Why do you want to live forever, Heinz Rudolf Kunze?

Hello Mr. Kunze, a new album is coming out. Right now, however, everything's still revolving around "Dein ist mein ganze Herz" (Your Whole Heart). 40 years ago, this fifth album marked the beginning of the hit phase of your career. Songwriter Kunze became rock star Kunze, had a Gretsch guitar on the cover, and jumped like Chuck Berry. What changed back then, and was that the plan from the beginning?

Yes. I just didn't have the slightest idea how to do it. My friend and guitarist Mick Franke didn't either. He was a good second singer, a decent acoustic guitarist, and could play bouzouki and mandolin, but he couldn't rock on the electric guitar. I needed a guitarist who could push me forward the way Rocco (Klein, editor's note) had pushed Klaus Lage forward. It was clear to me that without someone like that, I might just remain a quirky novelty act.

A songwriter.

Well, we were certainly loud. We did the crazy balancing act between songwriting and New German Wave. Some of the first albums featured very bizarre music. But I wanted to do what was called German rock when NDW ended. I wanted more success. Then Peter Köpke from WEA (the record company, editor's note) took me aside and said: 'You can do that too. But you have to do something painful—you have to get rid of Mick.' Which was very difficult. Someone then had Heiner Lürig in their address book. And then everything changed because he had this number as a morning gift.

“Yours is my whole heart”

Heiner played me an English version with a Black singer, which he himself didn't like because it was such a cobbled-together, stubbly English. He said, 'Why don't you try that?' 'Yeah, what? Should I put lyrics on it?' 'Yeah, of course!' 'But I usually do it the other way around.' 'Then try it that way.' And then that became the biggest success. So much for the value of lyrics. (laughs)

Were you torn down by fans of the singer-songwriter scene back then – like Dylan at the Newport Festival?

Judas? Just once. This radical exception was on the "Herz" tour in 1985, when an outraged hardcore fan in the front row threw a bleeding cow's heart at my chest. It's hard to believe how big a cow's heart is. (laughs) That was a clear Judas sign. I wiped myself off and carried on playing. Some colleagues freak out over things like that. That was never my style. Besides, I was afraid he was stronger than me.

Did you feel uneasy when the album came out?

Of course. I thought it might have turned out too cheesy. I thought: This has to be a hit. If it goes wrong, I'll have embarrassed myself.

What would have been different without “Yours is my whole heart”?

Everything. I don't know if WEA would have given me another generous five-year contract if the "Herz" album had been released under the working title "Burning Hands" and hadn't had a "heart." Five years of music – thank you, goodbye, back to normal life. And becoming a teacher – for God's sake! Or getting a job as an assistant at the university. That was actually my plan: to become a professor of modern German literature someday.

In Hanover, Heiner Lürig was back on stage after more than 15 years for the 40th anniversary tour of “Herz”.

It was nostalgia and friendship and more. Because, of course, Heiner Lürig, as a composer, had a lot to do with this anniversary. He was tense and then highly focused. We celebrated a little afterward – in the dressing room. Since the coronavirus pandemic, even good hotels don't open at all, or close at 10 o'clock. But we were still working (laughs).

Your latest album, your 47th, is called "Supply and Demand." Is that another title with two meanings ?

On the one hand, it's a mini-definition of art. We artists make an offer that contains a deeper demand. We want to get to the bottom of things. And then there's the obvious economic dimension: We make an offer and hope it resonates.

They only make album offers every two years.

Unfortunately, the market has collapsed.

Today, many things only appear on recordings after they have taken off online.

That's what really annoys me when my favorite magazine, "Uncut," announces an album on vinyl, CD, and streaming. And then you look at the online retailers and realize: Nope, it's not tactile. That drives me crazy. I am and will always be a collector. I want to HAVE things. And then you read that the musicians of the current Americana wave in the US work three jobs to survive. Only the really big sperm whales in the industry can live off CD sales anymore. As Richard David Precht rightly says: Another cultural asset that could have been given to people as a gift is gone. What should I give as a gift now? A streaming subscription? Fuck you!

