Escape With Romeo‘s return stopped being interesting simply as a comeback with 2024’s “Suspicious Bliss”. That album established that Thomas Elbern was not interested in reopening the band’s history merely to revisit it; there was new material to write and, increasingly, a present worth responding to. “Night After Night”, released on August 7, 2026 through Zeitklang, continues that trajectory with a harder, more immediate record built around guitars, electronics and a growing unease with the systems that govern contemporary life.

The circumstances behind it were different too. After forty years working as a music journalist for national radio, Elbern suddenly found himself with considerably more time, and sketches already sitting on his hard drive began turning into songs. At the same time, the world entering those songs had become increasingly difficult to separate into “online” and “real”: surveillance, AI, algorithmic behaviour, political extremism, digital dependence and the erosion of privacy all appear across the album. What interests Elbern, however, is less dystopia as spectacle than the moment when something previously intolerable becomes ordinary enough to be accepted as the “new normal.”

That tension also reaches the language of the record. Titles such as “Edit Me Out” and “Cancel Anytime” take expressions associated with platforms and subscriptions and apply them to people, while “New World Order” looks at the vulnerability created when increasingly large parts of everyday existence are handed over to digital systems. Musically, Escape With Romeo remain recognisably themselves, but the references continue to expand: “Wrong Side of Town Pt. 2”, for example, emerged after Elbern encountered Skeler and began imagining what EWR doing hardwave might sound like.

I spoke with Thomas Elbern about “Night After Night”, AI and what he calls “hijacked emotion”, why individuality can coexist with extreme predictability, independence after more than three decades, the practical realities of touring as a trio, and why Escape With Romeo still have reasons to move forward rather than simply preserve what they have already built.

Escape With Romeo interview

Karo: When I reviewed “Suspicious Bliss” for ReGen, the record seemed to exist in a productive contradiction: the music had become more physical and guitar-driven just as the lyrics were becoming increasingly preoccupied with technological intrusion, isolation and a reality that could no longer quite be trusted. “Night After Night” is harder, more emotional and more direct. Did “Suspicious Bliss” already contain the beginning of this record, or did something change in the two years between them that demanded a different degree of force?

Thomas: I would say that “Night After Night” follows the same path that “Suspicious Bliss” already craved. My personal situation was also different: my career as a music journalist working for national radio finally ended after 40 years. Suddenly, I had a lot of time, and all those sketches that were already on my hard drive began to form into songs.

The surroundings played a role as well. Watching catastrophic news and seeing more and more worst-case scenarios developing in the world encouraged me to make an album like this.

Karo: “Night After Night” is an interesting title because it suggests duration rather than catastrophe. Not one decisive collapse, but waking repeatedly into the same anxieties, systems and headlines until the exceptional becomes ordinary. Is that accumulation important to the album? Is the record concerned less with disaster itself than with what happens psychologically when people become accustomed to living inside conditions that would once have seemed intolerable?

Thomas: That’s a very good point. Yes, it is exactly the accumulation that is described here. It’s the thing people call “the new normal.”

What was intolerable in the past can become the new reality, and there seems to be no collective outcry. Instead, we see growing racism, homophobia, income disparity, hate speech and leaders who make everything worse.

Karo: “Edit Me Out”, “Cancel Anytime” and “Something That Lasts” almost form their own vocabulary of contemporary relationships. Words that belong to software, subscriptions and digital services have slipped very easily into the language of intimacy. Has that linguistic shift become interesting to you as a songwriter: the idea that people can now be edited, muted, cancelled, replaced or simply unsubscribed from?

Thomas: A lot of the titles on the album are “internet speech”: “Edit Me Out”, “Cancel Anytime”, or the song “What They Don’t Tell You”, which is not on the album. They all circle around things you read very often in blogs and publications.

It’s the idea that the intimacy you mentioned has stopped being genuinely private. It’s also the idea of masses becoming extremely predictable while still believing themselves to be individuals.

I got this idea while reading a lot of travel blogs. People travel through Bali or Laos and think they are doing something individual. People think that they are using a product, but instead they are the product. And yes, in that sense, they are all extremely replaceable.

Karo: Artificial intelligence was already present on “Suspicious Bliss”, while in our 2024 conversation you spoke about computer-generated voices and described the DAW itself as an instrument. The question feels different now. AI is no longer merely something an artist can use or write about; it increasingly influences distribution, visibility, recommendation and even judgments about value. Has the real concern shifted from what machines are capable of creating to the decisions we are gradually allowing them to make on our behalf?

