Outspoken German rock/folk icon FRIEDEMANN presents the double-live album, Mehr Sein Als Schein – Friedemann Live II, through Exile On Mainstream.

With three studio full-length albums and a prior live album under his belt, FRIEDEMANN remains one of the most truly independent figures in the German music underground. Having been recently dubbed, “the German Ian MacKaye,” by no less figure than Scott “Wino” Weinrich, due to his DIY-ethics and no-compromise attitude, FRIEDEMANN has earned merits for being outspoken and a true honest voice of reason in nowadays chaos and self-centered society. His natural gift for storytelling is revealed in his native language, German, and shines through poetic soulful blues alongside straight and radical statements on this new live album, which contains a full concert recorded in Berlin in November 2018.

Mehr Sein Als Schein – Friedemann Live II itself puts a closing bracket around an important part in FRIEDEMANN’s career: recorded with a full live band whose line up incorporates his brother Johannes and long-time friend Matze who left the band amicably shortly after the tour. This album therefore marks a recording that punters might not be able to witness live again as FRIEDEMANN will remain on touring solo or as a two-guitarist lineup in the future. The live setting itself reveals FRIEDEMANN’s outspoken nature as well as his approach to doubts and questions being raised by today’s culture and society setups.

With narrative and radical statements linking the songs, he leaves all standards of song announcements we might be used to. The statements in between the songs create another level in approaching his art and can move the listener deeply. Sentiments like this one show how much sense live albums can make as they illustrate in almost perfect manner how much of a personal connection an artist can reach with a crowd when leaving the comfort zone of just pleasing an audience. This album is a challenge as much as it is a blissful experience.

This lush 2xLP package features over one-hundred-eleven minutes of music and is pressed on 180-gram pure virgin black vinyl in a black polylined inner sleeve. The album is packaged in a 5mm wide-spine sleeve, on 300gsm GC1 board with gloss laminate, with an insert containing liner notes, printed on 170gsm uncoated paper, in a limited run of 500 copies worldwide. While the vinyl does include an mp3 download card; there is no digital or CD release of the record. [Exile On Mainstream]