1982–1985: Early years, debut album were formed in
West Berlin in 1982 by Jan Vetter (alias
Farin Urlaub, a pun on the expression "Fahr' in Urlaub", meaning "Go on vacation"), Dirk Felsenheimer (alias
Bela B, referring to Dracula actor
Bela Lugosi) and bassist Hans Runge, alias . Bela and Farin had previously played together in the
punk band Soilent Grün, established in 1979 and named after the film
Soylent Green. After Soilent Grün broke up in 1982, Bela and Farin decided to form another band. In the first two years (including Sahnie) they mostly played in clubs in their hometown, Berlin. Their first release was a contribution to the sampler
20 schäumende Stimmungshits (rough translation: "20 foamy party hits"), featuring a strong alcohol theme (for example, the chorus of "Vollmilch" translates as "you drink whiskey, he drinks beer, I drink milk"). In 1983 they won a rock contest in Berlin and with the prize money they recorded their debut EP ''
Uns geht's prima...'' ("We're doing great..."). Finally
CBS signed them, and they released their first LP
Debil ("Moronic") with their second LP following in 1984 with
Im Schatten der Ärzte ("In the shadow of ") a year later.
1986–1989: Success, controversies, line-up change, breakup After the second album, they parted ways with Sahnie due to internal problems. Producer Manfred 'Manne' Praeker played the bass parts on the third album. Later,
Hagen Liebing ("The Incredible Hagen") took over as bassist for live concerts, although he never became an official member of the band, with Farin playing bass on the following albums. The third album was also the first time that Farin used distorted guitar sounds on most of the album, moving the band's sound towards
rock. In 1987, the
German Federal Centre for Media Harmful to Young Persons put the songs "
Geschwisterliebe" ("Sibling love", a song about
incest, from the album ), "Claudia hat 'nen Schäferhund" ("Claudia has a
German Shepherd", about
zoophilia, from
Debil) and "Schlaflied" ("Lullaby", about a monster coming and eating its victim after falling asleep, also from
Debil) on the
German List of Media Harmful to Young People (often called "the Index"). This prohibited the band from performing the songs live or promoting the two albums and, more importantly, shops were prohibited from openly displaying these records or selling them to minors. At their concerts, they circumvented the ban by playing only the music of the prohibited songs, while the audience sang the lyrics. After several trials against shops that still openly sold the records, a lot of shops completely removed from their stock. The result was a drop in record sales and financial problems for the band. In response they released the
best of album
Ist das alles? ("Is that all?") with three new songs and the
10" compilation
Ab 18 (Adults only) containing all indexed songs and some other songs with controversial, mainly sex-themed lyrics. Although advice not to sell the album to minors was printed on the cover,
Ab 18 was also put on the index. The inner sleeve was put on the index separately because it contained the lyrics. Some tour posters were considered
misogynistic and were also put on the list. They contained a drawing of a tied up and gagged woman called
Gwendoline that was inspired by
bondage artist
John Willie and is the mascot of the band. Since then, have used a skeleton version of Gwendoline in the artwork of most of their albums. Later, from 2000 on, live shows have featured two oversized Gwendolines that flank the stage (especially at outdoor concerts). The commissioned artist had first colored the figures independently. However, after the Hard Pop Days were played with these colorful editions and a houseboat at
Popkomm in Cologne was adorned with them, they were recolored into classic black and white design. The following album
Das ist nicht die ganze Wahrheit... ("That is not the whole truth...") was even more successful; it charted in the top 10 of the German album charts. decided to go out on a high note and split up after doing one last tour and releasing a triple live album,
Nach uns die Sintflut ("Devil may care", lit. "
After us the deluge"), later released as a double CD, that became their first number one in the album charts. In 1989, they released one last single from the
Wahrheit LP and a compilation of early EPs and rare recordings (
Die Ärzte früher! ("Die Ärzte earlier!").
1993–1999: Reunion, new bassist, first no.1 single Neither Farin's new band King Køng nor Bela's Depp Jones became successful, so they decided to reform in 1993. They invited former Depp Jones guitarist Rodrigo González to take over on bass duties. He would also play guitar on songs he (co-)wrote. They released the comeback album
Die Bestie in Menschengestalt ("The beast in human form") and the single "
Schrei nach Liebe" ("Cry for love"), their first song to have political lyrics. It was recorded as a statement against the increasing racism and right-wing extremist violence in Germany at that time. The translation of the song's refrain is "Your violence is just a silent cry for love / Your combat boots are craving for tenderness / You never learned to express yourself / And your parents never had time for you / Oh oh oh asshole". The album was more varied than previous releases, including
ballads,
punk,
rock and even a song resembling
Volksmusik. Both the album and single became big hits in Germany, Austria and Switzerland. The follow-up
Planet Punk was also very successful. In 1996, they wanted to make an EP just about hair, however, they wrote too many songs for an EP and it became their next album,
Le Frisur. It was not as successful as its predecessors. Also during this year, as well as touring in their own right, they also supported
Kiss on the German dates of their
Alive/Worldwide Tour — a dream come true for Bela and Rod. In 1998 their single "
Männer sind Schweine" ("Men are pigs") became their first number 1 single in Germany, Austria and Switzerland, with the album
13 also being number 1 in Germany and Switzerland. After a lot of promotion and touring that year, they decided to take a break and also to never again play "Männer sind Schweine" during concerts, due in part to its huge chart success, which in turn attracted remakes, e.g. "Frauen sind Schweine" ("Women are pigs").