Thomas: Again, a very good point. The DAW nowadays, or certainly in the foreseeable future, can create almost anything. Even the artist who was once needed to programme it and provide the input it needs can now be reduced to somebody writing a prompt while the computer does the rest.

To quote our famous song “Somebody”, with a wink, this is the “hijacked emotion.”

On the other hand, in combination with a great artistic vision and real skill, this technology could lead to something completely new. But most of what I currently hear and see online is AI-generated shit that feels like cosmic debris, or a bad idea of chart music, while consuming far too many resources.

Karo: “New World Order” enters territory where dystopian language has almost become exhausted through overuse. War, AI, surveillance, extremism and environmental collapse are no longer speculative vocabulary; they are part of everyday information flow. How do you stop a song about the present from merely reproducing that background noise? At what point does a general anxiety become specific enough to turn into music?

Thomas: With “New World Order”, everything started with the trance arpeggio you hear at the beginning.

Lyrically, it could be seen as a protest song about the possibilities of digital surveillance combined with greedy corporations that will enslave you and take over your digital existence.

“Your beautiful saviour will shoot you in the back” is a metaphor for how two-faced everything is in “New World Order”. It’s similar to the idea in the dark comedy film “Brazil”, where a simple typing error, changing the name Tuttle to Buttle, can ruin somebody’s entire life.

In 2026, it can be the deadly phishing email, a vicious Trojan on your computer or your social media account that turns your life upside down. The idea of “New World Order” is essentially: stop for a moment and think about what actually surrounds you in 2026.

Karo: “Wrong Side of Town Pt. 2” returns to “After the Future”, an album you have spoken about with considerable ambivalence, and which became connected, indirectly, to the period when you decided Escape With Romeo had reached an ending. Why reopen that particular door now? Is “Pt. 2” continuing the narrative of the original song, or are you also revisiting your own relationship with a period of the band you once wanted to leave behind?

Thomas: It’s actually neither of those things.

I always loved the atmosphere of the original, particularly the cinematic quality of the sounds involved. Then I went to a gig by Australian DJ and producer Skeler in Cologne the night before, listening to and enjoying all that wave, hardwave and phonk-related material being played there.

I went back to my DAW the next day and tried to recreate what I had heard through a follow-up to “Wrong Side of Town”, using new lyrics, guitars and beats.

It’s my idea of EWR doing hardwave.

Karo: “You Need the Drugs” is an unusual cover because the original already sits between musical worlds: WestBam and Klaus Jankuhn’s electronic language meeting Richard Butler’s unmistakable Psychedelic Furs presence. Escape With Romeo has occupied that border between electronics and guitars for most of its life. Did the song feel strangely familiar for that reason? And at what point in the rearrangement did it stop feeling like someone else’s material?

Thomas: The idea of doing “You Need the Drugs” was born and realised even before the album itself took form.

I heard the original at a New Year’s party and immediately heard the EWR version in my head. It was clear that our version would become very much Escape With Romeo.

Guitars, guitars, guitars were the key.

Karo: Frenzy Erl’s role here goes far beyond drumming: the two of you recorded, mixed and produced the album together, and he also mastered it. Does having a drummer involved at every stage alter the hierarchy of a recording? When the person responsible for pulse is simultaneously making decisions about density, space and final sound, can rhythm begin to determine the architecture rather than simply inhabit it?

Thomas: When I make a demo or even a final production, I also programme the drums that I hear in my head. Frenzy usually plays the drums when the song has reached its genuinely finished version.

During the final phase of production, we decide together where the aural journey should go. What is important is that we normally mix and master everything in Frenzy’s studio in Munich, where there are no distractions and we can finish the album together.

Karo: Stella Tonon’s contribution to “Suspicious Bliss” was already more interesting than straightforward backing vocals; you said in 2024 that she immediately understood where her voice belonged inside the material. On “Night After Night”, does the presence of another voice ever change the point of view of a song itself? Can a voice entering from outside destabilise the narrator and make you hear your own lyrics differently?

Thomas: Talking about the opening track, “Edit Me Out”, the female voice there is actually a sample. That is nothing new for me; my way of working has always been very hip-hop in that respect. If I find a great legal sample that I want to work with, I go for it.

So that female voice is a major part of “Edit Me Out”, but many of the other female voices and improvisations on the record are very much Stella.

She always brings her own particular idea into the music of EWR. She fully understands and feels both the sadness and the rough elements in the music, and she can respond to them with her unique voice.

