Untitled Rammstein album

Composition

The album features the band's typical sound of Neue Deutsche Härte and industrial metal. "Zeig dich" criticizes the Catholic church, backed by powerful thumping guitar riffs, with lyrics demanding religious leaders stop hiding behind their so-called Lord; the composition also includes a Latin-language choir and Spanish-styled finger picking. "Sex" discusses sex as something disgusting yet life-giving. "Puppe" contains a strong doom metal influence and tells the story of a child playing with a doll while their sister prostitutes herself in the next room; as the sister screams, the child bites the doll's head off, and the ending suggests the child kills the attacker.

"Was ich liebe" may be influenced by Nine Inch Nails' "Closer" and includes an acoustic guitar section similar to one from "Stairway to Heaven". "Diamant" is a soft ballad describing a breakneck voyage through the multifaceted stages of romantic despair. "Weit weg" has elements of Tangerine Dream and Kosmischer Läufer, with lyrics about a man secretly watching a woman undress, possibly an allegory for risks faced by cam girls or sex workers. "Tattoo" evokes thrash and heavy metal of the 1980s and early 1990s, with lyrics alluding to identification of inmates in German concentration camps and modern tattoo trends. The ending track "Hallomann" is about a child abuser who lures a girl into his car and drowns her.

Promotion and release

In January 2019, Richard Kruspe mentioned that five music videos were planned for the band's upcoming release. Late March brought teaser clips for the first video, which included Roman numerals pointing to 28 March 2019. On that date, "Deutschland" dropped as the lead single on digital services, accompanied by a ten-minute video on YouTube and a remix from Kruspe. The band announced the album had no title and would come out on 17 May 2019.

Within four days, the video racked up 19 million views. A physical single for "Deutschland" arrived on 12 April as a 7-inch vinyl and CD, with the remix as the B-side. Between 16 and 19 April, the band revealed the track list on their YouTube channel, using short riff snippets. On 18 April, the album cover appeared there too, with a twenty-second teaser showing Kakhovska Square in Kherson, Ukraine.

Soon after, they started teasing a video for "Radio," which came out on 26 April. The album itself hit shelves on 17 May 2019 via Universal Music, with distribution handled by Vertigo/Capitol in Europe, Spinefarm Records in the UK, and Caroline International in the US. Physical editions included a double-180 gram vinyl and two CD digipaks, each with booklets; the deluxe version had more panels and a larger booklet. On 26 May, the band teased a video for third single "Ausländer," releasing it on 28 May, with the single itself following on 31 May.

Reception

Critics were largely on board with this album. On Metacritic, it earned an average score of 82 out of 100 from 11 reviews, a rating that signals universal acclaim. NME called it a resounding triumph, while Kerrang!'s Nick Ruskell praised it as a record built with care and craft, where nothing extraneous made the cut. Wall of Sound gave it a 9.5 out of 10, viewing it as a distillation of the band's six prior studio albums, blending their best elements with a few genuine surprises.

Rolling Stone's Kory Grow observed that the band had matured somewhat during their ten-year break, but not entirely; he noted that "Deutschland" carries the only real lyrical weight, while the other tracks drift between harmless and lecherous, though the German language makes it hard to tell which is which. Writing for Exclaim!, Lukas Wojcicky framed the album as a likely swan song, given that each member is around 50 years old. After a decade without a new release, a retirement announcement would not have been shocking, but instead the band delivered one final album and a touring cycle, making it a welcome addition to their catalog.

Commercially, the album was a massive hit in Germany. It debuted at number one on the German album charts on May 24, 2019, moving 260,000 album-equivalent units in its first week—the best first-week performance by any band in the 21st century. It slipped to number two for the next two weeks, then returned to the top spot on June 14, holding that position for two more non-consecutive weeks. The album remained in the top 40 for a full year, finally dropping out on June 12, 2020, and stayed on the chart for 127 consecutive weeks before exiting the week of October 29, 2021.