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Meindert Talma & The Negroes | Leave Stumper

Frisian quirkiness at its very best.
CD, Excelsior/V2

Tekst: Alex Tobin

Publicatiedatum: 26 november 2001

Germany. Summer 1982. Millions of pairs of German eyes are glued to the television, watching in anticipation, occasionally squirming in discomfort at the pictures playing out before them. It's the final game of what has been yet another exciting World Cup. Football, European-style, is the game, and a nation's hopes and dreams hang in the balance, all visions of grandeur sorely dependent on the actions of 22 men in a stadium in Madrid. Eleven of them are Italian, and eleven of them are the "local boys", men with imposing Teutonic surnames; names such as Dremmler, Hrubesch, and Littbarski. In the past weeks, overactive schoolboys have been busily swapping stickers manufactured by Panini, removing the adhesive backing with baited breath, before gluing them into their World Cup 82 annuals. "I'll swap you two Klaus Allofs for a Karl-Heinz Rummenigge." Rummenigge, the quintessential man of the hour; the young, blonde, dashing sportsman's ideal, cutting wide swaths over the playing fields of Spain. Together with the more talented of the two Förster brothers, Karl-Heinz, and curl-topped hero of Kaiserslautern Hans-Peter Briegel, this is the new triumvirate of German football potential. Demigods to the masses of beery-eyed supporters, pinups to any 12-year-old boy, and any mother's pride and joy. Unsere Jungs. Meindert Talma is not German, nor are his backing combo, The Negroes, dark-skinned. The singer's fourth full-length record 'Leave Stumper' does, however, open with a track called 'Rummenigge', a paean to blond Karl-Heinz. And although Germany lost on that fateful summer day in 1982 (Paul Breitner's goal in the 83rd minute didn't arrive in time to save much of anything.), 'Leave Stumper' is anything but an own goal. Twelve tracks are on this record. Aside from our bratwurst bombshells, Talma sings openly, directly, and with a complete knack for humour about black brassieres, bicycle races, fake blondes, playing chess, nymphomaniac tendencies, the girls in the Frisian town of Surhuisterveen, nice warm baths, and branding marks. All of this could sound like a bad comedy routine gone awry, were it not for Meindert Talma's complete sincerity and honesty. This man has "gain pappelefoefies"; he gets to the point and speaks from the heart. Alternating between Dutch and Frisian, 'Leave Stumper' also makes sense to the non-Dutch, non-Frisian speaker, as the music speaks for itself, appropriating everything from Giorgio Moroder to the most basic strains of pubrock. With no agenda and an imagination filled with wondrous tales, Meindert Talma is the Uli Stielike of Dutch rock music, the libero - inventive, full of flair, and passing the ball deftly without ever being offsides.

http://www.kindamuzik.net/recensie/meindert-talma-the-negroes/leave-stumper/1029/
Meer Meindert Talma & The Negroes op KindaMuzik: http://www.kindamuzik.net/artiest/meindert-talma-the-negroes