BROTHER GRIMM - unique type, unique music

14. January 2018

Brother Grimm

BROTHER GRIMM - unique type, unique music

Dennis Grimm is Brother Grimm. The 38-year-old, who grew up between Hamburg and Bremen and lives in Berlin, presents his second album "Home Today, Gone Tomorrow". Once again, Grimm recorded the work almost single-handedly. Once again his music is unique: minimal songs between drones and grooves, between noises and melodies, more in the dark than in the light.

eclipsed: Dennis, you were just on tour. How'd it go?

Dennis Grimm: Cool, it was nice. Being on tour is always cool. You get to know new people, new cities, new corners.

eclipsed: You're all alone on stage. How do you feel about that?

Grimm: Being alone on stage is interesting. It feels free. The comparison to a band structure then has to be made. I can do and do what I want and I am not subordinate to compromises.

eclipsed: But you don't feel left alone?

Grimm: No, not at all. If it was, I wouldn't have done it or stopped doing it. It feels good. I really like being alone on stage.

eclipsed: How did you even come up with making music on your own?

Grimm: How did I guess? Good question. After my last band experiences, I just wanted to try out developing solo sets that could be performed both solo and with bands. That was the basic idea. Then it stayed with being alone. The reason is I'm so comfortable with it.

eclipsed: Apart from music, are you also a loner?

Grimm: No, not really. That's a question I get asked a lot. Or the other way around, if I don't feel lonely on stage. It's not like that. I think it's even easier to get in touch with people on a tour when you're on your own. When you are travelling in a group, you are subject to group dynamics. Sure, I'll be alone in the car. On stage, I'm alone. There's a lot of people around. I feel I'm in good hands.

eclipsed: Your new, second album "Home Today, Gone Tomorrow" comes relatively soon after your debut. Do you like to work so fast? Wasn't it a "difficult second album"?

Grimm: In the development process it wasn't a difficult album at all. I actually recorded it in a relatively short time. This has to do with the fact that the songs that ended up on the album were already rudimentary, at least before I went into the studio. For the most part I had played them live before, quite differently than they landed on the record afterwards, but I didn't go to the studio to write.

eclipsed: How do you create the songs? Do you have the theme first, the lyrics, a melody or sound ideas?

Grimm: There is no real formula for it. Often it's the music that's there first. It rarely begins with an entire text. Sometimes it starts with a single line or just a single word from which something develops. The music can then emerge from one word and both develop further. There's no royal road. But it's usually a long process. The development of a song until I actually play it on stage takes a relatively long time.

eclipsed: Just like the debut you also recorded the new album in Copenhagen in Christiania. What's so special about it? What influence does that have there?

Grimm: That really has a big influence, because I record there with Tenboi Levinson, the guitarist of Hodja. I trust him blindly when it comes to sound direction. We are very similar to how we imagine my music on a record. It's a very family environment up there. The studio is very small and simple. It feels like visiting Tenboi and recording some songs on the side. There are other studios that can kill you for your size. Tenboi is incredibly quick at what he does. There is no one and a half day soundcheck. You come in, there's a microphone there, then the volume knob goes up, and you record. It's much more, but it feels so simple. For me as a musician this is a very grateful setting and a very welcome atmosphere.

eclipsed: The new album is stylistically very similar to the debut. Where do you see the differences?

Grimm: There are things in common, both in terms of the songs and the sound. This is surely due to the fact that the songs of the second album were written not so much later than those of the first album. For me personally, the difference is that it's the second record. The way there was different. I felt safer in the studio, dared to do more things. Without belittling the first record, with which I am still very happy, I felt even more comfortable than before. The new record got warmer again. I'm sure it's more personal. And braver.

eclipsed: When your music is described, terms like "gloomy" and "ghost house blues" come up. Of course, the pun comes in your name, "grim." What do you think of descriptions like that?

Grimm: There's nothing I can do about it, so I'll take it. I am often amused about certain things that are written there. The term "ghost house blues" amused me very much. "Nightmares in Fuckmoll" was adorable. I celebrated that very much. Some people think it's dark, others don't. Depends on your listening habits. Personally, I don't find the music as dark as it is sometimes described. That's all right. The music leaves a lot open. Therefore, I am also glad when it is interpreted in a multi-layered way.

eclipsed: Isn't your music beautiful, too?

