房倒屋塌

Einstürzende Neubauten (German: [ˈaɪnˌʃtʏʁtsn̩də ˈnɔʏˌbaʊtn̩], lit. 'Collapsing New Buildings') is a German experimental music group, formed in West Berlin in 1980. The band currently comprises founding members Blixa Bargeld (lead vocals, guitar, keyboard) and N.U. Unruh (custom-made instruments, percussion, vocals), plus Jochen Arbeit (guitar, vocals), and Rudolph Moser (custom-built instruments, percussion, vocals), who both joined the line-up in 1997. In 2026, Josefine Lukschy joined the band as the bass player.

One of their trademarks is the use of custom-built instruments, predominantly made out of scrap metal and building tools, and noises, in addition to standard musical instruments. Their early albums were unremittingly harsh, with Bargeld's vocals shouted and screamed above a din of banging and scraping metal percussion. Subsequent recordings found the group's sound growing somewhat more conventional, yet still containing many unorthodox elements.

History

1980s

On 1 April 1980, Einstürzende Neubauten made their first appearance, at the Moon Club in West Berlin. This first lineup featured Beate Bartel and Gudrun Gut, Blixa Bargeld, and N.U. Unruh. The two female members, Bartel and Gut - who had also been members of the underground band Mania D - left Einstürzende Neubauten after a short period, founding Liaisons Dangereuses and Malaria! respectively.

In 1981, 15 year old sound technician and multi-instrumentalist Alexander Hacke (alias Alexander von Borsig) and percussionist F.M. Einheit (from the Hamburg band Abwärts) joined Einstürzende Neubauten, and they released their first LP, Kollaps ("Collapse"), a mixture of rough punk tunes and industrial noises. The industrial noises were obtained from self-made music machines, electronics, and found objects such as metal plates. The live performances with Einheit in the 1980s included much metal banging and destruction on stage.

During their first German tour, Mark Chung (previously the bass player with Abwärts) joined the group of musicians. This lineup lasted nearly 15 years.

In 1983, Einstürzende Neubauten recorded their second album, Zeichnungen des Patienten O. T. ("Drawings of Patient O.T."). The title came from a 1974 book by Leo Navratil, describing the drawings of Oswald Tschirtner. The band also appeared as guest performers on Fad Gadget's "Collapsing New People" 7" single's B-side track Spoil The Child, recorded at Hansa Tonstudio, Berlin in November 1983.

Also in 1983, Bargeld joined The Birthday Party (featuring Nick Cave and Mick Harvey) in the studio, appearing as a guitarist on their track "Mutiny in Heaven". That group soon disbanded, but Bargeld became a longtime member of one of the bands that sprang from it, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds (again featuring Cave and Harvey). Bargeld remained a full-time member of both Einstürzende Neubauten and Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds until 2003, when he quit the Bad Seeds in order to focus on Einstürzende Neubauten.

In 1984, Einstürzende Neubauten, with guests including Genesis P-Orridge, Stevo Pearce, Frank Tovey and others, played a show titled The Concerto for Voices and Machinery at the ICA in London. After 20 minutes the venue halted the show when the band began to dig through the venue's stage with drills and jackhammers. 1984 also saw the first release of a best-of and rarities compilation, Strategies Against Architecture '80–'83.

The band's next album, Halber Mensch ("Half Man") in 1985, may be seen as a developmental breakthrough. Musical structure became more evident, and Bargeld's lyrics and, especially, his singing changed. He moved from shouted words and phrases toward organized, poetic melodies.

The band played a show in Vancouver, Canada, to kick off its third North American tour. The performance was sponsored by the German Goethe Institute as part of the German contribution to Expo 86. Also scheduled to appear were Test Dept and Skinny Puppy, though not everyone was able to play.

On the tour, the group's experimental and improvised live performance style occasionally caused difficulties with venue management and law enforcement. A performance at The Palladium in Manhattan ended after an improvised pyrotechnics display. The band ignited lighter fluid in a couple of metal pans, and management stopped the performance and cleared the venue.

The one-hour film Halber Mensch (1986) by Sōgo Ishii documents Einstürzende Neubauten's visit to Japan in 1985. The next two albums, Fünf auf der nach oben offenen Richterskala ("Five on the open-ended Richterscale") in 1987 and Haus der Lüge ("House of the Lie") in 1989, were great successes in the United States and Japan.

1990s

In 1990, the band tried something completely new, recording the soundtrack for East German playwright Heiner Müller's play Die Hamletmaschine ("The Hamlet Machine") for East German radio Rundfunk der DDR. The band image of Einstürzende Neubauten changed: Blixa Bargeld, formerly wearing punk/industrial style clothes, appeared at the live concerts in a suit.