A heavy metal umlaut (aka '''röck döts''') is an Umlaut over a letter in the name of a Heavy Metal band. The use of umlauts and other Diacritic s with a Blackletter style Typeface is a form of Foreign Branding intended to give a band's logo a Teutonic quality. It is a form of marketing that invokes stereotypes of boldness and strength commonly attributed to peoples such as the Vikings ; author Reebee Garofalo has attributed its use to a desire for a "gothic horror" feel . The heavy metal umlaut is never referred to by the term '' Diaeresis '' in this usage, nor is it intended to affect the pronunciation of the band's name.
Heavy metal umlauts have been parodied in film and fiction. In the film '' This Is Spinal Tap '', David St. Hubbins ( Michael McKean ) opined, "It's like a pair of eyes. You're looking at the umlaut, and it's looking at you." In 2002 , ''Spin'' Magazine referred to the heavy metal umlaut as "the diacritical mark of the beast".
Umlauts and diaereses
The German word ''Umlaut'' roughly means ''changed sound'', as it is composed of ''um-'' (a prefix often used with verbs involving "change") and ''Laut'', here meaning "sound". Adding an umlaut indeed changes the pronunciation of a Vowel in standard (non-heavy metal) usage; the letters ''u'' and ''ü'' represent distinct sounds, as do ''o'' vs. ''ö'' and ''a'' vs. ''ä''.
Umlauts, or visually similar Graphemes , are used in several languages, such as Icelandic , German , Swedish , Finnish , Estonian , Hungarian , Azeri and Turkish . The sounds represented by the umlauted letters in these languages are typically '' Front Vowel s'' (front Rounded Vowels in the case of ''ü'' and ''ö''). Ironically, these sounds tend to be perceived as "weaker" or "lighter" than the vowels represented by un-umlauted ''u'', ''o'', and ''a'', thus failing to create the intended impression of strength and darkness.
The English word '' Diaeresis '' refers to a diacritic graphically similar to the umlaut; the name comes from a Greek word meaning "divide or distinguish". This diacritic is used in languages such as Greek , French , Spanish , Catalan , Dutch , Portuguese with varying purposes. Occasionally English employs a diaeresis to indicate that two Vowel s are to be pronounced separately, as in the name "Chloë" or the word "naïve".
History
The German 's progressive rock epic "Starship Trooper" is entitled "Würm" (on The Yes Album , released 1971). However, this again is probably not gratuitous, seemingly coming from the Würm Glaciation .
The first ''gratuitous'' use appears to have been either by (with the b-side Rat Salad ), for no forthcoming reason, renamed the single "Paranoïd" with an umlaut above the "i". {Link without Title}
On their second album '' ()—two short lines slanting up and to the right rather like a right double-quote mark—instead of dots (Hungarian uses neither the () nor the traditional German umlaut ("Ä") over the letter "A", though). This was before Lemmy Kilmister , later of Motörhead , had become a member of the group.
Motörhead and Mötley Crüe then followed. The umlaut in ''Motörhead'' was contributed by the graphic designer of the band's first album cover. In the words of Lemmy, Motörhead's front man: "I only put it in there to look mean." {Link without Title} (Interestingly, the standard German pronunciation of ''Motör'' is similar to the standard English pronunciation of "motor", the umlaut over the second "o" requiring, in German, the fronting of the vowel. The French equivalent, ''moteur'', is genuinely pronounced that way.)
For the Crüe (according to Vince Neil in the band's Behind The Music edition), the inspiration came from a Löwenbräu bottle. At one Mötley Crüe performance in Germany, the entire audience started chanting "Mertley Crew-e" - a pronunciation often used in Hungary as well.
used the umlaut in an unexpected place — above a consonant.]]
stated, "The umlaut over the 'y' has haunted us for years. We spent eleven years trying to explain how to pronounce it." {Link without Title}
Hawkwind -influenced 1980s Space Rock band Underground Zerø used a variation on the concept, using the Scandinavian vowel '' ø '' in their name. This may have been inspired by Computer System s of the time, many of which used the Slashed Zero as a glyph for the digit 0 to distinguish it from the letter O and thus resembled ''ø''. The Dutch band Bløf also uses ''ø'' in its name, even though the letter is not used in Dutch . Outside of rock, Electronic Music artist William Orbit as of recent has used the "Ø" in his surname.
