In a small town in Austria, nine-year-old Cornelia picks up her first guitar, immersing herself into a classically trained world amid the home of the Viennese Waltz. Years later, under the guise of a working au pair, Cornelia (“Connie”) comes to America to fully realize her dreams of starting a band.
Wielding waltzes and singing songs of hope and struggle, Connie, along with husband Frank, form Baroque-pop outfit DieAlps! (translated: The Alps!) in 2012. The last two years have been committed to writing, recording, playing shows and quickly becoming an in-demand staple of Central Florida’s independent music scene.
Today Ghettoblaster has the pleasure of debuting a new video from DieAlps! for “Rules of Discipline.” It’s a great (and dark!) Krampus-themed video.
We recently caught up with Connie to discuss her own interactions with Krampus.
“For me, Krampus (in the video) stands for feelings of angst and fear, which everyone can relate to. Growing up in Austria, every December 5th Krampus and St. Nikolaus would come to our house.
It’s exciting and terrifying at the same time because Krampus is really scary and growls at you and might even hit you with his birch and kinda makes you think that he will take you away, but you’re also excited because you think if you can convince St. Nikolaus that you’ve been a good kid all year he will give you a bag full of candy, peanuts and mandarins.
We would usually cower on the bench around the kitchen table in the corner furthest away from Krampus. It was really terrifying hearing them taking the stairs up to our house, you could hear the cowbells and chain rattling from Krampus, and growling, and then them stomping into the kitchen. These are childhood memories that are truly imprinted on my mind.
St. Nikolaus would ask: ‘Have you been a good kid this year?’ And me and my brothers would just nod in terror, trying to avoid looking at Krampus, but he would often MAKE us look at him or try to touch us or make us think he’s going to put us in the basket on his back.”

( Visit the band here DieAlps! on Facebook and at the DieAlps! Artist page at new Granada.)