When I was in my 20's and alcohol seemed to have zero effect on me, I used to brew a lot of historic Burton Ales. ~1.070 with 160 IBUs of EKGs at 90min isn't terribly bitter. Remember, hop utilization goes down tremendously as gravity goes up, it isn't quite logarithmic, but it's in the neighborhood. Going into the keg, these ales were rip snorting monsters, but once they'd been given a month or two to relax, they were no more bitter than other hop forward beers.
The point being, don't put too much stock in IBUs. Back in the mid-90's early 2000's IBU wars period, folks liked to brag about their favorite 160IBU double IPA. Those beers were invariably brewed with too much crystal malt and at too high of a gravity to really be bitter. To me, those beers always tasted sweet and under attenuated. Remember, the average human tongue punks out at around 80-100IBU, so anything over that threshold isn't real.
I used to enjoy serving the Arrogant Bastard crowd a vicious little pale ale that I used to brew called Lie Detector. It was 1.045 of Briess two row and 90IBU of CTZ at 60, 20, 10, knockout, and 2oz of Amarillo or Cascades as a dry hop. Suffice it to say, it sorted the folks that bragged about IBUS, but really liked sweet boozy beers, from the folks that really enjoyed having their skulls caved in. Then I got my hands on Simco.... muahahahaha!
I know you're approaching beer from your time in Germany, Mr. Walker. But don't discount the UK brewing tradition. It is amazing! I'll agree that those IBU numbers seem obscene, but they work rather well in the glass.