Karl Marx City (Chemnitz)

I'm into coffee, cigarettes, and Diamant bikes1.

I was never the "sit in the front of the class and raise my hand" guy,

more of a poser, just a stupid guy hanging around,

nothing really changed about that to this day, damn!

I'm not responsible, but most don't understand,

that it's not my fault if my life is shit,

but actually the system's, politics' and Hartz IV's2,

No matter the cause, it's not me.

I come from Karl Marx City3, I'm a loser, baby, original Easterner.

I come from Karl Marx City, I'm a loser, baby, original Easterner.

I'm not on any guest list,

I'm not even cool in a city full of Nazis, pensioners and hooligans,

I cruise around the Karl Marx Head4 in my Trabant5, eating a banana6

the streets empty of people and the food without artificial colouring.

Discriminated against, unmotivated, the water is dripping from the ceiling, nothing functions.

That's how we live in Saxony, on molding mattresses,

always in a good mood, even without money in our pockets.

I come from Karl Marx City, I'm a loser, baby, original Easterner.

1. east-german bike brand, unpopular at the time of release
2. welfare system for the unemployed (at time of release, now discontinued and replaced), infamous for it's many bureaucratic and societal problems
3. the city of Chemnitz, where the band is from, was named Karl-Marx-Stadt from 1953 to 1990
4. the Karl-Marx-Kopf or locally called "Nischel" is a large monument in the Chemnitz city centre, depicting the head of communist Karl Marx
5. car brand seen as crucial to GDR culture
6. reference to the near-unavailability of certain goods in the GDR, for example bananas and other tropical fruits