Karo: You once described the audience as the place where a song is finally tested: only onstage do you discover whether its internal logic actually survives contact with people. Escape With Romeo is now taking these songs out as a trio, despite studio arrangements that can contain almost unlimited layers. Has that smaller configuration forced you to identify what is genuinely indispensable in a song? What remains once production is stripped away and three people have to make the idea physically convincing?

Thomas: Interesting point! We are studio nerds and take full advantage of every sound source we can get hold of.

But if you want to survive financially as a touring band, you have to make decisions that nearly every band makes nowadays. That is called backing tracks.

You have to decide which parts of the sound are the most important. Those are played live. The rest becomes like a parallel universe coming through the speakers. Making that distinction is always crucial.

But I also think that, as a trio, we cannot strip things down much further than we already do. Drums, guitar, bass and the main vocal always have to be live.

Karo: Escape With Romeo built a genuinely independent structure remarkably early, with label, studio and management gradually becoming part of the same ecosystem. But independence in 2026 is a peculiar condition: an artist may own the masters and finance the record while still relying on platforms, distributors and opaque recommendation systems to become visible. Has independence become less about escaping gatekeepers and more about choosing which gatekeepers one is prepared to depend on?

Thomas: Having been independent for more than three decades, I can say that the game is always changing.

The role of record companies has largely vanished for us; now everything is about live gigs and promoters. Yes, it’s also about numbers and streaming, but it is still, as it always was, about luck.

If your music gets used in a famous series or film, you automatically reach another level.

And today’s gatekeepers are tomorrow’s open doors. It’s a complicated music world and nobody is particularly happy about it. But in the end, connecting directly with your fans will always remain one of the main points.

Karo: There is something counterintuitive about making a record more direct after nearly four decades of accumulated technique, experience and musical memory. Young bands are often direct because they have relatively little to discard; an established artist has to decide what no longer deserves to remain. Is directness for you now partly an act of subtraction? And after 13 albums, is making something immediate actually harder than making something elaborate?

Thomas: I found working on the previous albums quite liberating.

From a production point of view, it is always a pain in the ass, because it’s the final 15 percent that creates most of the work. But it is liberating in the sense that we don’t have to prove anything to anyone.

We can evolve and do whatever we think is right for EWR.

Making an album is both elaborate and, in this case, immediate, so “Night After Night” feels like a natural step in our history.

Karo: And finally, where can people actually catch Escape With Romeo on the road in the coming months? Which dates or places are you particularly looking forward to, and is there any show on this run that matters most to you?

Thomas: We are touring mainly in Germany in 2026, and we plan to play more abroad in 2027, if the world is still standing. That includes Europe and South America.

Karo: Thank you very much for your time, Thomas.

Thomas: Thank you, Karo!

“Night After Night” is out now through Zeitklang. Escape With Romeo’s confirmed 2026 tour begins in Munich on 19 September and continues through Cologne, Essen, Karlsruhe, Bielefeld, Nuremberg, Rüsselsheim, Hamburg and Berlin, before crossing into Poland for the Shadow Dance Party at Pod Minoga in Poznań on 31 October. A December date in Rhede is also confirmed, while the band says further dates for 2027 are being developed.

About Escape With Romeo

Escape With Romeo were founded in Cologne in 1989 by singer, guitarist and songwriter Thomas Elbern. Before starting the project, Elbern had fronted the new-wave band Seltsame Zustände and had been a guitarist and songwriter with Pink Turns Blue. The first Escape With Romeo album appeared in 1989, and the early track “Somebody” became one of the songs most closely associated with the band, helping establish an audience beyond Germany. The band’s own historical account describes the project as growing from Elbern’s initial setup of Atari computers, drum machines, four-track recording, turntables, guitar and bass into a full live band after “Somebody” began circulating in clubs.

From the beginning, Escape With Romeo combined guitars with electronic production rather than treating rock and electronics as separate phases of the band. Their long-used description, “Post Punk meets modern Electronica,” remains a useful shorthand, although the catalogue itself has moved through considerably more territory: new wave, darkwave, alternative rock, electronic pop, acoustic work and, increasingly in the current period, elements of trip-hop, post-rock and contemporary electronic production.

The early album sequence included “Escape With Romeo,” “Autumn on Venus,” “Next Stop Eternally,” “Blast of Silence” and “How Far Can You Go?” Later records included “Come Here White Light,” “Love Alchemy,” “Psalms of Survival,” “Emotional Iceage,” “Samsara” and “After the Future.” From 2001 onward, releases were issued through Zeitklang Records, the label established and run by Elbern.

