There was great outrage when Rammstein released a video teaser for their single “Deutschland” in March 2019. The Berlin band could be seen in the 35-second excerpt in prisoner clothing reminiscent of those worn by concentration camp prisoners in World War II. Guitarist Paul Landers wore a yellow Jewish star on his chest, the band stood – their heads in a noose – on a gallows. At the end of the teaser, the song title appeared in Gothic script. This excerpt was then discussed controversially, for many the pictures were tasteless, for others a mockery of the victims of the Nazi regime.
“The band crossed a line with this video. The way Rammstein misuses the suffering and murder of millions for entertainment purposes is frivolous and repulsive,” Charlotte Knobloch, ex-president of the Central Council of Jews, explained at the time. The Jewish historian Michael Wolffsohn took a similar view and described the teaser as a “form of desecration of corpses. Completely unacceptable!” Karin Prien, the spokeswoman for the Jewish Forum in the CDU, spoke at the time of a “disgusting tastelessness” that only served to “generate clicks.”
Does the video contribute to a concert ban for Rammstein?
More than four years after the video was released, this discourse flared up again in the context of allegations of abuse against Rammstein singer Till Lindemann. In an interview with the newspapers of the Funke Mediengruppe, the Federal Government’s Anti-Semitism Commissioner, Felix Klein, described the video as something that “mocks the victims of the Shoah with a perfidious extermination camp look.”
He even spoke about a possible ban on concerts for the Berlin group – and according to his own statements, considers it “questionable whether the planned Rammstein concerts in Berlin in the state-run Olympic Stadium should take place like this”. Klein continues: “Anti-democratic discrimination such as anti-Semitism, misogyny and racism often go hand in hand. We should take the women concerned seriously, just as we should take Jews seriously when it comes to anti-Semitism.” One should not allow “the limits of what is sayable and feasible to be pushed further and further, even if this is done under the cloak of artistic freedom.”
The Lindemann scandal is keeping the music industry busy
Rammstein have been the focus of public criticism for weeks after reports that the Berlin band allegedly devised their own system for attracting young women to sex at after-show parties after concerts, now known as “Row Zero”.
Some of the women (anonymously) also accused them of sexual abuse or abusive behavior. In a statement, Rammstein asked to refrain from prejudice. Singer Lindemann, meanwhile, rejected all allegations about his lawyers as untrue without exception. The public prosecutor’s office is now investigating the Rammstein singer. Drummer Christoph Schneider distances himself from his bandmates.