Teuton from the hip

Few nations are so encumbered with stereotypes as Germany. Musically, especially, there is a tendency to portray the Teutons as a soulless bunch, in love with cold rhythms and stark, staccato melodies. If robots wrote songs, we imagine, they’d sound a lot like the Germans.

Ulrich Schnauss, it may reasonably be claimed, does not fit this stereotype. A graduate of Berlin’s hyper-eclectic electronica scene, Schnauss makes dreamy, languid soundtracks, that are at once warm and slightly mysterious – the clipped, icy precision of, say, Kraftwerk feels a universe away.
“People expect German music to be very stark and harsh,” says the 29-year-old, sitting by the mixing desk of the home studio where he’s finishing his new album. “I think my records surprise them, because the songs I write are very different from that. Of course, this is because I am a human being first and a German second.”
Shoegazing – that wistful early ‘90s collision of feedback and ennui – is a clear influence yet Schnauss does more than crib from his favourite bands.
His records have the glittering, formal beauty of skyscrapers; they take the shoegaze manifesto and drench it in neon. Critics have dubbed his sound ‘stadium chill-out’, which captures the sweep but perhaps not the dreamy lushness of Schnauss’ music.
“For me, my favourite bands have always been those from the ‘90s,” he proffers. “My Bloody Valentine in particular. What was special was the way they could express emotions, incredible feeling, with just a guitar. They said more than many lyrics.”
Remarkable art is not always recognised in its native land. Schnauss, on his way to becoming a cult figure here, in Britain and in America, admits to being regarded as something of an outcast in German techno circles. His crime? The charge sheet is crowded, but right at the top is his use of vapour trail guitars to create effervescent soundscapes – heresy to the electronica hardcore.
“In Germany, the different scenes are very much divided. If you make techno music, it’s expected that you will be influenced only by techno. In Ireland, you get crossover. Here that is not allowed.”
Schnauss’ first album, a sleek electro meisterwerk called Far Away Trains Passing By, was born of compromise he says: “On that album I was trying to live up to other people’s expectations. In many ways it is a straightforward electronic record – not what I was interested in making. I was living in Berlin at the time, and the scene there is very cliquey and there was some peer pressure, which I responded to.”
The musician says he only truly found his voice when he moved home, to the remote, and by his own admission quite forlorn, fishing village of Kiel on the Baltic coast. There, he wrote A Strangely Isolated Place, an album that has the delicate fury of a snowstorm.
The record has been turning heads, and not always where Schnauss expected. Hollywood has recently come knocking – director Cameron Crowe insisted the song ‘Passing By’ be on the soundtrack to excruciating rom-com Elizabethtown. It was one of those long-distance collaborations – Schnauss and Crowe never met.
“There was no direct contact. I just heard there was some interest in using the track. I’d like to write for the cinema in the future. However, at the moment I don’t know anyone in Hollywood.”
For now Schnauss is concentrating on finishing his new record (the process is painstaking; after three years he hopes the project, as yet untitled, will finally see daylight this summer) and looking forward to a short tour of Ireland and Britain.
“It’s really difficult to play techno in a live environment. I try to compensate by making sure the music is really, really loud.”