Rammstein Concert Review

Place ~ Minneapolis, MN
Venue ~ First Avenue
Date ~ Tuesday, July 24, 2001

Line-Up
CrossBreed
Godhead
Rammstein

Preshow
Fuckin eh. First off, I'm not much of a big city driver, being from the desolate state of SD. So driving in downtown Minneapolis during the five o'clock rush was a major pain in the ass. Not to mention I was up all night hanging out at a friend's house, and we left for MN at six in the morning. A LONG drive, with a lot on my mind, and I about fell asleep many times on the interstate. But after getting our motel, we left about three hours early, thinking it would be plenty of time to find the place and get up front. I drove in Milwaukee, so I didn't think this would be any worse.

FUCKING WRONG!! The freeways were bumper to bumper. A normal five minute drive took about an hour just to get into the city. Then after driving around another hour, we finally located First Avenue. Then another hour to find a damn place to park. It was hell. But we made it.

Due to the lateness, we missed the first band, Crossbreed. It didn't really matter, since I heard they sucked anyway. But Godhead was up next. Unforunately, we couldn't get up front, and I was too lazy to shove myself through the fray to get there. But soon after, Godhead hit the stage.

Godhead
I had seen Godhead at Ozzfest. They had some decent stuff, but they weren't much to mosh to. At Ozzfest, Godhead was one of my "break" bands, that I went and sat on the hill and rested.

There wasn't a whole lot special about them. They said "We are Godhead!" like five times. I fucking knew that, buh! They played the same set they did at Ozzfest, I believe. Most of the people up front just stood except for a couple songs which had a good jumping beat. During one song the singer wore some gas mask or something which altered his voice. But when he sang with it, it caused major distortion in the microphone and led to many people holding their ears from the loud squak. It was a valiant effort, I give them that. He would take off his mask and sing normally later.

The only song I really recognized was "The Reckoning". The bassist, I think. His name is "Meth" had the most energy of the band. The others just kind of stood there. But eventually Godhead left the stage.

The crew started setting up the water tanks with body parts in it for Rammstein. I was getting exciting and hoping they would get to use the pyro. It took FOREVER to fucking set up. The crowd starting getting anxious and a "Rammstein!" chant began. It wasn't soon after the lights cut.

Rammstein
Someone came out on stage first, and everyone erupted. It took me a little to realize, but it was Flake, the keyboardist. He got up in his .... little area, or whatever and started the beginning sample for "Mein Herz Brent". The violins came in, and a chill went up my spine. All you could really see was Flake, so I imagine this is where the rest of the band, except Till came up. Then Till voice came, singing the first part. Surprisingly, to me, a lot of people were singing along with him. The shout of "MEIN HERZ BRENT!!" came as Till busted out on stage and everyone went insane.

Any loyal Rammstein fan probably knows their new look. A lot of them, including Till now have mohawks. Till's is the longest. Richard and Flake have bright red hair. As Till sang the chorus, he shouted "Brent" repeatedly and hit himself. The pyro came in. Before you couldn't notice it, but still had this red, glowing "heart" on his chest. During the slow part of the song, it glew bright, and lit up to the beat. Till ripped it out of his chest, held it up in the air, and as the music hit hard again, it burst into flames, like a flare, lighting up the whole venue.

After that, they went into "Links 2 3 4" which got the band, and most of the crowd, marching along to the intro. I don't think there was a whole lot special with this song. Maybe an explosion, but there were so many, I don't remember precisely. Till would get the crowd to go along with the cheer after he yells "LINKS!", then the recorded cheer would go, too. But at times, that also caused some big distortion, and ended up in a big squeal through the PA that about made your ears bleed. Even Till kind of looked like "WTF?". Personally, I thought crowd participation was pretty good for an American show, anyway. I thought most people wouldn't know any of the songs except "Du Hast", but there was a lot of singing along, especially to the choruses.

I'm not sure on the order of the songs, but I think next was "Feuer Frei". There were some huge ass explosions to start it off, that fucking hurt my ears. Feuer Frei is an awesome song, live and when Till would shout "Bang bang!" fire would burst out of the stage. Then during the break in the song, Till went off stage. I notice Flake was wearing a strange mask. Like a gasmask that was shooting out a stream of water. Then pretty soon, Till came back on wearing a mask not unlike Flake's, only instead of water, this one shot out FIRE!! Each time he yelled "Bang Bang!" fire shot out like fucking ten to fifteen feet, while Flake, I guess tried to dampen his flames with his measly little stream, but it didn't do much good.

