This election season, America isn\u2019t the only country where disaffected, xenophobic voters are airing their grievances at the polls. Recent state elections in Berlin, Germany, brought heavy losses for the Christian Democratic Union, the party of Chancellor Angela Merkel. The results were payback, it seems, for Merkel\u2019s decision last year to open her nation\u2019s doors to hundreds of thousands of Middle Eastern refugees.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It\u2019s a complicated issue, and one that German rock and pop legend Nena would rather not talk about\u2014not with an American music writer who doesn\u2019t sprechen sie Deutsch<\/em>. On the eve of her first-ever U.S. tour\u2014a three-city trek that kicks off Sept. 30 and comes more than three decades after her eponymous band reached No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 with the surprise 1983 German-language smash \u201c99 Luftballons\u201d\u2014Nena prefers to focus on music.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cWe could do a face-to-face interview and sit down and talk [politics], but it stresses me out to do it on the phone,\u201d says the 56-year-old singer, songwriter, actress and author, days before flying from Hamburg to San Francisco to launch the tour. \u201cI can\u2019t give you a satisfying answer in one sentence. There\u2019s so much going on here.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Nena speaks better English than she thinks, but her fears of miscommunication make total sense\u2014especially in light of her signature hit. Inspired by a 1982 Rolling Stones concert in West Berlin that ended with Mick Jagger releasing a bunch of balloons into the night sky, \u201c99 Luftballons\u201d imagines someone\u2019s helium-filled party favors drifting over the Berlin Wall, getting mistaken for enemy aircraft, and kickstarting World War III.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The story befits a Twilight Zone<\/em> episode, but with its funky slap bass, punky guitars, and cheesy New Wave synths, \u201c99 Luftballons\u201d is pop gold\u2014the ultimate \u201880s Cold War jam. It\u2019s appropriately dramatic yet subtler and more affecting than Frankie Goes to Hollywood\u2019s \u201cTwo Tribes,\u201d The Fixx\u2019s \u201cRed Skies,\u201d and most of the day\u2019s other nuclear-paranoia anthems.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It\u2019s also eerily relevant in 2016, as Germany splinters over the refugee crisis and the United States and Russia butt heads over issues like Crimea and Syria.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cFor us, it was always a song about misunderstandings,\u201d says Nena, who remembers being instantly \u201ctouched\u201d by the lyrics, penned by the band\u2019s keyboard player, Carlo Karges. (Another bandmate, J\u00f6rn-Uwe Fahrenkrog-Petersen, wrote the music.) As Nena sees it, the song\u2019s chilling exploration of the so-called \u201cbutterfly effect\u201d has more to do with everyday human interactions than with international gamesmanship. \u201cIf you want to change the world, you have to start with yourself,\u201d she says. \u201cWe\u2019re all responsible for what happens in the world, what happens to us.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n That message didn\u2019t come across in quite the same way on \u201c99 Red Balloons,\u201d the English-language version Nena released in 1984 at her label\u2019s urging. Featuring lyrics by Irish musician and songwriter Kevin McAlea, who tweaked the story somewhat in order to preserve the melody and phrasing, \u201c99 Red Balloons\u201d was a hit in the U.K., Canada, and Ireland. In the United States and elsewhere, though, it was the original German version\u2014first spun by legendary Los Angeles DJ Rodney Bingenheimer\u2014that made the biggest impact.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Nena and her bandmates have long voiced dissatisfaction with McAlea\u2019s translation, which some hear as silly and less nuanced. \u201cThe energy of the song was working,\u201d Nena says. \u201cThere was no need to do a translation. The record company panicked. The whole vibe is different. We never felt it in English.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The key differences come at the beginning, where McAlea opens the action in a \u201clittle toy shop,\u201d and the end, where he replaces \u201c99 years of war\u201d with \u201c99 dreams I have had.\u201d \u201cWe sing about war,\u201d Nena says, \u201cbut in kind of a poetic way. It just worked. People got it and still get it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The fact that Nena is finally coming to America at a time when \u201c99 Luftballons\u201d is timelier than it\u2019s been at any point since the fall of the Soviet Union is pure coincidence. The tour is happening because the singer\u2014a major star in Germany with 17 albums under her belt\u2014found a booking agent that works with a lot of German bands, and because she\u2019s always wanted to play here. While she\u2019s sure to sing \u201c99 Luftballons,\u201d fans shouldn\u2019t expect any political stage banter. Asked to comment on the coming U.S. presidential election, Nena says she\u2019s \u201cnot a big fan of Trump\u201d and leaves it at that. What she will say emphatically is that she feels good about the future\u2014despite that nightmare scenario she still enjoys singing about every night.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cIt makes no sense not to be hopeful,\u201d Nena says. \u201cIt doesn\u2019t make the world any better to be afraid or scared or paranoid. The world needs strong people with open minds. As soon as you get scared about what\u2019s going on in the world, you\u2019re weak. That\u2019s not how I live my life.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Posted from: https:\/\/www.pastemagazine.com\/music\/nena\/three-decades-after-99-luftballoons-nena-comes-to\/<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n