Xmal Deutschland had an extraordinary impact on British audiences in the early Eighties, having cast a spell through staccato rhythms, unmediated channels, and mysterious (to most at the time) language, further carried by the unique vision and strength of the women involved. Commemorating their ‘4AD years’ (1983-1984) forty years on, the mysteriously enchanting group returns now with a brand-new release entitled Gift: The 4AD Years, out 9 May.
The limited-edition 3xLP boxset contains 2025 Abbey Road remasters of their two albums released with the label (the feverish Fetsich and titanic Tocsin), as well as tracks off other related releases and EPs including Incubus Succubus II and Qual, creating a package pulsating with power and poise. Gift’s striking cover artwork — featuring photography by Peter Schulte — was designed by Timothy O’Donnell, based on original art by 23 Envelope. It accompanies original sleeve photography by Nigel Grierson. Rounding out the package is an additional photo booklet containing images by Kevin Cummins, Paul Slattery, Sheila Rock, and more, as well as text by Chris Roberts.
Xmal Deutschland’s Gift: The 4AD Years will be available on 9 May digitally, and on 2xCD and 3LP.
Xmal Deutschland – Gift: The 4AD Years
4AD0730
9 May 2025
Formats: 3xLP, 2xCD, and Digital
Fetisch
A1. Qual
A2. Geheimnis
A3. Young Man
A4. In Der Nacht
A5. Orient
B1. Hand In Hand
B2. Kaempfen
B3. Danthem
B4. Boomerang
B5. Stummes Kind
Tocsin
C1. Mondlicht
C2. Eiland
C3. Reigen
C4. Tag für Tag
D1. Augen-blick
D2. Begrab Mein Herz
D3. Nachtschatten
D4. Xmas in Australia
D5. Derwisch
Incubus Succubus II
E1. Incubus Succubus II
E2. Vito
Qual
F1. Qual – 12” Remix
F2. Zeit
F3. Sehnsucht
ABOUT XMAL DEUTSCHLAND
The extraordinary impact Xmal Deutschland had upon British audiences in the early Eighties is difficult to convey forty years on. A spell was cast by the staccato rhythms, unmediated channels and mysterious (to us) language of their music, and by the vision and strength of the women involved. Their breakthrough support slot with Cocteau Twins and first two albums with 4AD dazzled and dug deep, speaking in tones and temperatures unlike any band before or since. “And at some point, it seemed to people we just… disappeared,” muses singer Anja Huwe. “So this myth of Xmal Deutschland just got bigger and bigger over the years…” Gift reminds us of a past which sounds like an alternative present, wrapping — in distinctive style — Fetisch, Tocsin, and related EP tracks in a package pulsating with power and poise.
Like most bands commonly labelled ‘goth’ or ‘gothic’, the visually striking, black-clad and dynamic-haired Xmal preferred ‘post-punk’. They genuinely were, having been inspired, in terms of attitude as much as sound, by witnessing developments in London from their home base of Hamburg. And, as part of the Neue Deutsche Welle, playing live with bands like DAF and Palais Schaumburg, and as friends with Einstürzende Neubauten, radicalism and self-reinvention were in their ice-cool bloodstream. They took their name from an early Sixties socio-political treatise by communist author Rudolf Leonhard.
“When we started, the punks said it was not punk and the avant-garde people said it’s not avant-garde. So nobody could really say what it was,” Huwe told me back then. “It was… Xmal Deutschland, you know? This really strange band from Hamburg. It comes from our bodies, our souls, and yes, our hearts. Of course we take ourselves very seriously.”
“You’re influenced by your environment, of course,” said Fiona Sangster, “but then again, we’re not typically German at all.” “It’s wrong to falsify,” added Manuela Rickers. “You must do what you feel.”
The formative line-up of Huwe (then on bass), Rickers (guitar), Scottish-born Sangster (keyboards), Caro May (drums), and Rita Simonsen (vocals) soon underwent a vital tweak when Huwe was pushed up to the microphone by the others for learning-curve shows and singles on Hamburg label ZickZack. Wolfgang Ellerbrock came in on bass, laughing at being described as “the token male”; and Manuela Zwingmann arrived on drums. It was this quintet which recorded Fetisch, and the singles Qual and Incubus Succubus 2. The UK indie charts lapped up the Germans’ gung ho guile.
