Maximilian Hecker

Maximilian Hecker (born July 26, 1977, in Heidenheim an der Brenz) is a German musician from Berlin, known for ethereal pop or dream pop music, similar to Radiohead, Sigur Rós, Tom Baxter and Nick Drake. He himself describes his songs as »melancholy pop hymns«.

Hecker grew up in Baden-Wuerttemberg and North Rhine-Westphalia. He learned to play the piano, the drums and the guitar and did his A levels at Freiherr-vom-Stein-Gymnasium in Bünde in 1997. Having finished his alternative civilian service at Klinikum Schwabing in Munich, he started training in nursing practice at the hospital Charité in Berlin in 1999.

Apart from his activities as a trainee nurse, Hecker continued pursuing his musical hobby busking in the area of Hackescher Markt in Berlin-Mitte. Thus he came in contact with Berlin's music- and cultural scene. In 2000, the demo of his song Cold Wind Blowing was used for the score of German director Esther Gronenborn's movie Alaska.de. Soon after that, the Berlin-based record company Kitty-yo, having released the movie's soundtrack, offered Hecker a record deal.

In October 2001, Hecker released his debut album Infinite Love Songs, produced in cooperation with German producer Tommi Eckart. The album was critically acclaimed worldwide and even reached the top ten list of The New York Times’ album of the year contest in 2001. Hence, Hecker's debut was to be found amongst albums of Bob Dylan, The White Stripes and Alicia Keys. Critic Neil Strauss writes:

»In a long list of precious, fragile, heartbroken artists to emerge in the last two years (Tom McRae, Ed Harcourt, the Kingsbury Manx), Mr. Hecker, by legend an oft-disparaged Berlin street musician, whispers the most precious and fragile heartbreak of them all.«

From October 2001 to February 2002, Hecker went on his first European tour – at that time solo, with electric guitar, keyboard and groovebox –, as a headliner mostly, but also as an opening act for Bill Callahan, the Walkabouts and others. Around that time, his song Polyester became a hit in Israeli mainstream radio and was considered a peace anthem. In April and May 2002, Hecker opened for Lloyd Cole on his tour of France.

In May 2003, Hecker put out his second studio album Rose, produced by British producer Gareth Jones, who had previously worked with Depeche Mode and Erasure. In particular the British press praised the record. Dan Martin from British music magazine New Musical Express writes:

»In the first three minutes, a lovelorn Hecker bemoans how he’s spent seven days without a glance from Kate Moss. But if the former busker has something of the stalker about him, he’s not one of those men who have bad fringes and still live with their mum. "Rose", Hecker's second LP, is as beautiful and barbed as the flower itself and proves that sinister can also be suave and beautiful. While his sexless Germanic vocals threaten to get smothered in drippy melancholy, he’s wise enough to ease off with the string quartets as things progress, transmuting his snail pace into the kind of pin-drop quiet electro Fischerspooner would make after a pint of heroin. Lovely.«