Rammstein Vergiss uns nicht lyric with English translation

Michelle
I actually think you’re right about the sperm saying it.
and also, it’s the best thing to have your own idea about what a song is about.
No one can say it’s about this or that, it’s what you make of it yourself. (unless you say it’s a farewell-song, which it is not.lol )

you know.. I don’t like affenknecht so much with everyone’s take on Rammstein songs. At first when I saw the lyrics to this one, I thought to myself that the ones saying Vergiss Uns Nicht were the sperm from the man. It’s their little story, in my honest opinion, ha ha. 😉

OMG
this is NOT a farewell-song.
just because he says “don’t forget us” doesn’t mean they’re quitting!
goddamn. is it the only sentence you understand? the whole lyrics are about a completely different topic (usual vage Till-lyrics)

I too think is Rammstein’s way of telling fans farewell. And now they are releasing everything great in a Best Of album, plus all music videos ever made, and they are touring like crazy not even a year after LIFAD. Sounds like a goodbye and thanks-so-much album release and farewell tour to me. Very depressing. I grew up with Rammstein. If they quit, I will feel like I lost a family member. 🙁 I will never forget them.

Hmmmmm, hopefully they will be like KISS and have farewell tours over and over LOL.

@Funkenstoss

Thanks for the revisions/explanations, nice to know what you’re working with when you are trying to figure out what the song means to yourself.

@Laaz, the farewell idea is a fair one for people to assume, as this seems to be the final official release of a song, however, consider the song Liese. These two songs, and others released on singles, seem to be pulled more directly from Till Lindemann’s poetry (search for Till Lindemann Messer if you were unaware). These songs just seem to be extras that have not much rhyme or reason, but can surely fit many situations, much like their whole discography. To label it with one interpretation or another would really defeat the purpose in my eyes, but to clearly understand the literal translation would be necessary before forming an opinion, which Rammstein still likes to play around with, and may be why they are so internationally popular.

To be curt, the song is a good counterpoint to Mein Land.

The only way to know the true meaning to any Rammstein song is to know what they intended it to originally mean, because everyone gets lost in their own perception of what the song means. By all means try to decipher the meanings of the songs but the true meaning is what Rammstein intend them to be.

If it were a farewell song, the lyrics seem to point a fat finger towards us, the fans, for being a dead ground and not fertile, so that Rammstein lost their interest in us and gave up.

I hope this isn’t the case.

@ Funkenstoss – Good points! I never said you made a mistake, I was merely giving another opinion 😉

just because this song was written in 2007 doesn’t mean it isn’t the farewell song. it could be or maybe not

@ Mods: below is a revised version of the transcription and translation; please replace the existing ones (I put them into pseudo-tags to ensure the translation footnotes don’t get ommited).

[transcription]

Als wir uns zusammen steckten
Mit den Hüften, wie Insekten
Begann mich selber zu versprühen
Und das Feld fing an zu blühen
Die Saat war gut und früh das Jahr
Doch der Boden nicht fruchtbar war

Der alte Schoß wollte nicht empfangen
Und all die winzig kleinen Schlangen
Fielen durch das Lendengitter
Und befreiten ein Gewitter

Vergiss uns nicht
Weißt du noch, im März…?
Der Vater hat das Feld bestellt
Der Mutter brach das Herz

Die Kinder stiegen aus der Haut
Auf den Grund und sangen laut
Wo ich mich selber ausgesät
Ein Herz in toter Erde steht

Vergiss uns nicht
Weißt du noch, im März…?
Der Vater hat das Feld bestellt
Der Mutter brach das Herz

Vergiss uns nicht
Weißt du noch, im Mai…?
Der Vater hat sein Herz verloren
Der Mutter brach’s entzwei

[/transcription]

[translation]

As we were putting us together
By the hips, like insects
I began to spray myself about
And the field started to blossom
The sowing was proper and the season early
But the soil was not fertile

The old womb was unwilling to conceive
And all those tiny little snakes
Fell through the loin grating
And unleashed a storm

Do not forget us
Do you remember, in March…?
The father took care of the field
The mother’s heart broke *

The children rose from within the skin
Onto the ground and sang aloud
Where I had sown myself
There a heart stands in dead soil

Do not forget us
Do you remember, in March…?
The father took care of the field
The mother’s heart broke *

Do not forget us
Do you remember, in May…?
The father has lost his heart
The mother’s broke in two **

—–
* due to a subtle grammatical ambiguity, the line might also be interpreted as “the mother’s heart he broke”.

** similarly to the above, the last line might also be read as “the mother’s (heart) he broke in two”.

[/translation]

Thanks to everyone for their comments, especially to Suarga for pointing out a subtlety that eluded me initially.

