Who is "Messer Fur Frau Muller"?

November 14, 2005 10:59 PM

I stumbled upon this amazing Russian electronic rock group but I can't even pronounce their name! Can anyone help me figure out who these guys are? (It'll probably help if you have a cyrillic font installed!)

I was shopping on AllofMP3.com for some new tunes the other day and I somehow wound up clicking through to "Нож для Frau Muller", which apparently transliterates as "Messer Fur Frau Muller", and translates (according to the internet) as "Knife For Frau Muller". I downloaded their album "Треугольник, Черт и Точка".

They have a great, high energy, sampled sound that makes you want to get up and dance, It's become my favorite album practically overnight, and everyone I've played it for has thought it was a great find.

It's also kind of cool having all these song names and such in the cyrillic alphabet, especially since (surprisingly) the iPod displays all the crazy looking letters just fine. My problem is that when I play it, people ask me "Hey, that's great! What is that?", and I have to say "I don't really know!"

See, I have no idea how to even pronounce "Треугольник, Черт и Точка", let alone what it means, and any site I can find about the band turns out to be in Russian.
I'd love a little background on who the heck these artists are, and failing that at least a reliable translation of the track titles on this album.

So how about it metafilter?

Anyone know anything about "Messer Fur Frau Muller?"

posted by shanevsevil to Media & Arts (10 answers total)

Best answer: "Messer Fur Frau Muller" - who told you that?

The band-name transliterates roughly as "Nozh dlya Frau Muller." The internet translation of the band-name is correct.

The album name means "triange, devil (or imp), and point."

(My Russian is not what it should be.)
posted by kickingtheground at 11:12 PM on November 14, 2005

I'm pretty sure kickingtheground meant "triangle, devil and point" Point could also be "spot" or "dot."

Okay, I'm going to try to transliterate "Треугольник, Черт и Точка": "Traygolnik, Chiort, i Tochka." Feel free to correct, anyone.
posted by Uncle Glendinning at 6:12 AM on November 15, 2005

Have you tried using Babelfish to translate the Russian? I don't know how good it is, but it might help.

And I'm correcting myself; I'd say "Треугольник" more like: "Trayoogolnik."
posted by Uncle Glendinning at 6:14 AM on November 15, 2005

Best answer: I tried to post this last night but Ask was down.

There were sort of two MFFMs and both had Oleg Gitarkin in them. The before doesn't sound much like the after. You probably heard the after.

Oleg Gitarkin is also (in) Messer Chups (bio. Perhaps allofmp3 has some of his albums, which you may also dig.) There are some vids on the above link.

Comfort Stand Records has released a MC single and put it up as zipped mp3s and artwork. Another mp3 is here.

The other member of the "after" MFFM was Oleg Kostrow. He released a solo album in the late 90s called Great Flashing Lights from Iwona, which was sort of a kid-themed performance/play thingy. I've never heard it or seen a copy.

If you're gonna find out anything useful about these guys (and Gitarkin is the one to watch), check out Solnze Records' web site. Far as I know MFFM is defunct and only MC continues and Gitarkin adds/deletes members between releases. Chicago's Southern Records (bio link above) distros them in North America/Europe.

I can't help you with any translations.
posted by dobbs at 6:15 AM on November 15, 2005 [1 favorite]

MusicBrainz usually has the original artist names in their db, because they are international. They also always have transliterations. Here is their page on this band.

The band's web page.
posted by smackfu at 6:20 AM on November 15, 2005

'Messer fur Frau Muller' is not a transliteration, it's a translation - into German. And it does indeed mean 'Knife for Frau Muller'. Will leave the rest to someone whose Russian is better than mine (paging languagehat...)
posted by altolinguistic at 6:38 AM on November 15, 2005

Response by poster: Thanks kickingtherground and altolinguistic, I got "Messer Fur Frau Muller" off a picture of an album cover (I guess the german release) that was one of the few things I found googling "Frau Muller" myself. I guess I should have realized this wasn't a transliteration.

dobbs:very interesting, great answer. How did you come to know so much about this group if you don't speak russian?
posted by shanevsevil at 7:49 AM on November 15, 2005

I'm familiar with much of Southern's catalog and I just pursue artists I like. I like MC. Once you know MC, it's much easier to find info as they're still "together".
posted by dobbs at 8:19 AM on November 15, 2005

Oh, and altolinguistic is correct--they lived in Germany for a while. I believe that's stated in one of my links.
posted by dobbs at 8:21 AM on November 15, 2005

I'm here now, but have nothing to add -- the translations given above are correct. As for the music, I'm old-school: I like Bulat Okudzhava and Vladimir Vysotskii (and yes, I even have a soft spot for the Red Army Chorus).
posted by languagehat at 11:56 AM on November 15, 2005