Silly Interwiev in der Jungen Garde Dresden

Silly, originally Familie Silly, is a German rock band founded in 1978 in East Berlin, which rose to prominence with singer Tamara Danz. Today, the band consists of long-time members Rüdiger "Ritchie" Barton (keyboards, vocals), Uwe Hassbecker (guitar, violin), Hans-Jürgen "Jäcki" Reznicek (bass), and—until December 2018—singer Anna Loos. Since 2019, the two well-known artists AnNa R. and Julia Neigel have taken over vocal duties. Reinhard Petereit (aka Herr Petereit), Daniel Hassbecker, and Ronny Dehn are regular guest musicians. Thomas Fritzsching (guitar, vocals) founded the band in 1978 in East Berlin. Together with Mathias Schramm (electric bass), he discovered Tamara Danz as a singer, recruited keyboardist Ulrich Mann from the Weimar University of Music, Mike Schafmeier (drums) from Cottbus, and Manfred Kusno (keyboard), who soon left to join the band Metropol. The band name Silly had already been chosen, but was rejected by the East German authorities because of its Anglicism; moreover, "silly" translates to "foolish" or "simple-minded." So the band called themselves Familie Silly (Family Silly) and promptly declared Silly—a cat—their mascot. The authorities eventually accepted that the band has been known simply as Silly since 1982. Their first gigs were in Romania and Norway. They were particularly successful in Romania. In 1981, they won the Grand Prix of Bratislavska Lyra, one of the most prestigious entertainment music awards in the Comecon countries. Silly was initially presented as a lighthearted, fun-loving band, comparable to the Neue Deutsche Welle (New German Wave) in West Germany. After the release of the album Tanzt keiner Boogie (Nobody Dances Boogie), there were some lineup changes: in 1982, Ritchie Barton, who had been living with Tamara Danz for two years, replaced founding members Manfred Kusno and Ulrich Mann on keyboards. Additionally, lyricist Werner Karma joined the band and significantly influenced its development. Karma wrote all the lyrics for the 1983 album Mont Klamott*. According to Michael Rauhut, the band combined "the musical bite of New Wave with sensual, vibrant, and profound imagery on a level that was unique, not only by GDR standards." Silly did indeed encounter censorship issues due to the lyrics, which affected its successor, *Zwischen unbefahrenen Gleisen (Between Unused Tracks), even more severely. It was banned and later released in a toned-down version as Liebeswalzer (Love Waltz) in 1984. Mont Klamott was voted Album of the Year in the GDR in 1983. The song "Mont Klamott" reached number 4 on the GDR's year-end charts that same year. A song for the people was written in 1983 for the "Rock for Peace" festival at the Palace of the Republic and performed together with Dieter Birr of the Puhdys. In the 1988 documentary "Whisper & Shout – A Rock Report," Danz said: "We made a lot of compromises at the very beginning, we learned from that, and since then we haven't made any more. [...] You can't make music with compromises." Silly's songs from that era are mostly very poetic and contain hidden allusions that—bypassing censorship—critically address the living conditions in East Germany. Singer Tamara Danz explained their approach to writing lyrics in the post-reunification period, describing how they deliberately included so-called "green elephants" in the songs—sections of lyrics so exaggerated and critical that they were guaranteed to attract censorship. Alongside these exaggerations, smaller, more subtle allusions, which the discerning audience certainly perceived, could then remain in the lyrics. Silly's songs from that time are mostly very poetic and contain hidden allusions that the attentive listener definitely picked up on. In 1984, drummer Mike Schafmeier also left the band and joined MTS; his replacement was Herbert Junck. In 1986, after the completion of the LP Bataillon d’Amour, bassist Mathias Schramm had to leave. Jäcki Reznicek (electric bass) from Pankow and Uwe Hassbecker (guitar, violin), who had previously played with Stern Meißen, joined the band. Hassbecker—initially a secret lover—became Tamara Danz's partner and later her husband. In August 1988, Werner Karma left the band due to internal disagreements. Only two of his lyrics appeared on the album Februar. The songs were now primarily written by Tamara Danz, Ritchie Barton, and Uwe Hassbecker, with lyrics by Tamara Danz and Gerhard Gundermann. The album Februar contains more critical and direct lyrics than its predecessors. Numerous tours followed, including tours in Germany, Denmark, Sweden, Austria, and the USA. February ......... Source: Wikipedia - https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silly_(...) #EastGermanmusic #GDRmusic #GDR #pop #popmusic #schlager #amiga #schlagerfans #schlagersongs #schlagermix #schlagerlove #GDRmusic #Germanmusic #EastGermanmusic #Silly