In 2017, Elbern announced that Escape With Romeo would come to an end. A farewell period followed, including the band’s final tour in 2018 and festival appearances in 2019. What was intended as an ending did not remain one. During the pandemic years Elbern began reconsidering the project, and Escape With Romeo returned in 2022, initially through newly arranged versions of older material and the double compilation “Based on a True Story – Best of Escape With Romeo.” The official notes to the 2022 versions of “Refuge” and “White Room” explicitly described those recordings as the beginning of the band’s return.

The more consequential step came with “Suspicious Bliss” in November 2024. Rather than continuing primarily through retrospective material, Escape With Romeo released an entirely new album. Its harder guitar sound, electronics and dystopian lyrical concerns established the direction that now continues into “Night After Night”. The band themselves described “Suspicious Bliss” as a fresh start following their 2022 reorganisation.

Released on 7 August 2026, “Night After Night” is Escape With Romeo’s 13th studio album. It contains fourteen tracks and was produced by Thomas Elbern and Frenzy Erl, with Erl also handling the mastering. “You Need the Drugs” is the album’s one outside composition, written by Klaus Jankuhn, Maximilian Lenz/WestBam and Richard Butler; the remaining songs are credited to Elbern. The record was preceded by 2026 singles including “Fear’s a Ghost” and “Sound and the Fury”.

Escape With Romeo currently perform live as a trio: Thomas Elbern on vocals and guitar, Tobias Schwartz on bass and vocals, and Frenzy Erl on drums. Stella Tonon remains part of the wider recording world around the band and contributed vocals to recent material, including the “Suspicious Bliss” period and subsequent recordings, but she is not part of the touring trio.

The current configuration is deliberately compact. Elbern describes guitar, bass, drums and lead vocals as the elements that must remain genuinely live, while additional studio layers are carried through backing tracks. That division is less an attempt to reproduce the recordings literally than a practical decision about which components constitute the physical core of Escape With Romeo onstage.

The band begin the “Night After Night Tour 2026” in Munich on 19 September, followed by Cologne, two Essen shows, Karlsruhe, Bielefeld, Nuremberg, Rüsselsheim, Hamburg and Berlin. On 31 October they cross into Poland for the Shadow Dance Party: Halloween Edition at Pod Minoga in Poznań, followed by a December show in Rhede. The official band site says further dates are being developed for 2027, while Elbern tells Side-Line that the plan is to return to broader international touring, including Europe and South America.

Interview by Karo Kratochwil.

Karo Kratochwil

Based in Wrocław, I work as a music journalist and photographer covering electro, industrial, EBM, gothic, and darkwave. My work includes features and live coverage, as well as concert, portrait, promo, and theater photography. What interests me most is the connection between artistic intention, what the work communicates, and what unfolds live on stage, all in pursuit of the bigger picture behind the music.

German post-punk and darkwave act Escape With Romeo released their 13th studio album, “Night After Night”, on August 7, 2026 through Zeitklang. The Cologne band’s new release arrives on CD digipak and digital, and follows the group’s 2024 comeback album “Suspicious Bliss”.

‘Night After Night’ tracklist and credits

“Night After Night” runs 14 tracks: “Edit Me Out”, “No Turning Back”, “Sound and the Fury”, “Something That Lasts”, “New World Order”, “Cancel Anytime”, “I Need Something Stronger”, “Fear’s a Ghost”, “Little Did I Know”, “Night After Night”, “Skyscraper Spiders”, “I’m My Own Worst Enemy”, “You Need the Drugs” and “Wrong Side of Town Pt. 2”. All songs are written by singer, guitarist and songwriter Thomas Elbern, except “You Need the Drugs”, a cover of the 2013 WestBam track featuring Richard Butler of the Psychedelic Furs, credited here to its writers Klaus Jankuhn, Maximilian Lenz and Butler.

The album was recorded, mixed and produced by Elbern and drummer Frenzy Erl at Zeitklang in Brühl and Highline in Munich between January 2025 and June 2026, and mastered by Erl. Elbern handles vocals, guitars, synths, vocoder and samples, with Frenzy Erl on drums, Tobias Schwartz on bass and Stella Tonon on vocals. Artwork and graphic design are by schmalfett.com.

Themes and rollout

The band describes “Night After Night” as harder, more emotional and more direct than “Suspicious Bliss”, the direction Elbern set out to push further at the start of 2025. Songs including “No Turning Back” and “New World Order” address what the band calls a dystopian zeitgeist driven by AI, while “Skyscraper Spiders” and “Wrong Side of Town Pt. 2” extend the mood signalled by the single “Fear’s a Ghost”. Press materials for the release describe it as “somewhere between post-rock, trip-hop, and the much overused term post-punk.”

