RAMMSTEIN & COMBICHRIST
LONDON WEMBLEY ARENA 04/02/10
So the cult of Rammstein! Just what makes this band so popular when other great German acts such as In Extremo and Die Apokalyptischen Reiter can hardly fill the Underworld? Well there are somewhere around 13,000 people here obviously expecting something special but before we got to that I was very happy to see that support act were Norwegians Combichrist. I settled down into a seat (not my normal sort of choice) but having lots of space unlike those packing the standing area and a great view right at the side of the stage I was not complaining. Singer Andy LaPlegua was marching around at the front of the stage whilst behind him were two percussionists hitting a variety of things and a keyboard player / sampler in between them. First number ‘All Pain Is Gone’ tribally stomped in heavy and brutal and it has to be said that since I was last at Wembley a lot has improved, the sound system certainly packed a wallop here and for once it was not wasted on commercial dross. I loved the bouncy industrial EBM although it felt wrong here and quite unlike Slimelight at 2AM in the morning, the audience below were also looking slightly confused and not quite sure how to act. ‘Scarred’ sees the stage bathed in deep blood red and I have to admit being very jealous of the sole picture taker in the camera pit for this. The set may have been short but they threw all the favourites into it (and the two drummers threw plenty over the keyboard players head at each other making it all of a bit of a circus). ‘Body Beat’ and ‘This Shit Will Fuck You Up’ got crowd response and everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves. As one punter summed it up in the queue for the toilet “Not bad for an unknown band,” yep unknown bands play sold out arena shows every day of the week, such great words of wisdom.
So the main event and it was not disappointing in the slightest. Basically Rammstein do something different every song and have their own unique party tricks, normally blowing things up. This may well be part the reason for their success but it is not all about their antics, the music is also very good too. They certainly create an entrance pick-axing and blow torching their way through a wall onto stage and causing huge (I hope that was just a fart) explosions. First number the militant sledgehammer attack of ‘Rammlied’ was the obvious opener and Till Lindemann was wearing a butcher’s smock for it and as for what he had glowing in his mouth as he sang, I’m really not quite sure. Naturally the audience was instantly pumped as they were for the rest of the set which comprised of most if not all of new album ‘Liebe ist für alle da’ and a load of older favourites for good measure.
I loved the way that keyboard player Flake was playing behind two Frankenstein like generators and also as the set went on his parts in all the mischief. The Laibachian horns of ‘Waidmanns Heil’ were more than just an intro to the song as huge pyramids of flames leapt up from the stage and a wall of fire from the front of it. That wast good ja! Next it was blasts of dry ice or steam, looking all cold funnelling into the air along to big muscular guitar drives and the front trio marching back and forward across the stage. The songs such as ‘Feuer Frei’ and ‘Weisses Fleisch’ came thick and fast and so did the tricks. Christoph got in a solo and the keyboard player escaped to gimp about at the front. I loved it when the singer and guitarists came back with funnels and looking like Dr Who monsters breathed huge flames of fire across the stage. This certainly put black metal musicians who attempt a spot of fire breathing to shame.
What next? Green Laser lights coming out of dead babies eyes during ‘Wiener Blut’ you got it? Dead babies littering the floor to romantic ballad ‘Frühling in Paris’ no problem! For ‘Ich tu dir weh’ the stage opened to resemble a futuristic nightmare of steel which was straight out of Fritz Lang’s Metropolis, visually this was all a complete spectacle and honestly quite like nothing I have ever seen at a concert (and over the years I have been to a few). The cheeky keyboard player picked a fight with the singer who threw him in a steel bath, rose to the roof on a big column and rained down some sort of napalm on him, then Flake got out the bath changed into a glitter spandex costume and continued to play his parts on a treadmill, like wow! Elton John please follow that. Tops were taken off, ladies and probably some gents swooned and during ‘Pussy’ the singer sat on a giant cannon which shot (errr) foam all over those at the front, then a confetti launcher was used to launch a rain forest of paper into the sky.
‘Du Hast’ had everyone pumping the air and a crossbow launched pyro off the stage, to a tower in the arena and back with a huge bang. During the encore ‘Hafisch’ which I had described before as the ‘row, row, row your boat song’ saw just that with Flick getting in a rubber dingy and going right across the arena borne on the audiences hands. Still not finished the finale Engel would have made John Phillip Law cry as Till came on in giant angel wings, naturally piping out flames.
Well I doubt I was alone in falling out of that show dazed and I have been reliably informed if you think that was good you haven’t seen anything yet. Apparently if you are off to Knebworth to see Rammstein at Sonisphere they are bringing out the big fucking guns, well 20 tonnes of explosives and eight big trucks of it, sounds like the place to be. Damn that wasn’t a fart!
Pete Woods
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