Christian Flake Lorenz - Its the Worlds Birthday Today

this is a genuine rare bird book

Rare Bird Books
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Los Angeles, CA 90013
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Copyright 2017 S. Fischer Verlag GmbH, Frankfurt am Main

Translation copyright 2020 by Marshall Yarbrough

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever, including but not limited to print, audio, and electronic. For more information, address:
Rare Bird Books Subsidiary Rights Department
453 South Spring Street, Suite 302
Los Angeles, CA 90013

Set in Minion

epub isbn : 9781644281727

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Flake, 1966 author. | Yarbrough, Marshall, translator.
Title: Its the worlds birthday today / written by Christin Flake Lorenz;
translated by Marshall Yarbrough.
Other titles: Heute hat die Welt Geburtstag. English
Description: Los Angeles : Rare Bird Books, 2020.
Identifiers: LCCN 2020013247 | ISBN 9781644280638 (hardback)
Subjects: LCSH: Flake, 1966 | Rammstein (Musical group) |
Rock musiciansGermanyBiography.
Classification: LCC ML420.F554 A3 2020 | DDC 782.42166092 [B]dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020013247

Ich habe endlich keine Trume mehr

Ich habe endlich keine Freunde mehr

Hab endlich keine Emotionen mehr

Ich habe keine Angst vorm Sterben mehr

Alles Grau, Isolation Berlin

At last, I dont have dreams anymore

At last, I dont have friends anymore

No emotions at all anymore

Im not afraid of dying anymore

Everythings Gray, Isolation Berlin

Contents

I wrote this book on tour, in my downtime on the bus or at the concert. Any resemblance to actual persons or events is the result of my lack of imagination and is not intentional.

Ive lost all sense of what time it is. Our flight left this morning, and the clock on my phone automatically resets whenever the plane even gets close to a new time zone. Inch by inch the bus makes its way through the city center. Budapest seems to be pretty big. Were stuck in rush-hour traffic. Today is Friday; everybody wants to get out of the city as fast as they can. But fast is not an option here.

I look out the window. My view extends about two feetto a big, dirty delivery truck in the next lane. Even it moves faster than us. Our driver has no patience for this situation; whenever he spots the tiniest opening, he floors it, and I get thrown back into my seat, which doesnt smell very good. Immediately he has to brake again, and I lurch forward. When the truck passes us, it opens up the view of a gray wall. So we do seem, ever so slowly, to be approaching the outskirts. I would have preferred to sit up front, but the driver has all his stuff laid out on the seat next to him, and he gave me a weird look when I tried to open the passenger door. Like Id tried to climb into bed with him.

In the back, I feel so cast off, like Im luggage. Like I dont have any say. Plus I enjoy talking to the driversa lot of times theyre our only real point of contact with the country we happen to be in. Right now Id like to ask him about the music thats blaring out of the speakers.

I found out about a new band in a shuttle bus one time. Or at least the band was new to me. Their music sounded very urgent and kept jumping between different loops, almost like a record skipping. I was totally fascinated, and I asked the driver who the band was. We were in Barcelona, and I couldnt really understand what the driver was saying. That wasnt his fault: I speak neither Spanish nor passable English. And so he just pulled the CD out of the CD player and gave it to me. Or at least thats what I assumed was happening. When I got back to Berlin, I proudly played the CD for my daughter. I wanted to show her that even at my age, I was still with it, still had my finger on the pulse. I tried to explain to her that I liked this music so much because it sounded as if a broken record were randomly determining the melody. All it took was a glance at the CD player display for my daughter to figure out that the CD was actually just skipping. The look she gave me is indescribable.

I do still like listening to that CD, though. Its meditative, in a way, and plus you really cant predict when its going to skip. It doesnt feel like Im listening to a piece of recorded music; rather, its like Im an active participant in the listening experience. I always hear something new.

The song that was just playing, which I also really liked, has finished. Now comes the newsalso in Hungarian, of coursewhich means its too late to ask about the last song. I dont know how else I could start a conversation with the driver, he makes such a tight-lipped impression. Not that theres anything to talk about at the moment. When I got in, all he wanted to know was if anyone else was going to ride with us. Assuming I understood him correctly. And I couldnt even answer this simple question, because now that we all sleep in separate hotel rooms, I never know where the others are.

Id hoped we would all ride to the venue together, but when I came down, I was the only one of us standing there, and so the driver drove off with just me. The others probably know how pointless it is to leave at this time of day. Assuming it really is what time I think it is.

Ive also had it happen that the clock hasnt reset itself after weve flown back from a concert somewhere far awayat any rate, I cant rely on the clock on my phone anymore. And you cant even trust the TV, since the networks all broadcast from different countries. If its three oclock in England, itll be much later here.

In Australia, there are even time differences of a half hour. Sometimes a city will be split between two different time zones, with the dividing line running right through the middle. There you cant even make it to the dentist on time. It might be like that in America, too. In Hartford or someplace.

It was in Hartford that we once climbed up a railroad bridge on a dare. If Id spent less time sitting around the house as a kid and more time playing with the other kids, I wouldnt have had to do this kind of thing at a much older age when the fear is that much greater. Naturally a train came, and right when wed reached the middle of the bridge. We had to press right up against the edge; there wasnt any railing, and when we looked between the crossties we could see straight down to the water. The train was infinitely long, which was probably why it moved so slowly, and it felt like an eternity until it was all over, especially since I spent the whole time staring at a run-over dachshund or raccoon that looked like a cut-open teddy bear. On this bridge, I had the opportunity to experience how elastic time can be, how much it can stretch out. Unfortunately, it usually tends to stretch out in unpleasant situations.

Like here on the bus, where it feels as though weve been driving forever. Im not entirely without blame in this, since I insisted we book a hotel in the city centerthat way all the sights are right there. Though the sights dont really interest me much. That may sound strange, but back in Berlin I dont ever go to TV Tower or the Brandenburg Gate. Meanwhile, most of the venues we play are located outside of town so that the fans, whether theyre our fans or the fans of the local soccer team, dont mess up the citys image. This works pretty well, and I can tell were getting close to the venue because I can see quite a few fans on the sidewalk to the left and right of us. Theyve parked their cars on the side of the road and are now walking in little groups. On foot, theyre faster than the bus.