The cover title was meant to say: “I may be banned, but I have a name and address right in the heart of Berlin-Mitte—easy for friends and foes alike to find. ”
Chausseestraße 131 is the second LP recorded by East German Liedermacher and poet Wolf Biermann. It was his first album released after the Socialist Unity Party officially blacklisted him from performing or releasing music through the East German music monopoly VEB Deutsche Schallplatten. Due to being blacklisted, Biermann was unable to use a professional recording studio to record the album, forcing him to record in his apartment at Chausseestraße 131 using a Grundig tape recorder and a Sennheiser omnidirectional microphone smuggled in from West Germany. As a result, background noise from the street—dogs, children, cars, and trams—found its way into these early recordings as an artistically authentic expression of the ban: the “awesome Chausseestraße sound. ”
