#1 Schattenmann. The first theme is part of a Romanian song, originally played on a hammer dulcimer. This inspired Dirk (who used to play drums in a heavy metal band) to pick up on his percussion qualities. So he got himself a Persian santur that he ruined recording the first part of the melody. Antje added a recorder tune, and Carsten the blues harp (one of his favorite instruments). We then added the bigbandy horn section and the vocals, that do not belong in this kind of song in the first place. Well, neither does the blues harp, or the horn section. The German lyrics are about your shadow having this weird personality of its own.
#2 Son Mystère. The song started out with the French lyrics, about a guy completely lost in his own fascinating world. His mystery. We were arranging this song in Essaouira in Morocco. There, mystery seems so much part of everyday life (and those people talking to themselves are not locked away). All that went into that clarinet note near the end, and we wanted that note to express what that yearning is about.
#3 Wann war das? The only song almost finished when we started recording the album. The two main chords b Minor and E Major 7 are the two nicest chords on the ukulele. Christopher was fooling around with those chords and wrote the accordion melody to keep him company. The German lyrics are about a long love relationship falling apart, with him drifting off into a world of his own, and her left with the memories of what their dream once was.
#4 Deine Tränen. Another Romanian melody. In this case Kruisko, our accordion player, was the only one to get his fingers around the B part of the melody properly, so it became an accordion-based tune, with Dirk banging away on his Austrian “Hackbrett,” that had replaced the santur. The chorus is in a Major key, because Christopher wanted to weave a British sounding chord progression together with the Eastern main melody.
#5 Teshko. Carsten the bass player had built a resonator-cello. Basically a cello with extra strings attached to it, that “hum” along (similar to the sitar). He sat practicing, using this traditional tune from the Balkans. He finally came up with a version, playing only the chords. Henry on the clarinet was somewhere else, and we sent him the “resonating track” and he recorded the melody. He then sent back the tracks, and we played the rest, jamming along with what was on tape. It doesn’t sound it, but it was a lot of work. Harmonium and tanpura were two Indian instruments we had just found a liking in.
#6 Tick Tack. This tune started out as an instrumental we called “Papadam” after an Indian fast food on sale at one of our first gigs. With Uwe using tuba for the heck of it, which changed the whole feel, and then the German (nursery-rhyme style) lyrics about time passing by, it hopped into place.
#7 Moving Song. Again Carsten our bass player was trying out some new gadget of his, this time a jew’s harp, that kinda turned the Cajun tune we were playing around with, into an acoustic-techno piece. Christopher was using tanpura (an Indian instrument) on everything, because he loved the sound, and that led to the string arrangement: Indian, Cajun, Techno… again this tune divides our audience!
#8 Apache. We were sitting on the roof of a friend’s house in Morocco, when someone came up with the “let’s play a tune we all know” game. And let’s play it in a beat that we like best. That happened to be a Turkish 9/8. The only tune we all happened to know was Apache. The dog barking was actually on a neighboring roof.
#9 Heimlich. See press release.
#10 Just like you. Elmar had been playing the trumpet theme for over a year during sound checks, and with a day left of recording, Christopher went to bed with the melody in his head. Not being quite sure, he called Carsten at two o’clock in the morning, who sang the melody onto Christopher’s cell phone. He spent all night trying to figure out what to do with the song, and they recorded it the next day.
#11 Madame. Madame was a song in English Christopher had written ages ago. He thought the lyrics were, hmm… cheesy. Kiki thought it a funny idea to get Dirk to sing in French. So the two things combined turned out to be this song about a girl being very vain about love.
#12 Rustemul. The beginning and end are the only bit on the CD played in a way someone in the Balkans might recognize. To be honest the rest is just fooling around after watching a Metallica video.
Additional Info
17 Hippies Storm North America: Top Secret Acoustic Rock from ...
Performance Tales
About the Songs on 17 Hippies’ Heimlich
Introducing the Band Members
Top of Press Release
