Anyone living north of the Weißwurst Equator sometimes has difficulty understanding those who live south of it. Not to mention us Prussians. We practically live at the North Pole.
I already have a hard time understanding the lyrics of Hans Söllner. I have to translate them almost simultaneously from Bavarian to High German, which sometimes works and sometimes doesn’t.
Now HEISCHNEIDA come on stage and I think, “What is that?”
HEISCHNEIDA first appeared in 2015 and since then they have been shaking up stages, festivals, and village and city fairs, primarily in Bavaria.
The band released their second album on July 22, 2022, titled “Heidschneida II.” What you get from the band is diverse. Five Bavarians perform on stage, one of whom could be a hipster from Berlin-Neukölln, and the crowd goes wild. However, this is not the mindless party music that the band offers on stage.
The guys give the impression of standing on stage so casually and effortlessly as if it were nothing. Just having a nice conversation, person to person, and then bam, they excite the masses.
So simple... of course... human... Bavarian.
The second album features fifteen songs, all sung in Bavarian or, as they say, in Bavarian dialect. I understand only about half of it reasonably well, and the rest not so much. Nevertheless, that’s enough to grasp what the guys are about.
The songs deal with serious topics such as being left behind, the new crap... the beloved SUV, being on tour, but of course, there are also songs where you can dance, drink, and celebrate together, like “HSD´2” or “Weiß-Blau.”
What would a Berliner say about this work?
Well, the songs are mostly in a pleasant mid-tempo with equally pleasant vocals. The production is excellent and flawless. Musically, it feels a bit too smooth for me. The band has two guitarists and a trumpeter, and they could do more with that. Especially the trumpeter Simon (who also plays the flugelhorn) doesn’t get enough spotlight.
Lyrically, the whole album is okay, but it also lacks major provocations or even protests. The song “SUV” is an exception. A very positive exception.
Not everything has to be subculture, but overall, HEISCHNEIDA feels just a bit more polished than I would like.
