Blixa Bargeld: Mein Leben (2008)


Blixa Bargeld – Mein Leben
A documentary by Birgit Herdlitschke
Portrait for ZDF/arte series “Mein Leben/ Ma vie” (my life)

Synopsis, links, videos follow….

Synopsis: Blixa Bargeld
Portrait for ZDF/arte series “Mein Leben/ Ma vie”

Being at an Einstürzende Neubauten concert always felt like being on a construction site. Machine parts and tools like chainsaws and jackhammers were their instruments, the drum set was substituted by metal tubes and scrap iron.

In the center the front singer of this busting sound event – one of the most dazzling personalities in the history of German music: Blixa Bargeld. Nobody else embodied the 1980ies West Berlin punk attitude more than him. Nobody was so over the edge, so demonic and at the same time so inventive. Blixa Bargeld is mainly known for being the mind and front singer of Einstürzende Neubauten, although he is a multi-talent and has never restricted himself to being only musician.

Since the beginning of the 1980s Bargeld has worked in all kinds of performing arts. He did radio plays and movies, theatre productions, concerts, performances and installations. No matter which field he works in, it is always experimental.

He characterizes himself as: „I am everything possible and anything in between.“ Blixa Bargeld is a fictional character. Even though he has changed his style from his torn black rubber and leather outfits and wild hairstyles with shaven parts to in the 80s into dark, tailor-made suits and a symmetric hairstyle, he hasn’t lost his unwillingness to compromise.

As a true artist he is hard to take: He is despotic, impatient, explosive and dogmatic. Being asked why he keeps up the image of being arrogant, he bursts out: “I’m entitled to be arrogant!” On the other hand he is a friendly and hospitable school dropout, who nevertheless is surprisingly sophisticated.

We retrace the most important stations of the last three centuries of his artistic career and accompany Blixa to the places of his current creative work. His residences are spread over three continents – San Francisco, Peking and Berlin – but the base for his worldwide operations is and has always been his hometown Berlin.

We meet his band members Alexander Hacke and Andrew Unruh and watch the despotic Blixa during a rehearsal in the studio. We find ourselves in a noble and well-furnished house in San Francisco. While the rain drums against the glass panes, we see Blixa sitting on a white couch reading. The film allows its viewers to take a look behind the noisy and flashy facade of the character Blixa.

„Blixa Bargeld – My Life“ is an amazing earnest and open-minded portrait of Blixa Bargeld. He has not lost anything of his radical nature except for being more approachable. We are astonished about the determined and devastated young Blixa. And although he has become gentler, friendlier and almost adjusted he has remained true to his radical principles. He definitely hasn’t mellowed by age.  (Source + Postcard)

Thank you, Nevaree, for the English subtitles.




Info on the original German version can be found here.

2 comments

  1. Great post! And a big tip of my hat to you @nevaree, for accomplishing this major task of subtitling the whole thing. Well done! *bow*
    I love that documentary. We recorded it when it aired on arte in 2008, and it’s a favorite of mine. 😀

  2. I watched this some days ago (many thanks to Nevaree for the translation!), it was really interesting and entertaining to watch. Three things stuck in my head: first Blixa’s mother talking about Blixa’s clothes as a child, she sounded a bit like me talking about my youngest, so determined to chose the things he like and not let anyone else decide. Second, Blixa talking about the “hill” were he as a child used to play but which really is very flat. It reminded me of the town where used to live before (and nowadays work in). It’s really really flat, it’s almost silly. The one part of the town where there is som kind of difference in altitude is called “The hills” even though it’s not a very big hill, it’s just the only one there is. Third, I couldn’t help but notice Blixa talking about Hörby (when he looked on his notes there was something he had written in Hörby). It was unexpected and a bit funny since it’s a really small place not so far from where I live. Of course I thought a lot of other things too, but it was these three, small things that really stuck.

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