official Covenant Forum

at least the second one I can answer. Those two songs are the same. Der Leiermann is the German version of the song whichwas released as a single in Germany instead of the English song.

Question 1 is something for the band

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Originally posted by Brosy
1 why they always dress a suite?

I guess they thought it looked much better than the plastic garbage sacks, that were the stage outfits in the early days

not sure if der leiermann is an exact translation to tears in the rain though!

Der Leiermann (The Organ Grinder) is a famous German poem.

http://myweb.dal.ca/waue/Trans/Mueller-Winterreise.html

If i recall correctly (which i don't always, so please don't sue me), they'd already written "Like Tears in Rain" when Eskil made a second version with the poem as the lyrics. They sent it to Stefan Herwig (almost as a joke, i think) who loved it and decided to release it.

The Suits (TM)
Here is a quote from Industrial Nation (issue #17) that might shed a wee bit of light onto that:

IN: What prompted the switch from the more theatrical live shows you guys did in the beginning to the more austere 'guys in suits' look of the more recent tours? Was it ease or did you have any specific ideas behind that?

Montelius: Well, it's a bit of both. It was very time consuming to make these things. In the early days it took about 4 or 5 hours to make the [costumes] every single gig. As we got more and more gigs it just became impossible to do it. And we never had the money to get things constructed and we're not that good at making stuff ourselves. So we just decided we have to have something a little easier to make. In between [the costumes from the early shows and the suits] we had the dresses we had on the first US tour.

IN: I remember those. I thought they were monks robes, or something.

Montelius: They became that. In the beginning it was just girls dresses from a well-known chain of stores in Sweden [laughs].

IN: So you walked into [the store] and bought a couple of ladies dresses?

Montelius: Yes, we tried them out in the store, too. The three of us were standing there with five different kinds of black dresses in the ladies department very seriously discussing "oh, well that doesn’t fit you that good…." People thought we were totally crazy.

IN: I hope none of you turned to one another and asked "does this dress make my butt look big?"

Montelius: No, even though they actually did [laughs]. We started wearing the suits off-stage on the CyberVision tour. Then we decided, "well, let’s keep [the suits]. Nobody else has suits anyway."

--Sharon

Thank you very much for this posting. I´ve never laughed so loud after reading an interview. Strange things happened on the way to be famous. But going into a ladies department buying ladies dresses for a tour-outfit only to look a bit more strange than other bands is indeed totally crazy - but funny, too! :perfekt:

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Original von niki_6784
not sure if der leiermann is an exact translation to tears in the rain though!

nono, no translation. Totally different lyrics. Just the music is the same

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Originally posted by Black_Cat

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Original von niki_6784
not sure if der leiermann is an exact translation to tears in the rain though!

nono, no translation. Totally different lyrics. Just the music is the same

If I remember an article or quote I read someplace online correctly, they had written Like Tears In The Rain already and happened to read that german poem. When they overlaid it on the music, they found it fit so well they recorded a copy, and yes, did send it as a joke, but it actually was released. Either way, I get a bit creeped out hearing the german poem to the beat of it (Like Tears In The Rain) and not hear any english lyrics, it just sounds weird to me.

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Originally posted by Brosy
i have two questions

1 why they always dress a suite?

and

2 der leierman is the same song like tears in rain????

thanks

1) Probably because it looks cool. Though I really would have ~loved~ to have seen the ladies' dresses...


2) This has been answered already I see, a few times over. But here's a linkie anyway with a translation of the original:

der leiermann/the organ-grinder

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Originally posted by Kyron5
Der Leiermann (The Organ Grinder) is a famous German poem.

http://myweb.dal.ca/waue/Trans/Mueller-Winterreise.html

--Sharon

Gah- I didn't see you had posted this before I posted the link I did- sorry! Redundant me!

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Originally posted by Kyron5

Montelius: Well, it's a bit of both. It was very time consuming to make these things. In the early days it took about 4 or 5 hours to make the [costumes] every single gig. As we got more and more gigs it just became impossible to do it. And we never had the money to get things constructed and we're not that good at making stuff ourselves. So we just decided we have to have something a little easier to make. In between [the costumes from the early shows and the suits] we had the dresses we had on the first US tour.

IN: I remember those. I thought they were monks robes, or something.

Montelius: They became that. In the beginning it was just girls dresses from a well-known chain of stores in Sweden [laughs].

IN: So you walked into [the store] and bought a couple of ladies dresses?

Montelius: Yes, we tried them out in the store, too. The three of us were standing there with five different kinds of black dresses in the ladies department very seriously discussing "oh, well that doesn’t fit you that good…." People thought we were totally crazy.


--Sharon

Does anyone by any random struck of luck have pictures of the before-suit era?

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Originally posted by Megaprofit
Does anyone by any random struck of luck have pictures of the before-suit era?

There's an interview from '97 here that has a couple of pics of Eskil in the suit-dress. I know there's a site that has a few pics of all three of them in the priesty getup, but I can't remember where it is at the moment.

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Originally posted by michelem31

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Originally posted by Megaprofit
Does anyone by any random struck of luck have pictures of the before-suit era?