“Night After Night” was preceded by the singles “Fear’s a Ghost”, released on February 6, 2026, and “Sound and the Fury”, which Side-Line covered as the third single from the album in March 2026. The band will support the album with a Germany tour in autumn 2026, performing as a trio and mixing songs from “Night After Night” with material from across its history.

About Escape With Romeo

Escape With Romeo was founded in Cologne in 1989 by singer and guitarist Thomas Elbern, who had previously fronted the new wave band Seltsame Zustände and played guitar and wrote songs for Pink Turns Blue. The band’s early catalog appeared through Sound Factory, starting with the self-titled “Escape With Romeo” in 1990 and continuing with “Autumn on Venus” (1991), “Next Stop Eternally” (1993), “Blast of Silence” (1996) and “How Far Can You Go” (1998), a run that included the early single “Somebody”, the band’s best-known track from that period. Keyboardist Martin Pott joined from the second album onward.

From 2001 the band’s releases moved to Zeitklang, the label Elbern runs himself, starting with “Come Here White Light” (2001) and continuing through “Love Alchemy” (2002), “Psalms of Survival” (2004), “Emotional Iceage” (2007), “Samsara” (2012) and “After the Future” (2015). Escape With Romeo announced its farewell in 2017, played a final tour in 2018 and had dissolved following festival appearances in 2019.

The band returned in 2022 with the double compilation “Based on a True Story – Best of Escape With Romeo”, which led into “Suspicious Bliss”, released on November 1, 2024 as the first new studio album since “After the Future”. The 2026 rollout for “Night After Night” opened with “Fear’s a Ghost” in February, followed by “Sound and the Fury” in March, and now arrives with the album itself on August 7, 2026 via Zeitklang.

Bernard - Side-Line Staff

Chief editor of Side-Line – which basically means I spend my days wading through a relentless flood of press releases from labels, artists, DJs, and zealous correspondents. My job? Strip out the promo nonsense, verify what’s actually real, and decide which stories make the cut and which get tossed into the digital void. Outside the news filter bubble, I’m all in for quality sushi and helping raise funds for Ukraine’s ongoing fight against the modern-day axis of evil. Besides music I’m also an SEO and AI content flow specialist and have an interest in everything finance from stocks to crypto. There is music in everything!

side-line.com

German post-punk/darkwave act Escape With Romeo just released the digital single “Sound and the Fury”. The track comes out via Zeit.Klang Records and is the third single from the band’s forthcoming 13th studio album, “Night After Night,” which is scheduled for late summer 2026.

Thomas Elbern adds that “Sound and the Fury” was the first song written for “Night After Night” and that it was also the track that set the further recordings for the album in motion. An official video is also available.

Escape With Romeo tour dates 2026

Here are Escape With Romeo’s upcoming tour dates currently listed for 2026. The band’s official site says that more dates will be announced.

• April 4, 2026 – Death Disco Indoor Festival, Athens, Greece
• May 29, 2026 – Dark City, Benidorm, Spain
• July 25, 2026 – Amphi Festival, Cologne, Germany
• September 19, 2026 – Liveevil / LIVE EVIL im Fat Cat, Munich, Germany
• October 2, 2026 – Yard Club, Cologne, Germany
• October 3, 2026 – Grend / GREND Kulturzentrum, Essen, Germany
• October 10, 2026 – Die Stadtmitte, Karlsruhe, Germany
• October 11, 2026 – Movie EventCafe, Bielefeld, Germany
• October 23, 2026 – Club Stereo, Nuremberg, Germany
• October 24, 2026 – Das Rind, Rüsselsheim, Germany
• October 29, 2026 – Hafenklang, Hamburg, Germany (support: RUEBI)
• October 30, 2026 – Urban Spree, Berlin, Germany
• October 31, 2026 – Shadow Dance Party: Halloween Edition, Pod Minoga, Poznań, Poland

About Escape With Romeo

Escape With Romeo was founded in Cologne in 1989 by singer and guitarist Thomas Elbern. Before launching the band, Elbern had been active in Seltsame Zustände and later played guitar and wrote songs for Pink Turns Blue. Musically the band described its style as “Post Punk meets modern Electronica.”

