A Gritty Alternative Rock Record That Finds Grace Inside The Noise
listen to the article
Herr Schoen’s 100 Ways to Be a Gentleman doesn’t sound like a lecture in etiquette. It sounds like a man trying to stay upright while the room keeps shifting under him. Built from loud guitars, driving beats, and a restless emotional pulse, the album uses alternative rock as a pressure valve, letting frustration, longing, and self-questioning hit with real force.
Based in Minden, Germany, Herr Schoen writes like someone who has lived long enough to know that dignity is rarely neat. The record moves with the grit of classic alt-rock, but there’s something broader in its DNA too: flashes of Bowie-style theatricality, a Nick Cave shadow, a Springsteen-sized sense of human scale. It’s a mix that gives the album its bite. The songs don’t posture; they push, reach, and sometimes stumble in public.
That tension is the point. 100 Ways to Be a Gentleman treats the idea of gentleness as a hard-won discipline, not a polished pose. Across tracks like Good Morning, Mr. President
, The Planet’s Speech
, and the title cut, Herr Schoen folds personal reflection into a wider sense of unease — love, anger, the state of the world, the awkward business of trying to be decent when everything feels a little off-kilter. The result is music that thinks as hard as it moves.
There’s also a welcome refusal to sand down the edges. This is a record that wants to be played loud, and it earns that volume. The production keeps things direct and muscular, with drum programming and guitar work that give the songs a forward shove. Even when the album leans into introspection, it never sinks into softness. Instead, it burns with the kind of urgency that makes self-examination feel physical.
What makes 100 Ways to Be a Gentleman compelling is its plainspoken honesty. Herr Schoen isn’t chasing perfection here; he’s circling the messier truth that being good, or trying to be, is an ongoing negotiation. That idea gives the album its emotional charge, and its title its sly power. By the time he lands on the closing message, the answer feels both simple and hard-earned: be yourself.
For an artist working independently and fully in command of his own world, Herr Schoen makes a strong case for the album as a space where noise, thought, and feeling can still coexist beautifully.
If you would like to submit your music for playlist or feature consideration, please submit here via our partnership with MusoSoup.
