Schlager came to its traditional themes as the antidote to the licentious western pop that infiltrated Germany after the war. It endures thanks to its popularity with baby boomers and beyond, who are well served by infinite schlager TV specials – Fischer presents one every Christmas, a cloying all-star revue that makes Jools’ Annual Hootenanny look like Channel 4’s Club X.
In its down-home sensibilities, schlager is country music’s spiritual twin, and Fischer has given it an aggressive synth-pop update, as if she were the German Taylor Swift. But where Swift’s pop evolution made her cool, it is hard to overstate how little critical love there is for Fischer’s frankly awful music.
