Posted February 22, 200817 yr Hello, I see that there are a lot of German speakers here at Eurobricks. I currently am studying German and have recently started my second semester of the language. Unfortunately I am having massive trouble getting a grasp on this language and its really starting to bug. So I decided to do what I did for French and start watching, reading and listening to German media. Being from the States I really do not know much about German pop culture and was wondering if any members here could tell me of some good German bands (Rammstein excluded because that is the only one I know of, yeah typical huh), movies/TV shows or other forms of media
February 23, 200817 yr Oh boy, taste is so damn different... and you mentioned Rammstein, so I wonder if you might be interested in "normal" stuff as well :-D what comes into my mind about music.. Hiphop: 5 Sterne Delux Reggae: Gentleman, Sam Ragga Band, Jan Delay Indie: Tocotronic Pop: Wir sind Helden, Mia, Tomte, Virginia jetzt, Klez.e yea, watch some videos on youtube and if you like it, get a cd from ebay or somewhere... german TV is actually pretty shite, but there was a series which got quite famous in europe, named "Berlin Berlin" - never watched it, but people said it was nice.. apart from that ... nothing to recommend... there ae a few good movie makers .. and we have 2008, it shouldn't be a problem to get these movies (also notice that in germany 99% of the dvds have subtitles or different languages, not like in italy or france.. check also the german amazon page and imdb for all this stuff and lots of info and impressions!) some good movies are "The lives of Others" or "Lola runs" (both won an oscar); also the movies from Fatih Akin are quite good ("Head-On", "In July", Short Sharp Shock") and perhaps you might like "Life Is A Constrution Site" and "Knocking on Heavens Door" (which I am not sure is subtitled...) Consider that almost all the movies are rated R in the US and are movies you shouldn't watch with your kids.. If you are interested in older movies, there were a few directors in the 70s who got really famous, but this might be too dusty for you.. cheers!! :-)
February 23, 200817 yr what comes into my mind about music..Hiphop: 5 Sterne Delux Reggae: Gentleman, Sam Ragga Band, Jan Delay Indie: Tocotronic Pop: Wir sind Helden, Mia, Tomte, Virginia jetzt, Klez.e yea, watch some videos on youtube and if you like it, get a cd from ebay or somewhere... You forgot Die Edited February 23, 200817 yr by Stealth Hunter
February 23, 200817 yr I'm going back to the 80s, but Nena (German) and Falco (Austrian) were very good music groups/performers. Songs by them are available on YouTube (both in German and English). Gabrielle Kerner (from Nena) is still doing music. In fact, she did a remake of one of my favorites, Leuchtturm, a few years ago. Falco, (Johann H
February 23, 200817 yr what comes into my mind about music..Hiphop: 5 Sterne Delux Reggae: Gentleman, Sam Ragga Band, Jan Delay Indie: Tocotronic Pop: Wir sind Helden, Mia, Tomte, Virginia jetzt, Klez.e Interesting choice - I hardly know two of these by name (Tocotronic and Wir sind Helden) but can
February 23, 200817 yr I'm learning German as well actually, though I have massive trouble as well. If only the Belgian education system would start German training in elementary like they do with French I now might actually be able to constrcut decent scentences without making every possible mistake there is to make! >:-( Though being a native Dutch speaker, German is easy to understand. I'd recommend the uncut, German version of Das Boot as well as the traditional German channels such as WDR and such (if you have hem in the states) And also, this very funny schlager song my German teacher made us listen to last year X-D X-D Reinhard May -
February 23, 200817 yr I have had 4 semesters of German in Middle/High School (1 each year), and right now, I'm in my 2nd semester at college. My guess is you are probably having trouble with sentence structure and maybe conjugation? The further I got in high school, the more trouble I had with stuff like sentence structure in past participle, but my college course has actually cleared a lot of that up for me. And I can attest that German music and media can help you. At least it helped me retain some more knowledge during my 5 years away from the language. I like German metal myself. I do like Rammstein, but as you've already mentioned them I will not delve into them. I like Oomph!, at least more of their more recent stuff, and they remind me a little bit of Disturbed, just a little bit though. The lead singer does have a very good voice. Eisbrecher is ok too. Kind of reminds me of Rammstein, with less focus on guitar and more on electronic. There is also a good song by a Finnish band, Apocalyptica (they play heavy metal on cellos) with a German female singer accompanying them (Marta something). It's called Wie weit (How far). I'm not familiar with much else, but there is this one German hip-hop/rap group I know of called Fettes Brot. I'm not really all that big on them, but some of their stuff is kind of catchy. I have not seen many German films, but I do own some that I can recommend. Run, Lola Run (Lola Rennt) is a good start. The Downfall (Der Untergang) is one of my favorite war movies, and is about the fall of Berlin. A lot of it takes place in the Fuerher Bunker. If you like history and sports, check out Olympia by the ever controversial Leni Riefenstahl, which chronicles the 1936 Olympic games in Berlin. There was an interesting 3 hour documentary about Riefenstahl called the Wonderful Horrible Life of Leni Riefenstahl that I would recommend watching if you get a chance.
