The genesis of rock and pop is full of scandals. Sometimes it was about hip swaying and burning electric guitars (Elvis, Jimi Hendrix), sometimes it was about sex with minors (Jerry Lee Lewis, Led Zeppelin, David Bowie and many others) or about shocking citizen fright behavior (New York Dolls, Sex Pistols and others) .
Megamanager Malcolm McLaren, who died in 2010, took the game to great heights with loud attention, orchestrated according to the PR principle “Any press is good press”, at the end of the 1970s. For a while, punk didn’t just unleash dinosaur bands. The British riot press was only too happy to get involved when things went against the Queen and the establishment. You can read all of this on 610 pages in “England’s Dreaming” by Jon Savage, one of the best pop and society books, published in the UK in 1991. Ergo: principle recognized for over thirty years.
Now the rock scandal, triggered by a Berlin band that burns down half a refinery at each of their concerts, has advanced into new digital spheres. Two young women from the blogging and influencer scene, Shelby Lynn and Kayla Shyx, accused Till Lindemann and his men of professionalizing groupieism.
Rammstein have developed a perfidious delivery system designed for efficiency, which took the abuse of power against female fans often committed by male artists in rock music to a new dimension.
After a hesitant start, the “Assault Gun of Democracy” also pounced on this trash saga with a cover story. A few months after publication, Berlin star lawyer Simon Bergmann accused the paper of having a “sensationalist style”. His once again outrageous quote: “I’ve never seen ‘Spiegel’ that there was any insight, that they said: Oh, we’ve made a mistake here.”
The fans move closer, the rest move away
Months later, the band Rammstein seemed like they were coated with Teflon. Lindemann tours solo, making fun of critics and moralists. The band has closed its massive ranks of fans even tighter and will be back in 2024. The scandal was no longer a scandal in non-German-speaking countries. The public prosecutor’s office stopped the investigation because none of the women who accused Lindemann of sexual violence in the media allowed themselves to be interviewed by the investigators. The reasons for this can be varied: fear of the mental stress of a procedure or of the star lawyers.
What’s left other than cynicism and the backstabbing of royally paid Ku’damm lawyers: everyone can freely decide whether they want to spend another euro on Rammstein and their system. The reality at the concert box office and when it comes to merch looks like this: sales records for the band from Prenzlauer Berg.
But of course keyboard player Flake and pre-gymnast Lindemann can now stop their flirtation with the bourgeois camp (keyword: volume of poetry, recommended biographers).