The band’s early catalog was released through Sound Factory. That run started with the self-titled “Escape With Romeo” in 1990, followed by “Autumn on Venus” in 1991, “Next Stop Eternally” in 1993, “Blast of Silence” in 1996 and “How Far Can You Go” in 1998. The early single “Somebody” became the band’s best-known scene track, and keyboard player Martin Pott joined from the second album onward.

From 2001 onward, Escape With Romeo releases moved to Zeitklang, the label run by Thomas Elbern. Albums from that period include “Come Here White Light” (2001), “Love Alchemy” (2002), “Psalms of Survival” (2004), “Emotional Iceage” (2007), “Samsara” (2012) and “After the Future” (2015).

The band announced its farewell in 2017, played a final tour in 2018, and after festival appearances in 2019 was dissolved.

The band returned in 2022 with “Based on a True Story – Best of Escape With Romeo,” a double compilation that reworked older material. That led into “Suspicious Bliss,” released on November 1, 2024, which marked the first new studio album since “After the Future.” In early 2026 the band began the rollout for “Night After Night” with “Fear’s a ghost,” and now follows it with “Sound and the Fury.”

Anno 2026, Thomas is joined by Max Küchenmeister, Franz “Frenzy” Erl and Tobias Schwartz.

Bernard - Side-Line Staff

Chief editor of Side-Line – which basically means I spend my days wading through a relentless flood of press releases from labels, artists, DJs, and zealous correspondents. My job? Strip out the promo nonsense, verify what’s actually real, and decide which stories make the cut and which get tossed into the digital void. Outside the news filter bubble, I’m all in for quality sushi and helping raise funds for Ukraine’s ongoing fight against the modern-day axis of evil. Besides music I’m also an SEO and AI content flow specialist and have an interest in everything finance from stocks to crypto. There is music in everything!

side-line.com

For over three decades, Escape With Romeo has been a cornerstone in the realms of Dark-Wave, Post-Punk, and Melancholic-Pop. Founded in 1989 by Thomas Elbern, the band has masterfully crafted a sound that seamlessly blends melancholic melodies, driving rhythms, and heartfelt lyrics. In this interview, we explore their enduring legacy, their creative process, and what the future holds for this iconic German band. When they released the album “After The Future” in 2015, followed by a final tour, many believed it marked the end of their remarkable journey. However, by the end of last year, Escape With Romeo made a triumphant return with their latest album, “Suspicious Bliss”. This fresh and invigorated opus showcases a revisited, dynamic sound, proving that the band’s creative spirit remains as vibrant as ever. Inspired by this incredible comeback, I reached out to Thomas Elbern to learn more about the band’s evolution and the story behind “Suspicious Bliss”. (Courtesy by Inferno Sound Diaries)

Q: The 2015 album “After The Future” was, for a while, thought to be the final chapter for Escape With Romeo. Thankfully, that changed with the release of your latest opus, “Suspicious Bliss,” at the end of last year. Looking back, how do you view the journey from that apparent conclusion to this new beginning? What sparked the band’s resurrection?

Thomas: I was fed up with the whole music industry and all the stress that it brought. Also I did not see any perspective in playing the old songs again and again and was not very content with the “After The future” album, that came out in 2015 in the end. So we did this ‘final’ tour that ended in the summer 2019 at W-Fest in Belgium.

Then corona came and changed everything. I had a lot of time to rethink my musical past and what I really wanted with my music in the first place. So the idea came to rethink a lot of the Escape With Romeo songs and put them in another form. That turned out to be the compilation  “Based On A True Story” which was more or less arranged like the versions we play live. For me and the band there was a new wave of motivation to return to the roots somewhere in-between electronics, guitar driven Post-Punk and Indie. And after that worked, there was a new spark, that enlighted the flame of  “Suspicious Bliss”. An album where the guitar has a strong role in the sound and that is also the consequence of a harder and more direct sound, that speaks much more for 2024.

Q: With “Suspicious Bliss,” many fans might see this as the start of Escape With Romeo 2.0. How does that feel to you as the creative force behind the band? What sets this album apart from your earlier work, both musically and personally?

Thomas: The sound is more rough, unpolished and pushed to the edge. Maybe that is because I was listening to a lot of Metal-Core and Post-Rock at the time of writing. I’ve discovered the band Sleep Token and they became an influence as well. Also I’ve discovered that there is an important transition possible: I’ve written and released a couple of tracks with my other Electronic project Dirty Vocoder. I found a way to transform some of these songs into the Escape With Romeo Soundscape by adding a lot of guitars, real singing, but also computer-generated voices, as I did with Dirty Vocoder. That was a breakthrough in the whole production.

