Schlecht Dran / Gut Drauf

2009 release. Doc Schoko wrote his first songs at the age of 11. He self-distributed his first releases on microcassette in Germany's most industrialized and populated state of North Rhine-Westphalia (Rhine-Ruhr). A working-class punk rocker who uses the German language ("Some German words are so long that they have a perspective" --Mark Twain) just like his German idols, such as S.Y.P.H., Fehlfarben, Kolossale Jugend, Die Regierung, Ton Steine Scherben, Mutter, NEU!, and Blumfeld. No hipster bohemian attitude, just a down-to-earth understanding of stark, primitive krautrock. On Schlecht Dran/Gut Drauf, some of his heroes shine through, but they never dominate the presence of Doc Schoko himself. Doc Schoko has opened for Mark E. Smith (The Fall); both Smith and Doc Schoko appeared on Silver Monk Time: A Tribute to the Monks (PL 002CD, 2006). The Village Voice's Don Allred wrote, "Doc Schoko's doom-swallowing 'Sei Still' smirks at its English-speaking doppelgänger, 'Shut Up.'" Schlecht Dran/Gut Drauf was mastered by Hans-Joachim Irmler (Faust).