Die Ärzte - CD maxi singles 1993-2013

[originally posted on July 11th 2023 on cohost]

Today I got the final missing piece to this collection in the mail, all maxi CD singles by Die Ärzte, from their reunion in 1993 to their hiatus in 2013. The reason for this limited timeframe is that prior to 1993, all their singles in the 80s were only on vinyl, with the exception of 4 singles from 1988-89, which came out also as 3'' mini CDs, and are very hard to find and cost a fortune (Maybe some day). All singles since their comeback in 2018 came out also only on vinyl, which is a format I no longer collect. I would love to have these on CD but I guess the time for CD maxis is over. Oh well

Die Bestie in Menschengestalt era

Very standard packaging, some interesting tracks, but not the best era of the band for b-sides. The band definitely used up all their best material for the album. Still, we get some single versions here that are notably different than the album versions, both lyrically and musically, wish bands still did stuff like that. Also the absolute power move of releasing your big comeback single, but the first track on the CD, the first new thing people heard from the band for 5 years, is a 6+ minute long slow traditional Oktoberfest ass brass folk song. Iconic

Planet Punk / Le Frisur era

Not a lot of singles here, only 4 singles for 2 albums. There's also the promo only Rod Loves You, but that one's kind of like, really fucking rare, and since it wasn't a commercial release I don't count that here. All these are thin, very basic digisleeves, with a weird cardboard mechanism to hold the CD in place, nothing special. Strong b-sides in this era though, particularly Regierung and Warrumska are two of my favourite Ärzte b-sides. Unfortunately no longer alternative single versions of the songs, aside from maybe using different samples than on the album. Closest thing to that would be Chanson d'Albert, which is just an English language version of Schunder Song

13 / Wir wollen nur deine Seele era

Ahh, the era with the biggest commercial hit, Männer sind Schweine. Largely everything in this era is in cardboard slip cases, where a CD retainer slides out to the side of the packaging. Quite nifty, but unfortunately a bit fragile, and my copies of these are sadly also quite beat up. Not huge on the artworks here, but I do like that they have a relatively consistent design scheme. Very good b-sides though: Wunderbare Welt des Farin U., Backpfeifengesicht, Alles für dich, Schlimm and Ein Lied über Zensur. Once again a different sample in Männer sind Schweine on the single version than on the album, and also an alternative version to Punk ist.... Elke goes hard and this particular live version is kind of legendary but that song just aged very poorly. In hindsight, the live medley they put on the b-side is the real reason to have this single. It is worth noting though that while this single came out for the live album Wir wollen nur deine Seele, the performance of that song that is included on the album is actually a completely different one so it's 100% new content

Runter mit den Spendierhosen, Unsichtbarer! / Rock'n'Roll Realschule era

Very similar packaging situation as in the previous era, mostly the cardboard slipcases, but not much of a coherent design philosphy here. But the band went absolutely wild with the choise in singles during this era. Wie es geht is a safe pick as a lead, Manchmal haben Frauen... is already much less safe, and then they absolutely went hogwild with picking the 30 second track Yoko Ono as their next single, which I believe at the time might've been a world record for the shortest released music video? The final single Rock'n'Roll Übermensch is an equally wild pick. As much as I like this song and the irony of it, I don't know how to describe this thing. Wikipedia says it's dub? I don't think that's correct? Whatever it is it's most definitely not rock'n'roll. Either way, again some very strong b-sides, Poser, du bist ein..., Die Instrumente des Orchesters, the live staple Rettet die Wale, and one of my personal all time favourites, my ultimate depressed gay yearning song, Die Welt ist schlecht. Overall, this era does feel a lot more gimmicky though and I think overall the lineup of b-sides isn't as strong as previously, but it's still very good. On Rock'n'Roll Übermensch, they put a full album length lineup of remixes of the track, which is the first and only time Die Ärzte have done something like this

Geräusch era

All of these come in a nice cardboard vinyl gatefold design (even the CDs look like vinyl records, they're black and have grooves and everything). Some strong b-sides, I particularly like Kontovollmacht and Aus dem Tagebuch eines Amokläufers, but you can tell they kind of ran out of material for the second half of these singles releases as they're mostly filled with live and unplugged versions. Some of these are quite obscure picks you don't get on the live albums so it's not awful, but still doesn't compare to getting full on new tracks on the b-side. On the last single Die klügsten Männer der Welt, the b-side is even just a 17 minute compilation of stage banter, which is something that has precedent as they put similar compilations with their previous 2 live albums (and to be fair this band is famous for their stage banter), but man, the reason I'm a fan of music because I enjoy listening to music and not because I'm into improv comedy. I think I only listened to that one once. In all fairness though, the album is already a double album though so understandable they don't have a lot left over for the b-sides.

Jazz ist anders era

The other era of particularly big commercial success. All these are in very nice robust digisleeves, most with triple gatefolds. I really like the consistent design here, I don't think it fits super well to the pizza box packaging of the album, but they look really good together and I really like the individual artworks. Some solid b-sides, like Das schönste Lied der Welt and Nichts gesehen, but most of the discs are filled out with Economy versions of tracks that aren't included on the Economy version of the album. Basically like low effort shitty joke versions of their own tracks. Some are good, some are bad. Himmelblau / Perfekt / Breit is a triple a-side single that was released way after the original run of the album in conjunction with the music video DVD Overkiller. Nothing really on here musically, but kind of a collector's piece.

auch era

These come in the same robust triple gatefold digisleeves, and they look absolutely lovely. I love these designs from that era and they all fit together incredibly well. Mostly really nice b-sides, especially the first single zeiDverschwÄndung makes for an excellent EP where I'd even consider the b-sides to be stronger than the a-side, especially Quadrophenia has become kind of a semi-obscure fan favourite. Ist das noch Punkrock? is a split EP with their own alter ego band Laternen-Joe, which is, to my knowledge, the first time any Laternen-Joe tracks were released physically. This was also the last release I was missing in this collection. Just the double a-side single Waldspaziergang mit Folgen / Sohn der Leere feels pointless, with the b-sides being just some low-effort filler fucking around in the studio improv comedy bullshit. I don't really know why this exists, even having picked these songs as singles and pairing them up together was a weird choice. I'll gladly take it for the artwork but man you can tell they really needed a break at that point