''Brown Book'' is an

album An album is a collection of audio recordings issued on compact disc (CD), Phonograph record, vinyl, audio tape, or another medium such as Digital distribution#Music, digital distribution. Albums of recorded sound were developed in the early ...

Death in June Death in June are a neofolk group led by English musician Douglas P. (Douglas Pearce). The band was originally formed in the United Kingdom in 1981 as a trio, but after the other members left in 1984 and 1985 to work on other projects, the gro ...

, released in 1987. "To Drown A Rose" was released as a 10" single, backed with non-album tracks "Europa: The Gates of Heaven" and "Zimmerit". This single was later re-released as part of the 1989 compilation '' The Corn Years''. The song features

Rose McDowall Rose McDowall (née Porter; born 21 October 1959) is a Scottish musician, forming Strawberry Switchblade with Jill Bryson in 1981. History McDowall was born in Glasgow, Scotland in 1959. Her first venture into music was in the Poems, an art-pun ...

on lead vocals. The album is named after an index of West Germans who were previously involved in Germany's National Socialist government, compiled by East German authorities and published in 1965. Numerous songs on the album make extensive use of quotations from literature, including

Jean Genet Jean Genet (; – ) was a French novelist, playwright, poet, essayist, and political activist. In his early life he was a vagabond and petty criminal, but he later became a writer and playwright. His major works include the novels ''The Thief's ...

's 1948 novel ''

Funeral Rites A funeral is a ceremony connected with the final disposition of a corpse, such as a burial or cremation, with the attendant observances. Funerary customs comprise the complex of beliefs and practices used by a culture to remember and respect t ...

'' ("To Drown a Rose", "The Fog of the World"), and

Yukio Mishima , born , was a Japanese author, poet, playwright, actor, model, Shintoist, Nationalism, nationalist, and founder of the , an unarmed civilian militia. Mishima is considered one of the most important Japanese authors of the 20th century. He was ...

's 1969 novel '' Spring Snow'' ("Touch Defiles"). The sale of ''Brown Book'' has been prohibited in Germany since 2005 due to the title track's sampling of the "

Horst-Wessel-Lied The "" ("Horst Wessel Song"; ), also known by its opening words "" ("Raise the Flag", ), was the anthem of the Nazi Party (NSDAP) from 1930 to 1945. From 1933 to 1945, the Nazis made it the co-national anthem of Germany, along with the first sta ...

", the anthem of the

Sturmabteilung The (; SA; literally "Storm Detachment") was the original paramilitary wing of the Nazi Party. It played a significant role in Adolf Hitler's rise to power in the 1920s and 1930s. Its primary purposes were providing protection for Nazi ral ...

. In response to the proposed ban,

Douglas P. Douglas Pearce, known professionally as Douglas P (born 27 April 1956), is an English folk musician, record label owner, photographer and actor who is best known for his neofolk project Death in June. Pearce was born in Sheerwater in Woking, Surr ...

submitted statements to the German authorities explaining large passages of his work, including noting that the sample of "Horst-Wessel-Lied" was juxtaposed against samples from the film ''The World that Summer''. The samples in question included that of a Jewish grandmother describing her "suicidal fatalism", and homophobic statements from her lover, an SA officer.

Track listing

Personnel

* Composed by: Death in June,

John Balance Geoffrey Nigel Laurence Rushton (16 February 1962 – 13 November 2004), better known under the pseudonyms John Balance or the later variation Jhonn Balance, was an English musician, occultist, artist and poet. He was best known as a co-founde ...

(track B2) * Featuring: Bee,

David Tibet David Tibet (born David Michael Bunting; 5 March 1960) is a British poet and artist who founded the music group Current 93, of which he is the only full-time member. He was given the name "Tibet" by Genesis P-Orridge, and in January 2005 he a ...

(as "Tibet 93"), Gary Carey, Iain O'Higgins (as "Jan O'"),

Ian Read Ian C. Read (born 1953) is a Scottish-born American business executive and a chartered accountant, serving as executive chairman of pharmaceutical company Pfizer. He was succeeded as CEO by Albert Bourla on 1 January 2019, becoming executive ch ...

, John Balance, Rose McDowall * Performer: Douglas P.

References

1987 albums Death in June albums {{1980s-folk-album-stub