There's an interview from '97 here that has a couple of pics of Eskil in the suit-dress. I know there's a site that has a few pics of all three of them in the priesty getup, but I can't remember where it is at the moment.

"Jester: You mentioned that you are working on a new album, does it have a title yet?

Eskil: I don't know if we have an official title yet.

Joakim: I think we do. We are probably going to call it "Europa". It has a very Kraftwerk sound to it."


Awwww! Hee. Being the big Kraftwerk dork that I am, that made me smile. :-]


Aaaaand in closing:

"Eskil: We make music, and that is the channel we have chosen to express ourselves. I want people to overlook all of what you have read about us, and judge us solely on our music because that is what is important."





:perfekt:

A suit makes a man look very elegant... and adding to what Eskil said, such outfits don't disturbe the music.
I don't really like all these overdressed people with strange hairstyles and makeup... Hm... I guess I'm old-fashioned... or simply getting old...

I think most of the outfits which you can see on stages are ridiculous.
Music should be the most important thing during a concert and not the style of the
band-members.
IMO one should wear the same clothes on stage as in everyday-life.

I have to agree with you lot about outfits. With bands , though I love their music, some of their getup is so over the top and cheesy it's hard to take them seriously.

I remember when my my sister, my mom and I were taking a little road trip a few months back, and my sister (who thanks me for introducing her to Covenant and the whole EBM genre, go me) wanted to listen to some of the guys' older stuff, so I put on Sequencer. And while it was playing, we gave my mom a little information about the band, and some of the conversation went something like this:

Mom: 'I'm imagining them hopping around on stage with spiked hair, wearing big goth boots and having their arms covered in tattoos.'

Me: 'Actually, they hop around on stage with very nicely cut hair, business suits, and as far as I know, they have no tattoos.'

Mom: 'Really? Now that's the way to rebel.'

I think that's another thing I love about the band: the imagery of these three men who, by appearances, could be mistaken for CEO's of a huge mega business corporation, but actually make some of the craziest and loudest noises on the planet. Way to rebel, indeed.

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Originally posted by michelem31I think that's another thing I love about the band: the imagery of these three men who, by appearances, could be mistaken for CEO's of a huge mega business corporation, but actually make some of the craziest and loudest noises on the planet. Way to rebel, indeed.

I totally agree with you- and that appeals to me too. I'll be the first to agree that the music is by far the most important thing, but if you're trying to promote your music, yeah, image is a part of it.

One thing I love about this subculture in general is how *expressive* it is- at a show or a club you get aaaaaall different types of people dressed in and expressing themselves in aaaaaall kinds of different ways. I like the theatrics and the creativity but ultimately the music is by far the most important thing, no contest.

I've loved the suit thing since Kraftwerk, Japan, Roxy Music, etc- but I was especially delighted the first time I saw an actual picture of Covenant and saw how they were contrasting really harsh sounds (which I love) with elegant *suits* (which I also love).

:perfekt:

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Originally posted by Atma
A suit makes a man look very elegant... and adding to what Eskil said, such outfits don't disturbe the music.
I don't really like all these overdressed people with strange hairstyles and makeup... Hm... I guess I'm old-fashioned... or simply getting old...

Right on! :perfekt: When you know nothing about a person, unfortunately their appearance as well as their behavior are your first impressions. Luckily, I look at music as an extension of behavior.

Then again, I am someone who enjoys abstract visuals and feel that stepping out of one's every day clothes to perform mentally changes a person as well. Whether that's a business suit or a monkey suit. It's hard for me to explain when a visual distracts me from the music (like music videos) and then I feel I may as well just stick to recordings. The difference between a band I want to see live is that seeing them perform is a shared moment in time. The audience isn't invisible, musicians see us, and so when that exchange is full of positive energy, it's a dynamic moment. :nod:

My favorite thought is: whoever you admire, imagine them folding their laundry or tiling a floor. Or anything mundane in life we all do, really. They live their lives daily as we do, so when they get on stage it's also special for them, too. If it isn't, something is wrong, I think.

Edit: Michele, great story by the way!

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Lush:
I am someone who enjoys abstract visuals and feel that stepping out of one's every day clothes to perform mentally changes a person as well. Whether that's a business suit or a monkey suit. It's hard for me to explain when a visual distracts me from the music (like music videos) and then I feel I may as well just stick to recordings. The difference between a band I want to see live is that seeing them perform is a shared moment in time. The audience isn't invisible, musicians see us, and so when that exchange is full of positive energy, it's a dynamic moment. :nod:

Also, the difference for me between videos and live visual stuff (be it stage clothing/lights/whatever) is that with the latter, it's *immediate*. It augments the original vehicle of expression in an instantaneous way.
With videos there's a middleman- the interpretation of one medium into another, and for me something gets lost in that. Multimedia performances notwithstanding of course but that's something altogether different.

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My favorite thought is: whoever you admire, imagine them folding their laundry or tiling a floor. Or anything mundane in life we all do, really. They live their lives daily as we do, so when they get on stage it's also special for them, too. If it isn't, something is wrong, I think.

How dare you insinuate that they fold their own laundry and do dishes!