The new album is largely about the dark world situation, life's balance, late love, and death. A "late work." Do you like that word?

Thomas Mann's best novel—"Doctor Faustus"—was a late work. Johnny Cash's best records were all late works. I think it's long been proven that you can grow old with rock music. Many have done it well, and I want to try it too.

One song title is "What Am I Worth?" The protagonist reflects on the good he's done and the attitude he's shown in life, but also harbors doubts. Do certainties fade as we grow old?

Certainties begin to blur in midlife. In youth, you're sure about everything, and that's almost always a black-and-white picture. The truth is much more nuanced and gray. I'm part of the song, but at some point everyone probably comes up with these questions—otherwise, you're a crazy denier: What am I worth? Have I wasted my life? Can I look back with pride?—I find these questions quite important. And they're open to me (laughs).

In the song, you stand before the gates of heaven. Do you believe in a next existence? Do you cling to it?

Yes, I cling to it. I can't live well without the assumption that there might be a meaning and a God. I'm not religious, but I want it to exist. I assume it! Because I need it to get up in the morning. But these questions about God, love, ambition, and war have always occurred to me.

The last line of the last new song “What are children for?” is “I want to live forever.”

The new star of philosophy, the Swede Martin Hägglund, says that eternal life is worthless. There would be no temporality, nothing would be important anymore. But I can well imagine wanting to live for several centuries. Until I say, I'm tired, I don't want to anymore. That's my windmill, the one I keep crashing against like Don Quixote—that I don't have this choice. This crashing is also ridiculous. But that's our prerogative as artists: We're allowed to make ourselves ridiculous when it comes to the big questions.

Bruce Springsteen recently raised the big question of democratic freedom live, positioning himself in European stadiums with speeches against the "incompetent President" Trump and his "gangster regime." Some say that doesn't belong on stage.

Of course, something like that belongs on stage. I think it's a shame Bob Dylan doesn't do that. I was involved a bit with Springsteen, by the way. I did the German translation of his speeches for the screen. Jacky Jedlicki from the concert agency asked me to help. I said, "Jacky, you're an American citizen, you can do this better than me." "Yes," he said, "but you can speak German better."

Do you hear an increase in pro-democratic songwriting in Germany in times of political right-wing shift?

No. But maybe I'm deaf. I have the feeling the quiet-talkers and the lazy-minded still rule here. Even among the older generation, I sense a tactical reticence that I find suspect. Yet it's absolutely part of their work! In their songs!

"Supply and Demand" features some of your best love songs ever: brilliant in sound, serious, humorous. But it's less about the fire of the loins than about the warmth of affection. No sex, we're old?

It has to be appropriate, it has to be biologically and psychologically appropriate. Acting like I'm in my early 20s—that could only be ironic.

Does the schoolyard queen with the secret, out-of-date 1950s name in the country-esque song "That Which Never Was" really exist? And what was her name?

(laughs) Her name was Monika (laughs). She did exist, and I met her again. But we never dated. It would never have occurred to me anyway, because my best friend was in love with her—also in vain.

Love is celebrated with particularly graceful imagery. In your ballad "To Love Another Person," it says: "By loving another person / we fulfill the highest human duty / it's like sifting the air for gold / in the end, the sieve is full of sunlight." Magical realism.

I think that's the best line on this album. And it's also a love song for all ages. Good love songs are harder to write than political ones, because there's already so much boring, small-talk—with phrases that have been used a billion times.

For you, clear rhyme is important. In pop, and even more so in rap, this has long since become blurred, so that "nut chocolate" can rhyme with "hard foam mattress."

These are people who can't do their job. Incompetent (laughs).

In the song "Irgendwo" (Somewhere), you feel "at home" in language. Does writing bring you comfort?

I feel most secure not only when I'm writing, but also when I'm reading, not only when I'm making music, but also when I'm listening to music; always in this field of words and sounds. Except for my family, of course. For me, that's not an appendage; it's the important counterbalance to this crazy job.

Heinz Rudolf Kunze – “Supply and Demand” (Meadow Lake Music/Believe), released on September 12