From Reise, Reise · 2004 · Track 8
Morgenstern
«Morning star»
More from the album · Reise, Reise
In context
A woman so ugly that the light itself is frightened, and someone who prays to a star not to make her beautiful but to be able to see her.
- Ugliness
- Love
- Voice of the world
- Origin
- From “Reise, Reise” (2004).
- The German key
- In the chorus he asks for warm light to fall on her “Ungesicht” — her “un-face”, an extremely rare word that the Grimms' dictionary records in old texts. German lets you build that negative by attaching “un-” to the noun.
- What the band has said
- The band has not commented on the song.
- Live
- It was in the setlist between 2004 and July 2005.
Our reading
What turns it around is the second voice. Between the verses a chorus slips in repeating “hässlich, du bist hässlich” — ugly, you are ugly: the voice of the world, the one that sent her into hiding. Then a different narrator appears, the one who loves her, and he changes the request: he doesn't ask the star to make her beautiful, he asks it to shine on her so that he can see her. He ends up taking on the job himself, with his own light if need be.
The archive's interpretation, not an official account.
Original (German)
Morgenstern, ach scheine Auf das Antlitz mein
Translation
Morning star, oh shine upon this face of mine
Verse cited for the purpose of analysis.
An ugliness that frightens the light
The song opens with a literal cruelty: she is so ugly it is dreadful; when she looks at the sky, the light itself takes fright. So she hides by day, to avoid startling the brightness, living in shadow until the glow fades.
At nightfall she sees a star blazing in the twilight and begs it to paint beauty onto her cheeks. In the chorus she asks for a warm light to fall on her Ungesicht — her “un-face”, a rare, almost forgotten word — and, above all, to be told that she is not alone.
The other singer
What turns the song around is the second voice. Between the verses a chorus creeps in repeating “hässlich, du bist hässlich” — ugly, you are ugly: the voice of the world, the one that sent her into hiding.
Then a different narrator appears, the one who loves her. He too goes out at night and prays to the star, but he changes the request: he does not ask for her to be made beautiful, he asks it to shine on his beloved, so he can see her. He ends up taking the job on himself, with his own light if necessary.
The Morgenstern is Venus, the star visible at dawn. In German the word also carries that star’s other name: Lucifer, the light-bearer. The song uses both and explains neither.
Context
Eighth track on Reise, Reise (27 September 2004). It was played live 71 times between October 2004 and July 2005 and has not returned to the setlist since; a live version appears on Völkerball, recorded at the Festival de Nîmes.
Translation and notes by Rammstein Colombia, for the purpose of analysis. The full original lyrics belong to their authors.