love and disbelief up on the roof!…

Another song which could be a good lullaby also because of its name is Sleep, a very “atheistic” song… Oriental mood comes with listening to On planet off which is a mad song with unbelievable ups and downs and electronically full of different effects. The texts again seem to be senseless repetition of the authors mad thoughts like in a nightmare…

The least remarkable song in the album is probably Where In This World that is nothing new and is hard to listen to.

The Devil, you+me is a really magic song; so pure, magnificent and high! Songs like this make bands irreplaceable in people’s minds. The perfect melody and background beats get stuck in your mind bringing you such an idyll…

Everybody still speaks of Neon Golden, the most popular album of The Notwist but this album is definitely fascinating and is worth filling another important part of the unique music diggers memory. All in all very kind due to the magnanimous and hypnotizing vocal of Markus Acher and such a beautiful way of feeling the music…

1 Good Lies 5:24
2 Where In This World 4:41
3 Gloomy Planets 4:50
4 Alphabet 3:03
5 The Devil, You + Me 3:39
6 Gravity 3:56
7 Sleep 3:46
8 On Planet Off 5:07
9 Boneless 2:57
10 Hands On Us 4:29
11 Gone Gone Gone 2:09