REVIEW FROM THE BARRIER.
(all pictures are my own)
01.03.12 - Rammstein at Manchester Arena.
This was to be my second experience with a Rammstein live show, my first being a rather amazing one at Sonisphere festival in 2010. Both me and my best friend Helen both instantly fell in love. It was literally one of the most exciting and incendiary shows I'd ever seen and I just knew I'd have to see them again but this time from the barrier.
Intending to repeat a previous experience with barrier running at the arena, we headed to the building in the evening of the night before the show expecting to find other mad, desperate Rammstein fans to camp with. The place was empty so we actually got to have a decent night's sleep on a friend's couch before the show. We returned at around 1pm the next day and were 20th in line. Anyone who's had any experience with being a barrier dashing uber fan knows those godawful pre-gig nerves: a twisting feeling in your stomach that somehow convinces you that your tickets will be fake even when you know they're not and that you will never find the barrier despite the venue being one you have worked in for the past two and a half years.
Despite those pesky pre-gig stomach twists, we made it to the barrier unscathed along with two lovely girls we queued with who came from London and Wales to see Rammstein.
Fully prepared for barrier pain, excessive noise and pretty much destined to leave with a bit of burnt skin, we anxiously awaited for the Teutonic entertainment that was sure to leave us chattering euphorically about it on our way home.
Swedish support band, Deathstars put on an interesting introduction to our night. With a singer looking like a cross between Marilyn Manson and Professor Snape and dressed in glittery military garb, the band entertain a warmed up crowd with synth anthems such as Blitzkreig from their album Termination Bliss while bathed in lit-up green smoke and whipping four-foot long dreadlocks around like a weather vane. They're a suitable warm-up but everyone in the arena knows who we're really here to see.
The lights go down, heralding an anticipated scream from an over-excited audience. Instead of walking onstage behind a black curtain or stalking confidently in front of their crowd like any other band, the six members of Rammstein walk down one of the lower seating blocks and onto a B-stage situated in the middle of the standing floor of the arena, led by an Olympics-style flaming torch. A silver walkway descends from the ceiling over the heads of a squealing crowd and they slowly march across to the main stage to stand in a line in front of us, seemingly oblivious to our screams. After lighting two oil pits on either side of the stage, the band are ready to blow our minds.
Opening swiftly with the famous Snow White-sampled Sonne, the stage immediately explodes with fire and an almost entirely English crowd begin singing along in German as though they've studied it for years. Not surprisingly, the pyrotechnics are incredibly hot. When the blowers about five feet away from us set off, the entire front row screams, recedes and covers their heads with their arms as we can feel the fire burning our scalps. The stewards in front of us yell and leap forward as the heat becomes unbearable for them too. The band are closer to the flames than we are yet stand as if feeling nothing...
The show is, as expected, utterly fantastic. The band power through anthems like Keine Lust, Mutter and Asche Zu Asche during the first part of the show and this only prepares us all for more treats to come.
I was particularly looking forward to my personal favourite Feuer Frei!, eagerly anticipating the use of Rammstein's famous 'face-flamethrowers' and the fiery Berliners do not disappoint me. Singer, Till Lindemann and guitarists Richard Z. Kruspe and Paul Landers emerge with the large metal contraptions over their heads that shoot thirty foot flames up into the air during Lindemann's thunderous cry of "BANG, BANG!"
Lindemann himself, is an extremely interesting person to watch as a live performer. Physically he is, for lack of a better word, huge. An olympic-trained swimmer and standing at around 6,3", he has huge muscles in his arms and thighs and a voice that thunders, booms and growls all at the same time. He sings a lot with his eyes closed but when he opens them, he looks terrified. It's an interesting contrast, a giant coulda-been Olympian looking scared of a group of young adults staring up at him in awe. Despite his apparent fear, his voice appears flawless, even when weilding potentially life-threatening instruments. At one point, he whips his arms around like a windmill while red sparks shoot from his jacket sleeves. During Du Riechst So Gut, the same sparks shoot from huge metal bow-and-arrow: an instrument which later shoots red fireworks over the audience.
One of the show's most interesting moments comes during Mein Teil when Till emerges wearing a white apron and chef's hat splattered with blood and a long butcher knife at the end of his microphone while keyboardist Christian 'Flake' Lorenz plays from inside a giant metal cooking pot.
He ducks under the rim just in time to escape Till shooting a huge waft of fire, bathing the entire pot in flames for a few moments. Descriptions don't quite explain what a spectacle it is to watch.
Marching like a military swarm, they stomp through Links 2-3-4, Los and fan-favourite Du Hast with impressive grandeur as the audience shout every word back at them, most of them not fully knowing what they're actually saying (me being one of those). They never cease to be something to look at: three blowers shoot red, white and blue confetti all over the audience during Amerika and during Haifisch, the rail-thin Flake Lorenz sails across the crowd in a rubber dinghy: a boat on a sea of eager hands.
Two encores keep the crowd lively even after an hour and a half of bathing in heat from not only the pyrotechnics but being packed in with 3000 other sweating bodies. But this is a show in which you barely need encouragement to keep going. In fact you barely notice how tired and sore you are until afterwards...
The spectacles continue: Lindemann emerges wearing huge mechanical angel wings that shoot fire on either side of him for Engel, an oxymoron of a performance that is both ferocious and beautiful to see.
The metal stairway descends again and the band crawl across to the B-stage wearing dog collars and leads held by drummer Christoph Schneider dressed in drag to perform Mann Gegen Mann (supposedly Lindemann performed this while wearing a strap-on dildo. I was still at the barrier, so didn't see. Unfortunately) and Ohne Dich before returning to pull out the fantastic flesh coloured cannon for the concert's finale of Pussy. The cannon sprays the willing audience with white foam. Foam fights quickly ensue as we flick and wipe the bubbly white stuff on eachother, giggling like overexcited schoolgirls who've just heard their first innuendo.
Although they've been playing thunderously for just over two hours, the end still comes too soon as six panting, sweating and exhausted German men line up in front of us to bow their way out. A gentle voice, totally different to the booming tones we've been hearing all night, quietly thanks us with "Thank you very much, we love you" and, clapping and waving, they leave the stage.
As we slowly file out after collecting a well-deserved "I Survived Front Row With Rammstein" sticker from a steward, one thing is abundantly clear: no-one puts on a show quite like Rammstein.
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