At the end the singing turns into wild screaming. “You’re like adrenaline, adrenaline, poisonous,” sing the lead singers, who call themselves Dodo and Fülli. First loud, then screaming, even though it started out so dreamy. Even the sound of the guitar makes it in the first few bars of the song “Naturally” by Enlightenment and Rufo, to capture the mood of the track. Bass and drums come in, allowing the atmosphere of the first bars to take shape. The vocals that follow also sound unpolished, in keeping with the indie rock style of the song.
“You might think it’s a heartbreak song, but actually it’s more of a romanticized diss track to someone we once worked with,” says Antonia Lorrig, 21, with a laugh. With their lyrics, the band paints partly abstract pictures without becoming too complex. The language is often kept simple, the rhymes are monosyllables. “After our performances, people often tell us that we inspired them to make music too,” says drummer Lars Philipp Göritz, 23. “Our aim is not to be successful or professional. We simply have fun making music .”
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When you see enlightenment and Rufo at a concert, you feel a casual lightness – music can also be low-threshold. The band also doesn’t like to categorize itself into a genre; they have provisionally classified themselves as “experimental pop punk”. The soundscape of the tracks ranges from quiet indie to a more punk-like sound. And before the performances themselves, the band constantly reinvents itself. “We think of a motto and then we dress up: vulvas, favorite vegetables, everything was there,” says Dodo. This also helps her to be less excited. He just wouldn’t want to play in a motorcycle helmet anymore, Nico interjects and laughs, that was pretty hot.
“The lyrics are often about what’s on your mind at the moment. Sometimes it’s about heartbreak, sometimes it’s about hating the unemployment office,” says Nico Schneider, 23, the band’s guitarist. “It’s spontaneous and impulsive,” agrees bassist Liv Hesse, 21. And that seems to be popular: whether in Kafe Marat, in Milla or at the Pro-Choice demo, you can regularly find Erleuchtung and Rufo on line-ups. “It makes me overjoyed. At the beginning it was mainly friends who came to our performances. Now I see people I don’t know singing along to lyrics that Schnuri and I wrote on the way home,” says Dodo. Dodo and Julie Himmelreich aka Fülli have been friends since childhood. They founded the band six years ago and have been playing with a full line-up since 2022. They plan to record an EP soon. “We follow a DIY philosophy: print merch, make costumes, mix sound. We try to do everything independently,” says Lars.
Enlightenment and Rufo
Style: experimental pop punk
Occupation: Julie Himmelreich (vocals), Antonia Lorrig (vocals), Liv Hesse (bass), Lars Phillip Göritz (drums), Nico Schneider (guitar)
Out of: Munich
Since: 2022