Tocotronic

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Origin	Hamburg, Germany
Years active	1993–present
Genres	Alternative rock
Members	Dirk von Lowtzow Jan Müller Arne Zank Rick McPhail

Tocotronic is a German rock band founded in 1993 (see 1993 in music). Similar to Blumfeld and influential for bands such as Tomte, Tocotronic not only innovated German language music, but also inspired a number of later bands, such as Wir sind Helden. Their influence on pop culture is widespread, from fashion (Tocotronic made the combination of 1970s style training jackets with cheap second-hand ad-shirts famous in Germany) to the playful and weird look of their early records.

Tocotronic come from Hamburg and are released on L'Age D'Or, together with Die Sterne - forming the so-called Hamburger Schule (“Hamburg school”). The band members are bassist Jan Müller, drummer Arne Zank, and guitarist and singer Dirk von Lowtzow. Starting with the latest album "Pure Vernunft darf niemals siegen" a new guitarist and keyboarder, Rick McPhail, has joined the band. He used to play with Tocotronic on live shows before.

The band became a subject of dark irony when in 1995 they released the song "Michael Ende, Du hast mein Leben zerstört"' (Michael Ende, you destroyed my life) -- on its surface, a hate song against the writer of the popular book Neverending Story -- only a couple of months before Ende died.