And lyrically it’s very much about the time we are living in: angst, revenge, artificial intelligence, poverty, war times and being alone in overcrowded world. Nothing is quite what it seems, that is the idea behind the album title “Suspicious Bliss”.  

Q: Can you share some insights into the composition and production of “Suspicious Bliss”? How did the collaboration process unfold, and what roles did everyone take on? Did you have a clear vision for the album from the start, and how do you determine when a piece is complete or truly resonates with your vision?

Thomas: I did spent a lot of time in front of my Digital Audio Workstation (DAW). Very often I begin with just a sample that creates a special vibe. I see the DAW as a big instrument, technique and songwriting work flawlessly together.

The real challenge is finishing a song, because you’ve got so many possibilities nowadays. But in the end it’s the melody that creates the magic, wrapped into a production that peels out the good moments. Frenzy (our drummer) and I were very busy in the end of the production session and we are very nerdy, when it comes to a distinct sound and vibe. Also singer Stella Tonon from Cologne, who I work with for years now, had a strong influence on the sound. She knew instantly what to do with her voice, to fit into the sound and the vibe.

And yes, I’ve rediscovered the guitar as a weapon of happiness.

Q: You already mentioned some of the themes that inspired you so it all looks like dystopian themes played a role in shaping “Suspicious Bliss.” How did these themes influence the music and lyrics? And were there any specific personal experiences or global events that left a mark on the album’s creation?

Thomas: There were more global events than personal experiences on this album. Looking the news everyday gives you a glimpse of what is going on in the world. The direction it is heading to is very frightening.

I personally feel sorry for the younger generations that have to deal in the future with the climate change and right wing governments and a lot of other crap the we humans did cause.

That is mainly the influence on “Suspicious Bliss”; songs like “Find Out The Hard Way”, “Evil Renegade” or “No Humans Allowed” deal with all this.

Q: In recent years, you’ve kept busy with side projects like Glitter & Darkness, Dirty Vocoder, all released on your own label Zeit.Klang Records. How do you reflect on these ventures? What have these projects taught you, and how vital is composing and experimenting with music to you personally?

Thomas: These project did not a have a big commercial value, but a strong one on my artistic freedom. I find it very important to experiment with sound and styles with no genre borders in mind. It’s like finding something, without searching for it, very inspiring. As soon as you put it out, it needs labels for people to find it and relate to it.

But I learned a lot from a project like Dirty Vocoder that had, as I mentioned before, a big influence on “Suspicious Bliss”, because some of the songs have been there already, but needed a makeover for Escape With Romeo.

Also working with a DAW like Logic, it’s always growing and gives you new possibilities, that were Science Fiction in the 90s.

Q: If you could speak to your younger self; the Thomas Elbern who founded Escape With Romeo back in 1989, what advice would you give him? Looking at where you are now, what has stayed consistent since the beginning, and how do you envision the future of the band in terms of new projects, performances, and productions?

Thomas: My advice to my younger self would be: ‘never lose that consciousness, that brought you to music in the first place’. At a very young age I was already hearing the music that I didn’t compose yet. Sometimes I was in constant dream state, where I heard the complete orchestra play.

Being without inspiration is hard, you should do something else, but not making music.

And when I learned something for the future:  I’ll never do a ‘final’ tour again, you don’t know what’s coming.

For example; I’m working on a cover version right now, that idea came very suddenly on new year’s eve 2024 out of nowhere.

I always want to be open for spontaneous ideas!

Inferno Sound Diaries

I have been working for over 30 years with Side-line as the main reviewer. My taste is eclectic, uncoventional and I prefer to look for the pearls, even if the bands are completely unknown, thus staying loyal to the Side-Line philosophy of nurturing new talents.

www.side-line.com

Escape With Romeo returns with their first new album since 2015. This year, the German band led by Thomas Elbern also celebrates 35 years of existence. Following a few EP releases, their new full length features 14 songs inspired by our dystopian world. This theme has proven to be highly inspiring, resulting in beautifully crafted tracks. Each song is a work of art, imbued with a certain melancholy, where guitars and electronics seamlessly merge to create an exciting and cohesive whole. At times ethereal and even slightly psychedelic, as in the opening track, the album also explores danceable rhythms and grooves driven by dynamic sequences in other songs. This variety places the work somewhere between Rock-Wave and melancholic Pop, with a polished, meticulous achievement. Adding to its elegance, Thomas Elbern’s vocals are complemented by a female voice on several tracks, bringing a delicate yet powerful nuance to the compositions. While it would be an overstatement to say Escape With Romeo has entirely reinvented themselves, this album feels more refined and perhaps even more accessible than ever. A triumphant and noteworthy return! (Rating:8½).