“Funnily, in London, it seemed the stages were so big that I couldn’t see the people, and so I felt I could just do what I wanted,” recalls Huwe, a star onstage. “It had been much more difficult in small clubs. You get into this whole performing thing – or, I don’t know, maybe I was just born for it, ha!”
Co-produced by Ivo Watts-Russell, who’d been impressed by an “incredibly raw” demo tape, Fetisch was released in April 1983 and moved in comparable chilly, wilfully murky waters as peers like The Banshees, Bauhaus, The Birthday Party, and Joy Division. Yet its sheer single-minded focus, the chants and commands of Huwe, and the razor-cut riffs of Rickers, gave it a blinding clarity, an impossible-to-ignore charisma. Tracks like ‘Boomerang’ and ‘Orient’ still whisk the listener away to a diamond-sharp dimension. “The music is quite beautiful, but the lyrics are absolutely black,” Huwe said at the time.
Before the release of June 1984 follow-up Tocsin, Zwingmann had left, replaced by Peter Bellendir. Qual and Incubus Succubus II’ (a reworking of a pre-4AD track) kept fans flying, the elusive elixir of Xmal meaning they were supported from corners as contrasting as Peel and The Batcave. Tocsin was produced by Mick Glossop, who’d worked with Magazine, PIL, and Penetration, and found spaces and graces which flawlessly fused the art and the aggression, the enigmatic and the expressive. It was more inviting, but no less intriguing once you were through the door. Statements such as the majesty of ‘Mondlicht’, or the twists of ‘Tag für Tag’, are a dazzle of fascination. The whole album soars and kicks, a ravishing Pegasus.
“At first, being these ‘girls’, nobody took us seriously,” remembers Huwe. “But it’s surprising now how many claim we inspired them, either to form a band, or just to be creative. I like that. The power we had, as friends, and the communication: we were strong. And intellectually, we had certain ideas we wanted to bring across…it worked, for a long time.”
Fans will eternally debate whether Tocsin or Fetisch is Xmal’s intoxicating zenith, although after parting ways with 4AD they made two more albums, Viva and Devils. Then, after a brief 35-year hiatus, Huwe recently returned with the triumphant solo record Codes. This three-disc release, however, captures – or rather sets free again – that early essence of Xmal, as, after being offered an opening in a foreign place, they strode through, fearlessly, forging their own never-replicated identity.
Gift, which will fascinate newcomers just as it feeds the faithful, is brimming with presence. And if the word ‘gift’ in German slyly relates to a kind of poison, nobody said this music was all sweetness and light. Even if its radiance resonates, four decades later. Xmal Deutschland’s 4AD years were a bold and bewitching boomerang. The magic’s back.
PRAISE FOR XMAL DEUTSCHLAND
“‘Qual’ from 1983’s Fetisch, shows the band at its most confident, working a dance-punk hostility that brings to mind a more frantic, agitated version of the Liliput or Rubella Ballet.” – Rolling Stone, The 50 Best Goth Songs
“Not exactly art punks nor new wavers, the band played a moody and rhythmic style that would make them pioneers of a then-unnamed genre: goth” – The Guardian
“Xmal Deutschland embodies the doom of goth. Singer Anja Huwe has a deep voice and prefers to wail like the end of the world is upon us. Heavy bass, tribal drums and racing guitars all heighten the tension in this album.” – LA Weekly on Tocsin
“Effortless and imposing, the members of Xmal Deutschland produced a raw avalanche of sound […] This loose approach to music making, along with bold clouds of teased hair, self-made clothes, and thick eyeliner, gave the group an instant edge.” – Bandcamp Daily
“Xmal Deutschland embraced punk’s bold break from traditional norms, finding solace in its anti-establishment ethos—a stark contrast to the rigid conventions of the past.” – Post-Punk
XMAL DEUTSCHLAND ONLINE