The Spoof band Spın̈al Tap raised the stakes in 1984 by using an umlaut over the letter ''N'', a Consonant . This is a construction found only in the Jacaltec language of Guatemala and in some orthographies of Malagasy , although it is uncertain whether the writers of ''This Is Spın̈al Tap'' knew this at the time.
The gratuitous umlaut in other popular literature
The 1974 film '' Blazing Saddles '' included Madeline Kahn 's German-accented Marlene Dietrich -style Chanteuse character "Lili Von Shtupp" (according in the credits). She is announced on a poster outside the music hall as "Lili von Shtüpp"; the film's characters pronounce the name without any change to the vowel.
In the mid-1980s, cartoonist Berkeley Breathed parodied the heavy metal umlaut in the comic strip Bloom County with the fictional group Deathtöngue , fronted by the depraved and unwholesome singer/'lead tongue' "Wild" Bill Catt and infamous for the songs "Let's Run Over Lionel Richie With a Tank", " Clearasil Messiah " and "U Stink But I Love U". Breathed eventually had Deathtöngue change their name to the umlaut-free Billy And The Boingers following pressure from congressional hearings on "porn rock" led by one "Tippy Gorp", an obvious reference to heavy metal Bête Noire , Tipper Gore and the PMRC . The Bloom County book "Billy and the Boingers Bootleg" included an acetate single with two songs from "the band", "I'm a Boinger" and "U Stink But I Love U".
In 1988 , Jim Henson and General Foods released a Breakfast Cereal , Cröonchy Stars , based on the popular Swedish Chef Muppet . In addition to the gratuitous umlaut in ''Cröonchy'', most of the cereal's labelling and promotional material used the idiosyncratic spelling ''Swed̈ish Chef''. {Link without Title} As with ''Spin̈al Tap'', this marks one of the rare instances of an umlaut being used over a consonant.
The novel '' Zodiac '' (1988) by Neal Stephenson features a fictional metal band called Pöyzen Böyzen, which one character describes as "not bad for a two-umlaut band".
In 1997 , Parody newspaper '' The Onion '' published an article called "Ünited Stätes Toughens Image With Umlauts", about a Congressional attempt to add umlauts to the name of the United States Of America to make it seem "bad-assed and scary in a quasi-heavy metal manner".
Journalist and Author Steve Almond coined the term " Spandex and umlaut circuit" in 2002 to describe the heavy metal touring scene.
Rock critic Chuck Klosterman subtitled his 2001 book ''Fargo Rock City'' with ''A Heavy Metal Odyssey in Rural Nörth Daköta''.
Webcomic artist Scott Kurtz drew a series of cartoons about a fake band called ''Djörk'' in his PvP Online webcomic. Apart from possibly satirizing the heavy metal umlaut, this name also refers to the Icelandic singer/songwriter Björk Guðmundsdóttir, whose umlaut is genuine.
Other usages of diacritics in band or album naming
Umlaut
- Frank Zappa used an umlaut in the title of the album '' Läther '' (the sound represented by 'ä' is equal to the 'ea' of "Leather," and the album cover features a cow)
- Motörhead's 1992 album, March Ör Die
- The novelty rock band Green Jellÿ kept the umlaut after changing their name from "Green Jellö" This was after the manufacturers of Jello threatened to sue over the use of their trademarked name; the band maintained that the "ÿ" was pronounced like a long "o", therefore the written name of the band changed, but the pronounced name did not
- The Scottish NWOBHM band Holocaust spelled their name Hölöcäust on their first 7" , "Heavy Metal Mania".
- The Canadian Thrash Metal band Infernäl Mäjesty .
- The Australian Thrash / Black Metal band Deströyer 666 .
- The French Black Metal band Mütiilation . Technically this umlaut is superfluous - this "u" is already pronounced as the German "ü".
- The Florida Grindcore band Assück .
- The Czech death metal band Hypnös formerly known as Hypnos
- The Danish heavy metal band Handlebar Möustache .
- The Melbourne based avant-metal-jam-band Cünt Brigade .
- The hardcore/ska-punk band Leftöver Crack .
- Dürty Nelly's Pub , a rock bar in Charlottesville, Virginia .
- Peoria, Illinois band Mudvayne listed their members on one release as Chüd, Güüg, R-üD and Spüg.
- Minneapolis crust/hardcore punk band Stāte of Feär
- The Spanish Band Mägo De Oz .
- The term "nü-metal", used to describe Nu Metal with added umlautness.
- Gay heavy metal band/cabaret act Pink Stëël have two ''consecutive'' gratuitous umlauts, the first such instance in a band name.