Listen to “The Weight Of The World”:

About Escape With Romeo

Escape With Romeo was founded in Cologne in 1989 by singer and guitarist Thomas Elbern. Before launching the band, Elbern had been active in Seltsame Zustände and later played guitar and wrote songs for Pink Turns Blue. Musically the band described its style as “Post Punk meets modern Electronica”.

The band’s early catalog was released through Sound Factory. That run started with the self-titled “Escape With Romeo” in 1990, followed by “Autumn on Venus” in 1991, “Next Stop Eternally” in 1993, “Blast of Silence” in 1996 and “How Far Can You Go” in 1998. The early single “Somebody” became the band’s best-known scene track, and keyboard player Martin Pott joined from the second album onward.

From 2001 onward, Escape With Romeo releases moved to Zeitklang, the label run by Thomas Elbern. Albums from that period include “Come Here White Light” (2001), “Love Alchemy” (2002), “Psalms of Survival” (2004), “Emotional Iceage” (2007), “Samsara” (2012) and “After the Future” (2015). The band announced its farewell in 2017, played a final tour in 2018, and after festival appearances in 2019 was dissolved.

The band returned in 2022 with “Based on a True Story – Best of Escape With Romeo”, a double compilation that reworked older material. In early 2025, Thomas Elbern looked back on the band’s history in a Side-Line interview, ‘It’s The Melody That Creates The Magic’. Anno 2026, Thomas is joined by Max Küchenmeister, Franz “Frenzy” Erl and Tobias Schwartz.

“Suspicious Bliss”, released on November 1, 2024 via Zeit.Klang Records, marked the first new studio album since “After the Future” and is the album reviewed here.

Inferno Sound Diaries

I have been working for over 30 years with Side-line as the main reviewer. My taste is eclectic, uncoventional and I prefer to look for the pearls, even if the bands are completely unknown, thus staying loyal to the Side-Line philosophy of nurturing new talents.

www.side-line.com

Dirty Vocoder is a new electronic solo project by Cologne based Thomas Elbern, founder and frontman of the German new wave band Escape With Romeo. Besides Thomas Elbern we also find multimedia artist Shufflerror behind the project. Out now is the first single, “Cocaine Dawn”, and video for the project.

The “Cocaine Dawn” EP will hold 4 tracks: “Cocaine Dawn”, “Dream On”, “Cyber Lover” and “Halloween”. Out via Zeitklang / Reptile Music, the ep will mainly be released via Thomas Elbern’s own label Zeitklang, Reptile Music will just take care of the bandcamp release.

Here’s the video.

Where the era of Escape With Romeo ended with the last studio album “After The Future”, the Dirty Vocoder picks up the threads again offering melancholic electronica mixed with robotic voices and ethereal vocal samples. The debut EP “Future Shock” will now be followed by the second EP “Cocaine Dawn”, which deals with the consequences of drug abuse. It will be released together with a video to the title track, featuring model Blondrausch in her first music clip.

The Belgian scene…

Here’s what Thomas Elbern has to tell us about the project and the new single: “Dirty Vocoder is a project I’ve always wanted to realize. Especially working with vocoded and electronic treated vocals gave me a buzz. And it should not sound like Daft Punk, Kraftwerk or Telex. When it comes to the Belgian scene I was mainly influenced by projects like Elektrokiss or Minister Of Noise. The goal was to create an artificial character to electronic music. I’ve tried this with Escape With Romeo (“Heart Of Darkness” or “Firefly”), but that concept didn’t go as far as I wanted to go. So, after the debut EP “Future Shock” the new “Cocaine Dawn” EP is one step forward in the idea of Dirty Vocoder – a concept that spans electro to trip hop, but with a special (voice) character that is represented by the man with the mask.”

Bernard - Side-Line Staff

Chief editor of Side-Line – which basically means I spend my days wading through a relentless flood of press releases from labels, artists, DJs, and zealous correspondents. My job? Strip out the promo nonsense, verify what’s actually real, and decide which stories make the cut and which get tossed into the digital void. Outside the news filter bubble, I’m all in for quality sushi and helping raise funds for Ukraine’s ongoing fight against the modern-day axis of evil. Besides music I’m also an SEO and AI content flow specialist and have an interest in everything finance from stocks to crypto. There is music in everything!

side-line.com