The New York Times
"In a long list of precious, fragile, heartbroken artists to emerge in the last two years [...], Mr. Hecker whispers the most precious and fragile heartbreak of them all."

Uncut | Dream-pop debut from Teutonic tunesmith

Native Berliner and sometime fashion model, this 23-year old could well be the finest German export since Michael Owen's match ball. Like recent "Uncut" fave Kevin Tihista, his métier is beautifully-sculpted, 24-carat melodies, deceptively simple arrangements and a voice so eerily spectral it's in danger of vaporisation.

Hecker's creamy falsetto sails somewhere between Tiny Tim and Nick Drake, with all the breathy allure of Joe Pernice. The trip-folk of "Green Night" suggests what might have been had Nick Drake graduated from the same Bristol bloodline as Massive Attack and Portishead; "Sunburnt Days" is impossibly gorgeous, summer-meadow piano, while "Over" is a thrilling ride over a waterfall of acoustic guitar. At certain points, he sounds almost Beloved-esque. Most of the time, it's just plain otherwordly.

4/5

Loaded | Fragile asphyxiation album of the month

SOUNDS LIKE: Anaemic fragile songman about to asphyxiate on piano misery. It comes as quite a surprise to discover that Maximilian Hecker is a German man. Musicians from that part of Europe are usually dreadful. The Scorpions, they were German. So was Nena and her balloons, David Hasselhoff (sort of), and whoever it was that wrote "Oh Tannenbaum, Oh Tannenbaum Vy ist Zow Beautiful". All terrible. So imagine the shock in discovering that the author of this tender, eloquent and beautiful album comes from the land of ruthless efficiency and moustachioed nail sex. No wonder he's depressed.

BETTER THAN: Bonnie "Prince" Billy, I see a darkness

5/5

Mojo | Sumptous, soporific and heroically melancholic debut album from the young Berliner

Hecker, 23, is the unapologetic mild card in a Kitty-Yo pack dominated by sexy electro-rap and experimental electronica. He began his career on Berlin's streets playing Oasis covers, but he obviously regards Morrissey as his spiritual mentor. His Anglophiliac taste, though, runs more to my bloody Valentine and early Ride, albeit slowed down to a funeral pace. His voice is a dreamy whisper enervated almost to the point of exhaustion, with The Days Are Long And Filled With Pain sounding more deathbed confession than pop song. Elsewhere, Hecker summons the frozen beauty of Sigur Rôs (Cold Wind Blowing) and The Stone Roses' sun-drenched bliss-outs (Over). The Pet Shop Boys-toned title track provides a sole perky moment. Beautiful, but best in small doses.

NME | Teutonic techno-pop pastoral

Behold Berlin's Maximilian Hecker and wonder. On his debut album, he comes across as an unholy fusion of 10CC's "I'm Not In Love" and Sigur Rôs' back catalogue - atmospheric bleeps and swooning falsettos aplenty - but it's a trick that worked well enough for Radiohead. And while it doesn't sweat with the same self-importance as Thom Yorke's flirtations with avant-rock, this remains a portentous little debut album. Too oblique for the Ryan-Adams-fixated, mocha-slurping bookshop crowd, too real for the St Etienne pop ironists, Hecker's European melancholy would be best suited to those in a Tarwater/Four Tet kind of mood.

Sleek and shiny, with a heart as soft as melted margarine, this is a modern anomaly and worth it for that alone.

7/10

salon.com | Best Symbiosis Between Nick Drake and an Actual Volkswagen

Maximilian Hecker is a male model - quite popular, apparently, with the same Berlin-at-night scene that produced shock feminist Peaches and her own brand of bloody Salt-n-Pepa tributes - who at heart is but a softy of English folk proportions. His overlooked debut album referenced Drake so heavily - as well as Cat Power, Jeff Buckley, Radiohead and all the other great mopes of our time - that it felt like a deliberate attempt to squeeze the singer's sensibilities into a modern context. It was shockingly, blissfully successful. Give it a crack and you won't believe you missed it.

Musikexpress | Hinreißender, heimeliger, gefühlvoller und ehrlicher Pop

Wäre ich eine Frau mit stattlicher Oberweite, würde ich darin das Köpfchen Maximilians vergraben. Das sag' ich jetzt nicht einfach so. Nein, ich habe mich informiert in meinem Freundinnenkreis. Frauen um die 30 bei seinem Anblick oder beim Hören seiner Platte: "Hach Gott, ist der süß!" Muttergefühle weckt er möglicherweise, aber geil finden die den auch.

Aber vor allem: Er schreibt wunderschöne Lieder. Lange stand er als Straßenmusiker in Berlin am Hackeschen Markt. Gut möglich, dass daher diese Weisheit, diese Melancholie rührt. Schließlich will ja nicht jedes Mädchen, das des Weges kommt, gerne die Freundin von Maximilian sein. Und so singt er ihnen nach, schickt Stoßseufzer wegen gebrochener und einsamer Herzen gen Himmel. Eine der hinreißendsten, heimeligsten, ehrlichsten, gefühlvollsten, tollsten Tränen-Pop-Platten des Jahres. Irgendwie zu fabelhaft, um sie mit irgendwas zu vergleichen.

5/6

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