- The library/scifi metal band Blöödhag also have consecutive gratuitous umlauts.
- Seattle Spaz-core band BLOÜD WÜLF.
- The Devin Townsend punk parody project Punky Brüster .
- The Canadian thrash band Voïvod 's second album from 1986 was titled ''RRRÖÖÖAAARRR''. This album title actually has three consecutive gratuitous umlauts. The band's name has an umlaut over the I, but this may be acting as a diæresis. Their fourth album was entitled Dimension Hatröss , placing another umlaut in the title.
- The Finnish hardcore punk band Ümlaut (this use is almost a Self-reference ).
- The art metal band (also referred to as death metal) Ümlaut parodies the form while producing a serious CD & DVD set (Ümlaut: ültimate über death metal)[http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/umlaut with spoken word by the poet-vampyre Jiri Cech[http://home.earthlink.net/~jiricech].
- Zee , a short-lived band formed by Pink Floyd keyboard player Richard Wright and Dave Harris , made excessive use of gratuitous umlauts on their 1984 album '' Identity '' which included song titles such as "Cönfüsiön" and "Höw Dö Yöü Dö It".
- The Kibology inspired, Usenet -based quasi-band Interröbang Cartel , containing, in addition to its heavy metal umlaut, another exotic typographical reference, to the Interrobang character.
- The Spanish EBM duo Culture Kultür .
- The album "Paradÿsso", recorded by Spanish rock band Sôber , who added a gratuitous circumflex after changing their name from Sober Stoned.
- Chuck Dukowski of Black Flag was previously in Würm
- Heavy Metal spoofers Insidiöus Törment revitalize the umlaut by placing it at strategically hard to pronounce vowels.
- Experimental group Grotus spell their name with an umlaut over each consonant, leaving the vowels unembellished.
- The dance music record label Nocturnal Groove has an umlaut on the n.
- Hungarian ''black n' roll'' band Korog has a gratuitous umlaut over the letter ''r'' in their name, which actually means "it rumbles" and is a verb that is used exclusively to describe the sound of a hungry person's stomach.
- Italian metal band Labyrinth used to call themselves Labÿrinth until 2003.
- Minneapolis punk pioneers of the 1980s, Hüsker Dü , whose name comes from a Danish board game (the Original Game does not have umlauts). The name of the board game comes from the Danish interrogative clause "Husker du?" (without Umlaut), which means "Do you remember?" ('you' = first person singular, not plural).
- English Ceilidh band Stömp has an umlaut on the o. According to the band's website [http://www.stompceilidh.co.uk/html/the_umlaut.html this is to avoid confusion with the Stomp dance troupe [http://www.stomponline.com/home.html].
- The Spanish pop band Nosoträsh .
- Demoscene group Ümlaüt Design has two self-referential gratuitous umlauts. The group also prefers the alternate pronounciation.
- Seattle "splatter rock" band The Accüsed
- The spine of the DVD A Long Days Night reads Blue Oÿster Cult.
Other characters
- The German punk band Die Ärzte used three dots over the "A" in ''Ärzte'' to distinguish from its normal spelling with "Ä" (double dot) umlaut. This can be represented in Unicode: . The three dots may stand for the three band members.
- A three-dot umlaut has also been seen in artwork for King Creosote , over the i, as ''Ki⃛ng Cresote''.
- The American thrash band Lååz Rockit actually used the letter " å " gratuitously in their logo, but the umlaut ("Lääz Rockit") in some press releases.
- The French band Magma used a Fictional Language , the Kobaïan, for its lyrics. The umlaut appeared in several album titles, such as ''Mekanïk Destruktïw Kommandöh'' and ''Köhntarkösz''. However, this umlaut does affect pronunciation, and thus cannot be considered gratuitous. Kobaian also uses a three-dot diacritic over some letters in song titles, and an original letter that seems to be a cursive Ligature of "ie", which never appears without an umlaut.
- The English Indie Rock band Maxïmo Park also uses a double dotted "i" in its name.
- The Accent s and Cedilla in the name of the French electronica band Rinôçérôse are also gratuitous, exept the "é".
- William Ørbit .
- The dark folk / experimental / occult band Death In June used umlauts (and in the second case, even accented e's) in the original releases of their albums ''The Wörld Thät Sümmer'' (1985) and ''Thé Wäll Öf Säcrificé'' (1989) - and, on these releases, also in the band name, leading to ''Deäth In Jüne'' and ''Déäth In Jüné'', respectively.
