Rammstein Fanblog

Anyway, I was wondering about the guys' native accents. How are they like? Do they differ too much from each other, given they're from different parts of (East) Germany? And is Till's Hochdeutsch (assuming that's the one he uses while singing) similar to his own?

Thank you in advance 💚

Hi 👋

I'm sorry that it took me so long to come around to answer - real life outside of cozy tumblr has been a lot lately, yet it's slowly getting better and I at least have a bit of time for a breather.

Thank you for this lovely ask! Linguistical topics and accents have been a little of a passion for me since my days at university. The members of Rammstein did indeed originate from slightly different parts around East Germany, and even though there aren't many various accents present in the band, the accents vary in intensity among the guys. This can be caused by the influence of the immediate family, of the social circle the person moves in (often depending on whether the aim is to create a sense of belonging through (subconscious) linguistic adaptation if the accent doesn't exist in the speech in the first place) and the place where the person grew up. First up:

Paul und Flake

Both members are born and raised in East-Berlin (apart from Paul's time spent in Russia) and are known for their very heavy Berlin accents, which is pretty much prominent in every German interview of them respectively. You can recognize this form of accent, which is instantly identifiable for the German ear, by various typical words and features - like "ick" for the standard german word of "ich" (meaning "I"), "dit" instead of "das" (meaning "this"), "wat" instead of "was" (meaning "what") or the general soft pronunciation of the letter "g" (normally pronounced as a soft "k" in German in the uvular region of the mouth) as a "j" - "jeguckt" instead of "geguckt" ("looked at something"), "jekauft" instead of "gekauft" ("bought"), and many more little deviations from standard German. In general, the Berlin accent with its way of speaking comes across as quite direct, honest, doesn't sugar-coat anything and is 'frei von der Leber weg' as we say in Germany, meaning the speaker just tells what they think in that moment. So their accent really brings out Paul and Flake’s wonderful directness 😌

As a typical example serve the interview during the Feeling B era, as well as Paul's part in the documentary 'Jung, wild, grenzenlos' and 'Die Sendung mit Flake' on RadioEins.

2. Schneider

Schneider was born and raised in Berlin, like the aforementioned members, and has a definite Berlin accent while speaking. It is quite prominent, yet less than with Paul and Flake - it sometimes comes across (at least in my ears) that he restrains himself from "berlinern" and slips more into it given the circumstances (where he feels relaxed, finds his flow in interviews or similar situations). Like in the Wacken interview he slips slightly less into the Berlin accents than in the interview at Frankfurter Musikmesse 2011:

3. Till

Till didn't grew up in Berlin (he spent his early years in Rostock on the North Coast and Bad Kleinen, north of Schwerin), yet does have, however, a slight Berlin/ coloring to it - definitely audible, yet in my ears, considerably less that Paul and Flake or Schneider. His way of speaking, like here in the snippets in the TV documentation 'Anakonda im Netz':

is quite a bit more soft and "washed out" than his singing style, in which he indeed uses very clear and sharp standard German. The way he sings reminds me at times of the pronunciation in German songs during 1920s/1930s - like "Ich pfeif' heut' Nacht" or "Mir ist so nach dir". Both Peter Igelhoff and Leo Monosson both articulate the lyrics in a very sharp manner with a rolled ‘r’ (which used to be very common in German entertainment media of that era), similar to Till in several Rammstein songs.

4. Richard

Richard was born and raised for his early years in the small village of Weisen near Wittenberge and later moved to Schwerin up north. He spent time in Berlin and around Berlin-based musicians, and his speech sometimes does have a slight East German/Berlin coloring to his speech, yet from my observation, it only finds its way to the surface when he's quite relaxed, talkative and in a situation he feels comfortable in. Like in the interview for the TV documentary 'Wenn die Seele Trauer trägt', he speaks pretty much quite clean standard German, yet around Rammstein productions, like in some points of making ofs or the 'Rammstein in Amerika' documentary (which I used as an example for his accent here), every now and then, a few words slip out that are reminiscent of the Berlin dialect. Like in the making of of 'Keine Lust':

"Im Grunde genommen haben wir uns überlegt - nach all den Jahren, weißt du, ist man gesättigt von allen Sinnen, das heißt man hat es zu etwas gebracht, man hat Geld... man hat einfach keine Lust mehr zu...zu nüscht." (English: "Basically, we thought to ourselves – after all these years, you know, you’ve had your fill of everything; that is to say, you’ve made something of yourself, you’ve got money… you just don’t feel like… doing anything anymore.") And this 'nüscht', Berlin version of 'nichts' ('anything, nothing') really stands out, since it's the only word in his sentence which has some Berlin colouring to it, maybe to emphasis his point 😄

5. Olli

Olli was born and raised in Schwerin, later moved to Berlin where he still resides. In the few interviews he gave in the past, no notable accent is audible (at least to me) - he speaks pretty clean standard German, like in the 'Anakonda im Netz' documentary: