From Sehnsucht · 1997 · Track 3
Tier
«Animal»
More from the album · Sehnsucht
In context
It is about child sexual abuse, and it is one of the very few songs in the catalogue whose meaning Till Lindemann explained directly and without hedging. The title is the conclusion of the argument: whoever crosses the line between impulse and reason ends up on the side of the animal.
- Abuse
- Instinct and reason
- Denunciation
- Origin
- It was roughly the sixth song the band wrote and has existed in some form since 1994, with the working title “Sadist”. It was considered for “Herzeleid” and dropped —Jacob Hellner thought the chorus was weak— and for “Sehnsucht” it was rebuilt with a completely new instrumental, taken from a different song idea. The closing riff is almost identical to that of Die Krupps' “The Dawning Of Doom”, which is why Jürgen Engler is credited as co-writer: an unusual case in a catalogue where the credit is usually just “Rammstein”.
- What the band has said
- In two interviews in 1997. In “Zillo” he argued that animals mate with one another without there being incest, because that is nature, but that human beings think consciously, and that when a father becomes aroused looking at the daughter he himself fathered, it stops being natural and becomes an illness. In “Bravo” he was more personal: he said that sexually abusing a child reduces the adult to the level of a beast, that he considers incest and rape the most despicable crimes, and he mentioned both his shock at the case of the girls abused and murdered in Belgium, which was in the news in those months, and the fact that he himself had a twelve-year-old daughter.
- Live
- Premiered on 2 July 1994, three years before the album and in its old form, and was played 106 times up to 10 February 2001.
Our reading
That makes “Tier” a case apart on the album. Rammstein almost never explain; here they did, leaving no room for the reading that the song celebrates what it describes. When the archive asks whether a song endorses what it narrates, this is the one that shows you do not always have to guess.
The archive's interpretation, not an official account.
What the author said
This is one of the few songs in the catalogue whose meaning Till Lindemann explained directly and without hedging, in two 1997 interviews.
In Zillo he laid out the argument like this: animals mate with one another and there is no incest in that, because that is nature; but human beings can think consciously, and when a father is aroused by the sight of the daughter he fathered, that stops being natural and becomes sickness. The song, he said, is about where the line falls between urge and reason — and the title is the conclusion: whoever crosses it ends up on the animal’s side.
In Bravo he was more personal. He said that sexually abusing a child lowers an adult to the level of a beast, that incest, rape and abuse strike him as the most despicable crimes, and that the subject genuinely affects him: he mentioned being shaken by the case of the abused and murdered girls in Belgium that was in the news at the time, and that he had a twelve-year-old daughter himself.
That makes “Tier” a case apart on the record. Rammstein almost never explain; here they did, leaving no room for the reading that the song celebrates what it describes.
A 1994 song that returned unrecognisable
Its production history is the most tangled on Sehnsucht.
It was roughly the sixth song the band wrote and has existed in some form since 1994 — Flake confirmed as much in 1997, counting it among the group’s earliest. But that version bore almost no resemblance to the one released, neither lyrically nor musically. In 1995 a demo was recorded to cassette purely for internal reference.
Including it on Herzeleid was considered and rejected: producer Jacob Hellner thought the chorus was not strong enough. During the Sehnsucht sessions, with the band feeling it did not have enough material for a second album, the decision was made to rework it. It was given an entirely new instrumental, itself taken from a separate song idea — the same procedure applied to “Alter Mann” on that record.
A curious trace from that period: an audience recording of the 31 December 1994 performance circulated among fans for years under the title “Biest”, which never existed — the fans made it up.
The real working title was “Sadist”, and it stayed in internal use even after the rewrite, as late as 1997.
A riff with an owner
The riff in the final version is almost identical to that of “The Dawning Of Doom” by Die Krupps. Because of it, Jürgen Engler is credited as a co-writer of the song — an uncommon case in a catalogue where the credit is usually just “Rammstein”.
The drums are not entirely played either: the song uses a sample from track 4 of “Datafile Three”, the same Zero-G sound library that supplied the one on “Klavier”.
Context
Third track on Sehnsucht (25 August 1997), recorded in 1996 at Temple Studios in Malta. It debuted live on 2 July 1994, three years before the album and in its old form, and was played 106 times through to 10 February 2001.
Notes by Rammstein Colombia, for the purpose of analysis. The quoted statements are summarised from the referenced interviews. The original lyrics belong to their authors and are not reproduced in this entry.