 BINDER
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Alles Verloren
Binder&Krieglstein present a new album. Binder&Krieglstein hail from Graz (in Steiermark – the far east of Austria) and they are big time there when it comes to fuse local (pop) music with an international feel. This Shantel production for Essay Recordings will surely bring them international acclaim. One of their previous tracks (Wir Wissen Nicht, a Remix by Shantel) was already featured on numerous compilations around the globe – it is reissued here.
Pop Appeal under the Family Crest
The German title “Alles Verloren” means “All is Lost”. But don’t be fooled into thinking it’s all about gloom and doom. Rainer Binder-Krieglstein doesn’t take the concept of losing too seriously. It’s just a question of style, as he would say. And if there’s somebody who knows a thing or two about style, it’s him.
But where does Binder get his class, his cool, his nonchalance? One glance at the cover and we think we may have the answer: why, he’s an aristocrat! The lands and fortune may be lost, but Binder couldn’t care less. He makes music as if there were no tomorrow. Trashy sounds with a razor-sharp edge, wild melodies with a touch of sophistication. His ancestors came from Alsace, he says. Which is, of course, the place where sauerkraut meets champagne. Not that we have to believe everything Binder says, but he certainly has a thing about unlikely combinations. And so it was that he left his Austrian retreat in search of some felicitous combinations for his new album. He found what he was looking for in Frankfurt, with label-founder and club culture innovator Shantel (Bucovina Club / BBC Award winner). Yes, he has always had a talent for mixing and blending. As has Shantel.
He also has a very relaxed approach to the seemingly incompatible. We shouldn’t underestimate the influence of his background here. The Binders and the Krieglsteins, after all, have always been involved in the fine and the coarse. Makers of wine barrels, engineers, farmers, goldsmiths, cultural officials. Itinerant musicians, too, according to family history. And according to the nostalgic few. Like Bruno, who wrote a memoir entitled Jugenderinnerungen eines alt-österreichischen Salonlöwen. What about Binder himself? Well, let’s put it this way: he’s a man of independent means. A cosmopolitan, but with an outside toilet. Dressed in the finest fabrics, but with a tattoo of the family crest underneath. A real bloke. Even when all is lost.
Binder&Krieglstein
“I like putting things together that don’t really belong together. Which means, in this case, being able to translate the very crude mix of my productions into a sound that has the hallmark of Shantel. It also means finding points of contact with other genres. My vocalist Makki, for instance, is actually an artist (she studied at the University of Applied Arts in Vienna) and that makes the work incredibly exciting, because it means you are constantly negotiating different approaches. There are also contributions from Eva Jantschitsch, Uwe Bubik, Rainer von Vielen, Sasha Prolic, Richie Winkler, Lothar Lässser and Kurt Bauer, which are musically very different from one another.
Of course, the thing about the title, “Alles Verloren”, is that it isn’t just ironic. Because drifting, getting lost, simply has potential, especially for creative work. In that respect, I am striving for a certain equanimity, because losses also create space. The fact that my own family history fits in so well is the reason for the cover. The crest, by the way, is real.”
Attempt at a Biography
For a while, the most hyped line-ups and projects on the Austrian music scene had names such as Kruder & Dorfmeister, Dzihan & Kamien, Pulsinger & Tunakan. They were simply the names of the protagonists who put the Vienna Sound on the music map in the 90s and came to represent a whole new pop/electronic image. So when the name Binder & Krieglstein appeared, it was bound to make you think that this was just somebody else jumping on the bandwagon. Far from it: the name itself reflects the wit, irony and whimsicality of Rainer Binder-Krieglstein from Graz. The name may sound like a ‘duo’, but there’s only one person behind it.
“Punky Lo-Fi with attitude, trashy elektronic sounds and a generous portion of humour” is how FM4 described his debut album “International” in which the drummer who had previously played with Fetish 69, Sans Secours and various jazz bands, showed what he could do. Samples, loops and sounds all held together by the drumming and vision of Binder-Krieglstein. It is important for Rainer to make music with people he likes – no matter what the style. As long as the chemistry is right, anything goes: electronic, brass band or pop.
Pure eclecticism? A streetwise lust for life, more like. Wide-ranging minimalism. An urge to capture atmospheres, attitudes and moods and pass them on in distilled form to a surprised and delighted audience. Binder&Krieglstein – live: with room for everything from quirky folk guitar and idiosyncratic double bass to moody downtempo grooves, swinging jazz textures and straight tech-house beats. (Source: Walter Gröbchen, www. monkeymusic.at). |
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