February 23, 200817 yr German music: Something special.... Blumfeld, lyrics may be a little complex for beginners, but great music nevertheless.... Guitars as usual.... Die Sterne Real classics: Nina Hagen, of course.... *y* :'-) *y* ....a little more? Maybe her song Unbeschreiblich Weiblich, indescribable female indeed.... *sweet* Einst
February 29, 200816 yr Author thanks a bunch for all the bands that you have posted, i will give each one a look and reply on my thoughts of them, as far as youtube.de that was more or less common sense. i also found that Stage6 has some german southpark episodes, however since it is shutting down dont see how it will do much good now. thanks again
February 29, 200816 yr I've got some more recommendations for you: Pop music: Silbermond, Juli (I think they've not yet been mentioned.) VERY GOOD MOVIE: Das Boot. A film about a German submarine crew. Very neutral. Nothing that glorifies war but depicts war as it is. And I love the movie's theme!! Otherwise I can only recommend going to a country where German is spoken for half a year or a year. Consider exchange programmes. Though I would not recommend Austria or Switzerland, because there various dialects are spoken which might confuse you. Germany is the ideal country to learn standard German (though there are also many dialects, of course). I could give you some words from my own Austrian dialect and you would never ever find out their real standard German meaning. EDIT: One more singer: Reinhard Fendrich (Austrian) Some newspaper websites: www.vol.at, www.vienna.at (local ones, many pics and short articles, low quality). www.derstandard.at (Austrian, supportive of the social democrats) www.diepresse.at (Austrian, supportive of the conservatives) Edited February 29, 200816 yr by legotrainfan
March 1, 200816 yr Hi there, you could also practice reading and writing in german speaking forums. There are ones for LEGO fans (www.1000steine.de and www.lugnet.at) but also for nearly every other hobby you might have. greets from Vienna shary Edited March 1, 200816 yr by shary
July 16, 200816 yr Viele Danks fur das post. Mein Deutsch nicht gut gesprechen. Yes the grammatical forms are very difficult for me as well. Being a 1st generation american (Mein Vater auf Deustchland gekommen). My father wanted me to be american so never taught me german. I've had to learn on my own. I do remember Nena ( 99Luft....?). Das Boot is a very good movie with strong anti-war undertones, it has one of my favorite actors though: Jurgen Prochnow. This is great for the cultural exchange keep it going. There should be one of these for all our friends in the world ( France, Poland, Bulgaria, Brazil, etc....). Edited July 16, 200816 yr by Kogyik
July 16, 200816 yr Since this thread got brought up again, I thought I would post my recommendation. I was born in Germany and have been going there every year to visit family members. One thing I really like are podcasts from Die Sendung Mit Der Maus. It's a german show that you can get in short podcast segments off of iTunes. It's made for kids I believe, but it has really good educational material. Lots of science and how things are made. It help me a lot with my german. Hope this helps!
July 16, 200816 yr The right pic for the last post: (click on image to get to the website) This may be for TFOL only.
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