Music, for me, is one of the most important forms humans use to communicate or express themselves. My music may be imperfect, as were those vehicles at that time, but just like the cars, every song is something special. So, “Adam und Eva” was created as a pure improvisation on the piano, while other songs, like “Lost at Sea,” developed organically and gradually. Music may tell stories, or create images – and it may very well choose to take more than four minutes to do so.

The title of the album relates, first, to the legion of German scientists who, shortly after the 2nd World War, were forcibly recruited and brought to the US or USSR as “human reparations.” There, they put their ingenuity to the development of military technologies, such as the super-powers’ missile programs. But what of their own history in National-Socialist Germany did they carry along with them? Did their past infuse the substance of their new, grand endeavors? Did they reflect upon the nature of their research? What were their thoughts and feelings?

This is not to say that the album is conceptually about these scientists. Secondly and more generally, the title relates to the fragility of human life itself. Once damaged, whether physically or mentally, we are hard and sometimes impossible to repair. If there is a general theme at work, it is perhaps a notion of destiny and free will, of the way our choices relate to the paths our lives take and what consequences they yield. Making a choice, are we merely working the switches along a train ride whose tracks have been laid out long before and whose course and destination remain a mystery?

Music, too, can be a medium promoting awareness and contemplation. Listening to the world, we can all be more aware about what is going on, both around and within us.

Markus Roth