Grimm: If you say that, I'm happy. But it would be difficult for me to describe my own music as beautiful. But I also think she has her good moments. Beauty is an elementary part of life. That's why I'm not averse to showing it in my music. At concerts I also get the reaction of the listeners. There I experience many different points of view. I'd be bored if I kept hearing the same things. You can find an album threatening today and beautiful tomorrow. I remember hearing Sonic Youth for the first time with 15 records and being scared to death. That's what shook me through my legs. I didn't even know what to do with it. When I have heard such a record a hundred or two hundred times, I discover the beauty behind it. This is in the best case that it changes over the years and remains exciting.

eclipsed: That also means that an album is timeless.

Grimm: You won't know for 40 years if my records were timeless. I wonder if I'll live to see it Maybe I'm too old for this. That would be an advantage if you already made 20 records.

eclipsed: What topics do you deal with in your lyrics?

Grimm: There are no preferred topics. But themes that repeat themselves. Nevertheless, both albums are of course not concept albums. They do not follow a central theme. Basically, it's all about issues that people are so obsessed with. Love, hate, anger, joy, abandonment, being abandoned, finding oneself again, abandoning oneself, coming home. Things like that play a role on the new record. To have a relationship with a home.

eclipsed: When you do these things on stage, how do you feel? Are you focusing on playing it right in the first place? Or do the emotions overwhelm you, too?

Grimm: That's different. So far it was still the case that when I play concerts, I'm always in the respective song. I don't have the routine of just rewinding this. I hope I don't get that kind of routine either. I imagine that sadly when you write an emotional text out of a state of mind and when you have played it 200 times, you don't feel anything anymore. Then I'd stop playing that song. And that's probably one reason why bands stop playing a song. It touches me when I play my songs, but they don't overwhelm me. Then I wouldn't be able to finish the concert.

eclipsed: Your music is pretty unique. There's not much that sounds like it. Do you have role models? Influences? How was your musical socialization?

Grimm: Of course I have role models and influences. My influences are quite broad. I've always listened to very different music. Sonic Youth have been a very big influence over a long period of time. And they still are. I also heard a lot about the Beach Boys. There are also bands from the pop scene that I totally celebrate. But I don't presume that you can hear the influence of these bands in my music. I've also heard Talk Talk, including their 80s phase, the later one anyway. These are already components that show how far the influence is. I think that saved me from sounding like just one genre. I believe that this is also the great advantage, or the great freedom, that I still feel, of being able to live out various extremes on my own without being subjected to a compromise in a band context. A band is something wonderful, you can give each other a lot creatively. But in the end the result is often either the product of the stronger or a compromise. That can be totally great, but in my situation I don't have that feeling. I'm just me. I don't have to compromise and I don't have to be the stronger one. I can do what I want.

eclipsed: At the end of the new album you hid a cover of David Bowie's "Heroes". At the Burg Herzberg Festival 2017 you have intoned "Here Comes The Sun" by the Beatles at the big rain battle.

Grimm: I actually played two covers that day. This could lead to a heavy GEMA thunderstorm. The motto of the 2017 Herzberg Festival was "Fools On The Hill". Then I covered this Beatles song for a short time. That was a spontaneous inspiration. The day before my performance I arrived and drove through bad weather. It was all underwater. During the day I got the idea that "Here Comes The Sun" could be a nice song and spontaneously got carried away. That was a magical moment because a gap opened up in the clouds and then the sun actually came through.

eclipsed: What is the attraction of such cover versions?

Grimm: It costs a certain amount of effort to make a Beatles song. But the motto of the festival didn't get me around it either. It's fun. But it's a special feeling to cover a Beatles or Bowie song. It's exciting to do this. Especially when I find a way to borrow such a song for a short time and not to play it like in the original, but to find my own approach. For me it would be nonsense to play a Bowie song or any cover like the original. What am I supposed to say? That I can do it just like the band that wrote the song? That can't be the point. It's about reducing a song like that to the basics and then looking at how I would play it if I'd been the lucky one to write it.

eclipsed: You have an extraordinary stage presence live, a hard to interpret attraction. Have you ever noticed that you can cast a spell over the audience?

Grimm: At first, I only judge a concert for myself by looking at myself. When I think back to the first concerts that I played alone, it was a completely different overcoming than today. It feels natural now to do that. If you come from a band context, then that is one thing that also causes uncertainty. I try to evaluate what works and doesn't work on stage. Of course, it helps if I get positive reactions. Especially when you're alone on stage, that's important.

*Interview: Bernd Sievers