Global success didn’t happen overnight though it feels like it for KitschKrieg, a Berlin-based production team revelling in recognition that has bounced back to Germany thanks to US fans.
The song, "Gut genug," which means "Good Enough," started out as an unassuming demo in German.
It has since become a global phenomenon, despite the fact that not everyone knew what the lyrics meant.
Now, you hear in school playgrounds, on Instagram reels, in the feeds of US superstars and at the World Cup the track by music duo Blumengarten and rapper Shirin David.
Producers Christoph Erkes (Fizzle) and Christian Meyerholz (Fiji Kris) of KitschKrieg headed to New York to promote the hit - and spoke to dpa during a break in a Greenwich Village park.
KitschKrieg, a team for more than a decade, have theories about why the whole world is now singing along to the piece of work that had been forgotten.
“The song originated from an unreleased demo by Blumengarten,
which they still had lying in a drawer,” says Erkes.
“We asked them to open up that drawer full of demos and ideas for us, and that’s where we discovered ‘Gut genug’.” It was to become the first single from the new album “KITSCHKRIEG ZWEI”.
The work that began as a rough sketch took on a whole new dimension in the studio.
“The hook was already in the demo, but we changed the chords,
so it feels different,” says Meyerholz. “The vibe was a bit different, but the key lyrics you hear now were already there.”
Casual comment becomes reality
The core remained and the feeling grew - and it was exactly that feeling that powered its success. “There were early text messages between us and Rayan where we said, ‘This is a global hit.’ Just the sort of thing you say. Of course, we didn’t know it would actually turn out that way,” Meyerholz says.
Soon after it was released in May, people started adding the hook to their clips - sung at the same high pitch - and sharing it online.
Fans online played around with the words, often, singing different but rhyming phrases to the same tune, referring to the heatwave for example.
Viral hit in US
One of the memes found fans in the US, where it was widely shared. One morning, the Berlin-based producers woke up, switched on their smartphones and discovered that an unusually large number of US users had tagged them on Instagram and TikTok.
“They’ve obviously all discovered one of the ‘Good Enough’ clips on Instagram. That’s where it all started.”
That set off the global wave of sharing online that peaked as US stars like as Lizzo, Doja Cat and Wiz Khalifa joined in. They posted videos set to the German words “Du bist gut genug.”
“That’s pretty wild, isn’t it? It’s actually quite funny,” says Erkes in disbelief.
Some in the US who didn't speak German tried in vain to make sense of the words, and came up with nonesense phrases that sounded similar, such as "Doobie Scoot Canoe." This onomatopoeic reinterpretation then became another TikTok and Instagram meme.
Widely shared, that fresh wave of fame rolled back again to Germany.
"What American influencers and kids get up to has a huge influence on today’s internet culture. And then suddenly it was everywhere here, even in school playgrounds. That’s when we realised the hype had left the internet and arrived in the real world," says Meyerholz.
Song transcends language barriers
The fact that language plays no part in this delights the creators. “It’s just brilliant to realise that the emotion embedded in something can transcend language barriers. They could listen to plenty of other songs, but they choose this one because they clearly feel something when they hear it,” says Erkes.
“It’s yet another confirmation that good music and good songs find their way. You don’t know where or when, but they actually always find their way.”
The success isn’t based solely on the catchy sounds that have already made KitschKrieg famous beyond Germany.
The message strikes a chord with many, understanding what it says about self-doubt, acceptance and the sense of being enough despite feeling insecure.
Amid global crises, this is clearly what many are hungry to hear. “People just fancy experiencing something lovely and getting a bit of comfort right now,” says Meyerholz.
Blumengarten’s lead singer Djima, who is the face and voice of the "Gut genug" meme, is particularly aware of this hype. The two musicians from Velbert in North Rhine-Westphalia are also currently in the US to promote the song further and people keep recognising Djima and coming to talk to him.
Song reaches World Cup
KitschKrieg, who have all their photos and videos shot in black and white for purely artistic reasons, have filmed several online segments in New York and even given interviews for Norwegian television.
That fame comes as football fans sing along to the snippet of the song, which in their own language translates to something like "Another goal, Norway."
The Brazilian national team and several DFB players have also already posted clips set to the song from Germany.
“The World Cup is, of course, obviously the biggest media event in the world right now. So it’s naturally perfect timing to go viral at this moment with a song that’s also relevant worldwide,” says Erkes.
In New York and Los Angeles, they are currently working on a US remix of the viral hit. They hope to get one or two US stars on board and say this shouldn’t be too difficult. The numbers speak for themselves.
Historic success in US charts
The song has just made it into the Global 200 charts of the US music magazine Billboard, reaching number 129. Record label Sony says no German song has achieved this in this millennium.
Only a few German-language acts such as Nena (“99 Luftballons”), Falco (“Rock Me Amadeus”), Kraftwerk (“Autobahn”) or Ivo Robić (“Morgen”) have achieved similar success.
In Germany, "Gut genug" has been at number one for two weeks, and held the same rank in the global charts of the audio analysis app Shazam. The service lets music fans identify songs they don’t recognise – whether playing in their vicinity or on apps such as TikTok, Instagram or YouTube – within seconds.
You may well hear someone humming "Doobie Scoot Canoe," or other fan version, fresh interpretation or meme, as more are created moment by moment.
Beyond a summer hit, "Gut genug" seems to sum up how music works today: global, emotional and unpredictable.
