PHOTO: Rammstein in Prague. German metalheads can still surprise and shock

“Just enjoy the music.” With that, the women’s duo Jatekok began their performance at 7 p.m. The musicians played the notorious Rammstein songs in piano arrangement. They earned applause here and there, but the audience rather perceived them only as background music before the start of the main stars’ show.

Rammstein started just in time. As expected, they chose Armee der Tristen from their album Zeit as the opening song. The current recording had a very significant representation in the playlist and the band played songs from it at Prague concerts for the first time. Although the album, with its more relaxed tempo and chanson nature, aroused some disappointment among many fans, the performance defended the quality of the songs selected from it to excellent. For example, the real power of the title song stood out and it proved that the single Zick Zack was really created for giant concert stages.

The stage changed with lighting, colors, and fires. Mood rotation contributed to the dynamics of the show. The band managed to serve the audience with a horror spectacle, such as the song Puppe, or dance it to Radio, or let it chant them out of their lungs at the classic Du Hast. Hit Deutschland presented a dance remix of the song by guitarist Richard Z. Kruspe and an impressive dance in shining suits.

Although the group initially asked the audience to hide their cell phones in their bags, Engel encouraged them to take them out again and light their flashlights over their heads. The lyrics of the song appeared on the screens and the audience sang it with piano accompaniment almost alone. The group was then transferred to the hands of fans seated in boats. She managed to create a surprisingly intimate atmosphere for 60,000 people in a spectacular outdoor concert.

It was the ultimate example of how Rammstein can work with the audience and actively involve him in a concert, although perhaps the only sentence that singer Till Lindemann spoke throughout the concert was Czech: “Hands up.”

Rammstein presents such an exceptional concert experience that fans who go to them regularly do not mind that some scenes, such as the burning under the boiler with the song Mein Teil or the ejaculation from a giant metal penis on the heads of the audience during Pussy are repeated. The band offered a similar show as at their last stop in 2019. As a result, it didn’t matter.

German metalheads are among the world’s top concert players, so they face a difficult task before each tour. Defend your status, conceive the show so that it does not look retro, but at most topical, meet the high expectations of visitors and, most importantly, surprise and still shock. In Prague, they proved that they are still doing well.

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