Suarga wrote:

“Mein Herz in toter Erde steht

Also:

This says to me that the cum drips out of the skin onto the ground and says “I am my father, I planted myself in that soil, little did I know I was killing myself by being buried into dead soil”.”

There’s a problem with the “myself”, as the original line really reads

Ein Herz in toter Erde steht

translating to

There a heart stands in dead soil

I had already been asking to have this corrected, but it hasn’t been done yet. I’ll post a complete revised version of both texts below.

Suarga wrote:

“Vergiss uns nicht
Weißt du noch, im Mai…?
Der Vater hat sein Herz verlor’n
Der Mutter brach’s entzwei

In this section it makes more sense to me that the father has lost his love for the mother and/or his will to live. The final line seems to say more that the mother is broken in half. If this is the case, it would seem to me that because his seed did not grow for whatever reason, he decided to cut the mother in half. This would give it that old familiar Rammstein twist, to me.”

As a matter of fact, there is indeed a (not quite obvious at first) subtle grammatical ambiguity to the last line, which makes the interpretation you suggest plausible. Though, it does not jump at you at all, that’s probably why I initially overlooked it myself. Luckily enough, this ambiguity can be preserved in the translation, just by translating the two lines directly as they are:

The father has lost his heart
The mother’s broke in two

Now, the word “heart” is definitely being implied into the second line (in the original text, we have “brach’s”, which is an abbreviation of “brach es”, which means “it broke” – the “it” stands for the word “heart” appearing in the first line). Thus, the most obvious interpretation (with implied words in parentheses) would be:

The father has lost his heart
The mother’s (heart) broke in two

The interesting part is, that the grammar structure allows for another implication (especially that “brach’s”/”brach es” can mean “broke it” as well as “it broke”):

The father has lost his heart
The mother’s (heart he) broke in two

Admittedly, the implication of the father as being the one who broke the mother’s heart, although gramatically (just barely, but still) valid, appears as a bit of a atretch (a little less in the German original, more so in the direct English translation); that’s also why it’s tough to spot. But, as mentioned, translating these two lines directly as they are leaves that possibility in, so in the end it seems that would the best thing to do rather than forcing a particular interpretation.

(Actually, in the original text this would also work for

Der Vater hat das Feld bestellt
Der Mutter brach (er) das Herz

though preserving this implication possibility in translation here would be hardly viable.)

EinHeisserSchrei wrote: “Der Mutter brach das Herz – The mother broke the (his) heart.”

That’s definitely incorrect – the article “der” determines explicitly that it’s the heart of the mother which broke (or, was broken…?) No way around this.

Long explanation: it would work as you suggest if it was “DIE Mutter brach das Herz”, with “Die Mutter” being nominative case – the answer to the question “WER brach das Herz?” (“who broke the heart?”). Still, rather than that, it is “DER Mutter brach das Herz”, with “Der Mutter” being DATIVE case, being the answer to the question “WEM brach das Herz?” (which would translate very directly to “to whom broke the heart”; this obviously sounds very awkward, as the English grammar doesn’t work here as the German does – it would just mean “whose heart broke?”, with the genitive case replacing the dative case in English).

EinHeisserSchrei wrote: “Der Vater hat sein Herz verlor’n – would translate better as The father lost his heart”

The direct, most obvious translation of this phrase is “The father has lost his heart”. I preferred “The father’s heart had gone lost” (which essentially means the same thing) to keep it more cryptic and ambiguous, and because I think would sound/fit better overall. Thus, it’s definitely not a mistake, but rather a less direct translation employed intentionally.

However, the way I translated the last two lines masks away the second possible interpretation of the last line which Suarga pointed out, so it seems it would indeed be better to translate these lines just as they are:

The father has lost his heart
The mother’s broke in two

Please read on about this below.

RammsteinAM wrote: “Can anyone tell me why “Der Mutter brach das Herz”? I think ther must be “t” after “brach” – “Der Meutter bracht das Herz”.

Ich brache
du brachst
er/sie/es bracht
wir brachen
ihr bracht
sie brachen

Therefor “Der Vater bracht”.”

The culprit lies with the conjugation table you came up with being quite incorrect. The correct simple past tense {Präteritum) forms for the verb “brechen” are as follows:

ich brach
du brachst
er/sie/es brach (answering your question)
wir brachen
ihr bracht
sie brachen

Here are the correct forms for the present tense (as you seemed to be mixing up present and past forms somewhat):

ich breche
du brichst
er/sie/es bricht
wir brechen
ihr brecht
sie brechen

@ Rick Thompson, I meant to say MOST of you are fuckng idiots.
Sorry for the confusion you fucking idiot.