Ende Neu

SOME BIZZAREとの決別、新たな活動拠点をMUTEに移しリリースされた1996年リリース7TH。
邦題では『終焉、新』と題される本作は、アレクサンダー・ハッケの当時の妻メレート・ベッカーとブリクサ・バーゲルトとのデュエット・ヒット"STELLA MARIS"を収録。

The Wire - "...The surviving trio of Berliners turned inwards for [this] reflective album....opening with a fine barricade commentary and closes with the Kafka-inspired dronework....dreamy surrealism....containing the essential 'NNNAAAMMM'..." Q - 3 Stars - Good - "...ENDE NEU hits an altogether more reflective, ambient and plangent groove....their studiedly arthouse manner is offset by a streak of humour and a taste for oddly compelling melodies....Neubauten refine the profile of industrial music with a human face." Melody Maker - "You should try them with a pinch salt....as long as you overlook the sleevenotes detailing the meaning and methodologies of the tracks, ENDE NEU is, for the most part, a fantastic album, an album that for all its fixation on procedure, still manages to thrill, to make the heart race..." Q (10/96, p.163) - 3 Stars - Good - "...ENDE NEU hits an altogether more reflective, ambient and plangent groove....their studiedly arthouse manner is offset by a streak of humour and a taste for oddly compelling melodies....Neubauten refine the profile of industrial music with a human face." The Wire (4/00, p.44) - "...The surviving trio of Berliners turned inwards for [this] reflective album....opening with a fine barricade commentary and closes with the Kafka-inspired dronework....dreamy surrealism....containing the essential 'NNNAAAMMM'..." Melody Maker (9/14/96, p.51) - "You should try them with a pinch salt....as long as you overlook the sleevenotes detailing the meaning and methodologies of the tracks, ENDE NEU is, for the most part, a fantastic album, an album that for all its fixation on procedure, still manages to thrill, to make the heart race..."

By the close of the 1980s, industrial music heavyweights Einsturzende Neubauten had effectively demolished the boundaries separating rock music and auto-destructive art. While the band's power machinery-wielding approach could at times wrest scrap-metal symphonies of sublime beauty, more often the results played like a bleak, uber-realist commentary on the decline of modern civilization. But a dramatically different, creatively refreshed version of the band appeared on EN's 1996 effort, ENDE NEU. With a title that playfully references the band's name while translating from the German to "ending new", the album closes the chapter on EN's early, destructive phase, and hones their avant-garde tendencies to complement comparatively conventional songwriting. Perhaps a residual effect of his tenure with brooding Australian rockers Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds, EN front man Blixa Bargeld's vocals are in surprisingly cabaret-like form on the Brechtian "The Garden" and the exquisite strings-accompanied duet with actress Meret Becker, "Stella Maris".|