ZweiundVierzig XVII

Deutsches Haus at NYU presents, ZweiundVierzig (42), a monthly playlist that explores German music in a transatlantic dialogue with the trends occurring in the contemporary American music industry. What kind of music is popular in the German-speaking world? What does the demographic of the performers/artists say about the political, social, and cultural shifts in the German-speaking countries? What parallels can be drawn between these countries, and what kind of parallel terminology, slang, and themes have developed? What differences are immediately apparent? From urban music, to rap and trap; to rock, pop, and techno; to dancehall, reggae, and bossa nova, etc.; ZweiundVierzig has something for all preferences and is an incredible resource for any language learner or music lover.

Why 42?
ZweiundVierzig, a stylization of the German word for forty-two (42), is the address of Deutsches Haus at NYU (DH), as well as the answer to everything, according to some.

Why do you only update once monthly?
Deutsches Haus at NYU has a full program from cultural events to language classes, but a really small team. Depending on the amount of traction and follows these playlists receive, we'll try to update more frequently. For now, we'll take it slow.

I don't have Spotify! How can I listen?
We'll screenshot the playlist below with every update. That way you can use whatever other streaming service you have: YouTube, Apple, Deezer, Tidal etc.

Why not just add the Spotify widget?
NYU is working on making this possible for our interface. Please bear with our alternate display for the time being.

Where can I find past playlists? 

You can find them on our Spotify page linked above and below. At the top of the page, you'll also find a tab that serves as a drop-down menu for past playlists. You can scroll through from editions five to the present. Unfortunately, archiving only started post episode five. However, when we're back in office, we'll work on getting those pages up as well. 

Disclaimers: *Explicit content*
The ideas, terminologies, and views expressed in these songs are not shared by Deutsches Haus at NYU or its team.

Grüezi/Sali! Welcome back to ZweiundVierzig (42)! We made it to the end of our second academic year with edition seventeen, and this one is all Swiss! Don't understand a thing? No worries; us neither! Jokes aside, below, you can find a great selection of contemporary Swiss jazz, hip-hop, rap, folk, and indie. 

Edition seventeen starts off with Fischermanns Orchestra's "Njet, Molotoff," a lyric-less jazz piece that feels appropriate to introduce us to the Swiss soundscape. Warmed up, we can now dive into the folky hip-hop sound of Knackeboul's "James Dean" and the more articulated Swiss German lyrics in Milchmaa's "Tam shli." Sulaya's "Sie So_Ich So" feels more familair with its warped trill at the beginning before giving way to lyrics that one can only describe as perfectly crunchy. Later on, we see a similar pattern with Webba's "Du Hesch Ke," even if executed entirely differently, namely a delicious autotuned crooning to back the track. Having been in the rap scene since at least the 2000's, no exploratory Swiss playlist would be complete without Black Tiger's presence; here represented by his track "Eins Zwei Drei." Ready for another instrumental break? We got you with Pandour's "Hypno'tam." Maybe it's the fact that Switzerland has four working languages, and of course English floating around as the lingua franca, but instrumental beats and genres seem to be rather prevalent from the research we did. We also understand that with such a gamut of languages to choose from, it can be tempting to sing in the most marketable one (usually English or French), so finding Swiss German-singing female musicians was really daunting. In the long run, we were recommended Steff La Cheffe, represented by her track "Holunder," and Steiner & Madlaina, represented by their track "Ciao Bella," and are we surprised that these two are perhaps the standout tracks of the playlist? Not one bit. If you have any recommendations, feel free to reach out! We'd love to hear of more female Swiss-German singers in different genres embracing their market! To continue with distinctions and eagerness for more, this playlist ends with Faber (track: "Jung und Dumm") and Dino Brandão (track: "Derfi di hebe" feat. Faber and Sophie Hunger), which are a WHOLE take on folk/rock that seem unmistakably Swiss (to us). 

We hope you enjoy this edition of ZweiundVierzig (42)! Bis bald!