7. Killing Capitalism With Christmas (feat. Gerald Votava and GameJew)
Lyrics: Frank Apunkt Schneider
Music: Richard Wientzek
Gerald Votava, Roland Gratzer, Evelyn Fürlinger: voc
Jonathan Mann: all Instruments
Prod & Arr: Jonathan Man at Jonathan Mann Studios (www.mannmade.tv) and Gerald Votava at Studio Deluxe Wien, 2008


It’s Christmas. Can you hear the beautiful contradictions in the air? Love it while you hate it. Hate it while you love it. At this time of the year we’d like to ask: Why can those elusive moments of joy and peace not be absolute. The answer is the same as ever: it’s the system. There is no right life in the wrong one. But, hey, it’s Christmas and all that social and emotional stuff it drags along: Meeting old friends, wearing your best shoes, smoking some dope, singing some songs, smelling some old smells, getting close to it (whatever it is). It’s all so very nice. The context of total delusion is coming over for turkey and presents you with the great new Jonathan Richman album. Thanks a lot, have a seat, would you like to have some gingerbread eggnog latte frappuccino? The context of total delusion smiles, takes a deep drag from the new hash-pipe and for a while he forgets about his day-job fooling people.
We wanted to have our own Christmas song focussing on what Christmas means to us: it is something great and campy and gay and big and stuffed and fragrant and crowded and delicious but still untrue. But we know what we’ve got to do to make this Christmas come true. Check the great chorus for what that might be.
This is a reinterpretation of an old classic by pre-monochrom section Bamberg artgroup Die Winkelwurst which had The Ernst Neger Revival Band (from Chicago) for a musical subdivision. It was first released in 1999 on „Weihnachtshit-Sampler“, a compilation of DIY Christmas songs.
And, yes, it was inspired by the title of the great but reactionary sampler “Killing Capitalism With Kindness” by New Zealand-cult-label Xpressway. Its title of course triggers that old bourgeois belief that it will be a special form of (social) media which is going to “heal-the-world-make-it-a-better-place”. Be nice, be niche, be needed by a handful of people. But anyway it’s a great reference to what Christmas is like. This is our personal way of kissing King Rocko Schamoni’s feet and of smashing Harald Schmidt’s face. US Americans won’t know either of the two, but maybe they can cry about Vietnam a little!


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