2000–2013: Further success, MTV Unplugged, solo work In 2000 they came back with the album,
Runter mit den Spendierhosen, Unsichtbarer! ("Stop feeling so generous, invisible one!", lit.: "Down with the generosity trousers, invisible one!"), and two top 10 singles. For the third single from the album they released the 30-second-song
Yoko Ono, which, according to the
Guinness Book of Records, is the shortest single ever released (with a videoclip)—another example of their sense of humour. During their tour in 2001 they sold the limited edition album
5, 6, 7, 8 - Bullenstaat! ("5,6,7,8 – Cop State!") consisting of short punk songs that were written and recorded with the previous years full-length album published a year before, and with some cover songs that were published in 1995 (another tour only EP). After that, they again took a break. During the break Bela did some acting and Farin recorded his first solo album
Endlich Urlaub! ("Holiday at last!"). In late 2002, they did an
MTV Unplugged session in a school auditorium with the school's band (Albert Schweitzer Gymnasium, Hamburg, Germany), which they released under the title ''
Rock'n'Roll Realschule'' (in allusion to the
Ramones' song and the film ''
Rock 'n' Roll High School). The following year they released a new two-CD album, Geräusch'' ("Noise"). In December 2003 a live DVD was recorded and published the following year. While the band was on another break, Farin released another solo album
Am Ende der Sonne ("At the end of the Sun"). In 2005 a new version of the album
Debil was released under the name
Devil containing the original track listings plus some
B-sides and previously unreleased bonus material. The album can now be sold legally, since all the tracks from the original LP have been removed from the Index. Only Geschwisterliebe remains there. In 2006, Bela B made a solo album,
Bingo. On 2 November 2007, Die Ärzte released their latest album,
Jazz ist anders ("Jazz is nothing like this", lit. "Jazz is different"), which was preceded by the single
Junge ("Boy").
Junge was shown for the first time on MTV TRL Germany on 14 September 2007. The album was followed by two tours, in winter 2007 and summer 2008. After they played a few concerts in 2009, they took a break. In April 2011, they toured under the pseudonym "Laternen-Joe" and, in December, they gave two special concerts at the
Westfalenhalle in Dortmund, one only for women, and one only for men. In 2012, Die Ärzte released their next record
auch ("as well", "also"), preceded by the single "zeiDverschwÄndung" ("wÄste of time"). From May to August, as well as November and December in the same year, they went on two concert tours throughout Germany, Austria and Switzerland. Their concerts at the Festhalle Frankfurt and the Waldbühne Berlin were used for a live album and concert film called
Die Nacht der Dämonen ("Night of the Demons"), which was released in 2013. In October 2020, die Ärzte released their first studio album in 8 years,
Hell ("bright"). The tour that was meant to follow the album was first postponed into 2021 before being completely cancelled because of the
COVID-19 pandemic. In 2023, they played a further tour, announced only a week before it started (and sold out within minutes), and announced two further concerts at
Tempelhofer Feld for 2024.
Relationship with Die Toten Hosen Throughout their career, Die Ärzte have often been compared to fellow German punk band
Die Toten Hosen; a comparison that has often been stylized as a rivalry by the media despite both bands never having an official feud. The comparisons are mostly drawn because of a similar origin as both bands were pioneers of the German punk rock scene and started around the same time in the early 1980s, in both cases evolving from earlier locally famous punk bands (Die Ärzte from
Soilent Grün and Die Toten Hosen from
ZK). Furthermore, both bands are heavily linked to their cities of origin: Die Ärzte from Berlin and Die Toten Hosen from Düsseldorf. While Die Ärzte are generally known for their more humorous approach to music, Die Toten Hosen also have a couple of humorous songs, mostly about alcohol. Both bands enjoyed a similar career trajectory and success (with the most notable difference being the 5-year hiatus of Die Ärzte). Due to all of these similarities, multiple media outlets in Germany tried to establish a
Beatles/
Stones-style rivalry between both bands. While both bands admit to a certain level of competition and rivalry between them in the past, including a physical altercations in the early 80s, both bands are amicable towards each other today, if not poking fun at said "rivalry". Adopting aliases Die Ärzte and Die Toten Hosen have played small club shows together in the past. In 2012 Die Toten Hosen covered Die Ärzte's
Schrei nach Liebe on the bonus disc for their album
Ballast der Republik. The same year, they covered the song while headlining Germany's biggest rock festival
Rock am Ring and have continued playing the songs live on multiple occasions. In the music video for die Ärzte's "Noise" , as Bela B, Die Toten Hosen drummer Vom Ritchie makes an appearance playing drums with a Toten Hosen banner behind him, before being chased out by the band. In June 2022 Die Ärzte appeared at one of the 40th anniversary concerts Die Toten Hosen gave in Düsseldorf. They first performed two Die Toten Hosen songs on their own, before being joined by Die Toten Hosen for
Schrei nach Liebe and
Blitzkrieg Bop. == Band name ==