MY MOST AUDACIOUS MARKETING MOVE IV
I like Rammstein, the German music band, and they’re popular enough not just in Germany but elsewhere that people have translated the lyrics of their songs into other languages (certainly English, at least). But how cool it is that I found this rhyming English translation of the lyrics of the song “Engel” (“Angels”) which, for what it’s worth, are pretty much on target.
http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/rammstein/engelenglishversion.html
Meanwhile, the following is a good (“official”) literal English translation of the German lyrics of this song (if not one which rhymes):
Those who are good in their lifetime on Earth
Will become an angel after death
A look at the sky and you wonder
Why one can’t see them
Only after the clouds have gone to sleep
Can one see us in the sky
We have fear and are alone
God knows I don’t want to be an angel
They live behind sunshine
Separated from us (infinitely far)
They must cling to stars (really tightly)
So that they don’t fall from the sky
Personally, I was quick to compare it with my own French rhyming translation of the Garbage song “Right Between The Eyes” – see My Most Audacious Marketing Move II (dated 25th June 2014); and, while we’re at it “My Most Audacious Marketing Move” (dated 3rd October 2011) and “My Most Audacious Marketing Move III” (dated 26th June 2014).
So what is this particular blog all about?
Put simply, I’m taking the “My Most Audacious Marketing Move” thing one step further (which I never saw myself doing). By that I mean providing my own RHYMING FRENCH translation of the lyrics of the song “Engel” (if strictly taken more from the original German version than from this rhyming English version; and even though my mother tongue is neither German nor French, but English). Here it is:
Ceux de vies biennes ont la sort
De devenir d’anges après la mort
En regardant le ciel, tu
Comprends que personne ne les a vus
Il faut attendre le dodo des nuages
Pour voir en haut notre entourage
Nos peur et solitude s’allongent
Dieu sait que je ne veux pas être ange !
Ils vivent derrière l’ensoleillement
Séparés de nous infiniment
Ils doivent saisir les étoiles (très fort)
Pour éviter une fatale voile
Translated (literally) as:
Those who lead good lives have the fate
Of becoming angels after death
As you look at the sky, you
Understand that no-one has seen them
It’s necessary to wait until the clouds have gone sleep
To see our entourage up above
Our fear and solitude continue
God knows I don’t want to be an angel!
They live behind sunshine
Separated from us infinitely
They must seize stars (very tightly)
To avoid a fatal fall
Or, let’s compare it with my French translation of the rhyming English translation:
Laissez désir pour mérite et mœurs
Dans la tombe : dans anges en chœur
On cherche la raison pour laquelle
Ils sont invisibles en le ciel
Seulement après les nuages endormis
Peut-on voir des anges en paradis
Étant seuls et en peur ils questionnent fort
Bon dieu, pas un ange après la mort
Les vies des anges sont éternelles
Sép’rés de nous, derrière le ciel
Leurs âmes pâlissants se glacent
Mais un blanc paradis se passe
Translated (literally) as:
Abandon desire for merit and morals
In the grave: angels in a choir
One searches the reason why
They are invisible in the sky (i.e. “people don’t see them in the sky”)
Only after the clouds have gone to sleep
Can one see angels in paradise
Being afraid and alone they question a great deal
Good God, not an angel when I die
The lives of angels are eternal
Separated from us, behind the sky
Their fading souls become ice
But one witnesses a paradisiacal white
Oh yes, translation is what I do, baby!