- the Japanese rock group BOØWY .
- The Canadian rock band ÄlExBénnétt , with the umlaut over the A, and the Two E's. Strangely, they have no affect on the pronunciation of the name.
- Perl developer (Terry) Brian Ingerson legally changed his name to Ingy döt Net, to match his domain name. {Link without Title}
Non-gratuitous umlauts
- The US Punk / Alternative Rock band Hüsker Dü took their name from a Children's Memory Game , which added Macron s over each u in the phrase, replacing these macrons with umlauts. Without the umlauts, "husker du" is a Danish and Norwegian phrase meaning "Do you remember".
- The name of the Toronto, Ontario area folk-pop/geek-rock band Moxy Früvous is pronounced with long-u, "Fruuvous", so this is perhaps not gratuitous.
- The Florida Goth / Darkwave band The Crüxshadows , is also pronounced with long-u, "Cruu-shadows", so this is also perhaps not gratuitous.
- The Heavy Metal band Trojan used umlauts in their name on the 1985 release ''Chasing the Storm''. For Swedes the tour T-shirts from this time are particularly amusing, as "Tröjan" in Swedish translates as "the shirt".
- The Rhode Island "futurock" band Grüvis Malt have an umlaut in their name, but it may not be gratuitous, since it clarifies the pronunciation as "oo" rather than "uh".
- The San Francisco band Children Of Umlaut do not in fact have an umlaut in their name.
- The Icelandic artist Björk Guðmundsdóttir is using her birth name.
- The Ä in the Finnish heavily Manowar -influenced heavy metal band Teräsbetoni ''(reinforced concrete)'' is not gratuitous; while ''teräs'' means Steel in Finnish, ''teras'' is not even a word.
- The Japanese Rock band Lä-ppisch derives its name from the German colloquialism ''läppisch'', meaning "negligible".
- The Danish Spoof Band Insidiöus Törment feature 2 umlauts in their name, though whether they are gratuitous or not is up for debate. The first functions as the umlaut in Motörhead, arguably indicating the use of the Schwa (Ə) in pronunciation (in both names), whereas the second -— contrary to common practice —- influences the pronunciation of "torment" so that it becomes "tørment"—using the Danish , Norwegian or Faroese vowel of ø .
- The Haïti Twoubadou current in Haitian Music represents another legitimate use of umlauts in a musical title, because it indicates separate pronunciation of two adjacent vowels. (In Haitian Creole , ''Haïti'' is pronounced ah-ee-tee or ah-ee-tsee, with the former also being the standard French pronunciation.)
- Norwegian electronica duo Röyksopp spell their name with a Swedish-influenced ö rather than the proper Norwegian ø ; however, the umlaut is not gratuitous, as 'røyksopp' is Norwegian for 'smoke mushroom'.
- Another German band, Einstürzende Neubauten ''(collapsing new buildings)'', features an umlaut where, in German, there ought to be one.
- Two of the eight correct spellings of the Discordian project Die Epheser include wrong umlauts.
- The correctly umlauted name of the German folk band Bläck Fööss means ''bare feet'' in Kölsch , a German dialect.
- Belgian experimental electronics act Köhn from the Belgian Post-rock band De Portables uses the umlaut excessively in his song titles. All the words are (West-)Flemish wordgames and are made up. Their purpose is to mock the seriousness and intellectualism that is attached to "difficult" electronic music, e.g., Möhik Bin pronounced in West-Flemish dialect means "Can I come in". A selection: Zwöhn, Köhning, Kröhn, öhnöch, Köh-köh-köh-kök, Dröhn, Söng, Döhre, Mendelköhn, Niplöhn, Dedzu!, Plöhs, Nigewöhne, Vlaamse Röhs, Öhresong, Könöhn, Zwähftähf, Klöhrgöhr, Föhnen, Mendelssöhn, Köhnepijp, Köhtels, Nöhk, Köhnepoht, Köhnetand, Böhnhahs, Köhnflict, Swöhr L, Kallkühn, Akkönnkönk, Püberiosum and Möhik Bin?
See also
Sources
Notes
#Note|Garofalo}} Garofalo, pg. 292 ''Some groups, for example Blue Öyster Cult and Motörhead, added gratuitous umlauts to their names to conjure up a more generic gothic horror, a practice that continued into the 1980s with Mötley Crüe and others.''
External links and references
|