After the massive explosions of Feuer Frei, I believe they went into "Mutter". Till stood on stage and sucked on his thumb, and looked around like a child who had lost it's mother (which was probably exactly what he was trying to imitate!). He mouthed along with the baby mumbling at the beginning of the song. No pyro for this song, I believe, but it was a beautiful song live. It was very dramatic when Till was wandering around, and screaming "MUTTER!!" during the break of the song.

I believe after that, they went into "Rein Raus". It got a good reaction from the crowd, and I was hoping Till would come out with his imfamous strap on dildo, but he didn't. He grinned and nodded while he sung the verses, making the obligatory gestures. And while he sung the chorus, he made a fisting motion, which is thought was great. Maybe Till would join Fistianity? But it was a great song.

There was some silence and darkness for awhile, and the "Heirate Mich" intro started. I figured they'd go into "Stripped" because I've read that they start that song with the Heirate Mich intro. But as Till started singing the first lines of Heirate Mich, I wanted to go crazy. I pushed forward a little bit more, because Herzeleid is probably my favorite Rammstein album. There were the ear splitting explosions again as the song took off. Crowd participation was awesome in this song, with everyone screaming the "Hei-hei-hei" during the chorus.

Next, I went even more crazy as the intro to "Weisses Fleisch" started up. I tried to get closer and closer. I needed to fuck shit up during this song, one of my favorites. Till started out with the flaming boots as he kicked his feet around like he was doing a Russian dance. People were fucking shit up during this song, and with the strobe light flashing during the base riff of the song, it was insane. I loved it. Even though I wasn't "officially" in the pit, it still fucked it up as much as I could.

I think afterward, they went into "Stripped" which got people's attention, because it is Rammstein's only English song. Till sang it well, and crowd participation was high with this one, no doubt. No pyro, but as they were singing "Let me see you stripped" most of the band members took off their shirts, which got a good reaction from the crowd females, (my sister included).

Next I THINK was Zwitter. Paul had a cool acrylic, one string. Yes, ONE string guitar. He started out the main riffline. The crowd chanted along with the "Zwitter-Zwitter" at the intro. As Paul played, he did some cool things with that guitar. He kind of showed off, rolling his hand and arm around the neck as he played the line, but it was cool. I'm sure it doesn't take much to play a one string guitar, you're obligated to show off a little. During the chorus of the song, Till would get a cheesy grin on his face and hug himself. As the song ended, the band lined at the front of the stage and they all headbanged together, which was pretty fucking cool.

The next one was the show stopper, as they started the song that EVERYONE knows, Du Hast. I didn't really recognize it at first, because they've done some variations to it, which is good. Of course, everyone sang along with Till as he would point at random people and go "Du! Du hast! Du hast mich!", and everyone would point back at him. There was a part where the guitar riff was different. I've played this song on my guitar many times because it's so easy, but I watched Richard, who was in front of me, and he was playing different chords than how it is normally played. It sounded great. I was really getting into it, then one of those nice explosions went off again. Buh!

Next I think was "Adios". Or maybe it was earlier in the set. Like I said, I doubt these are in order. It was after "Stripped" for sure, because I remember they were shirtless. The song seems to be a reference to heroin, and as the intro was going, Till was patting his arm, and pretended to inject himself, using the microphone as the syringe. This song was fucking GREAT live. The highlight was Richard's solo. He stood up on a PA, and started the awesome solo of the song. And as he did this, the neck of his guitar burst into flames, and was shooting out fire. He kept waving it around, because I notice the flames kept going toward his face.

Asche zu Asche was next. I knew what was coming in this song. This one got the crowd going insane as well. I heard somewhere that Till often gets pissed off during this song in American tours because people singing pronounce it like "Ay-shah" instead of "Ah-shuh", but people seemed to be saying it right this time. And, as usual, during the last chorus, Richard and Paul's mic stands went up in flames as they sang along with Till.

The Sehnsucht intro kicked in. If you've seen the "Live Aus Berlin" video, you know that explosions go off as Schneider plays the first drumline. But they did a little variation. Where he played the drumline about three times before the song hit. So.. basically a lot of exploding going on. I was hoping Till would bash the mic into his head like he did on "Live Aus Berlin". But I don't think he did. Maybe he did a couple times, but he didn't start bleeding. Instead, the mic started to go out, and he got pissed off and whipped it into a PA.

At this point, people thought the show was over. The band had left the stage, but everyone stayed put, and people kept chanting "Rammstein! Rammstein!" People who know about their live shows, know they always do encores. We all kept chanting and stomping, then Flake came back out, fucked around with his keyboard, and the "Sonne" sample started.

It got dark again, and the band came back out. Everyone went insane, and Sonne hit, and hit hard. Everyone headbanged along with the core riff, following Till's lead. The crowd seemed to chant the number during the chorus, then Till would sing the line. The song was great, live. It is one of my favorites off of the new "Mutter" album.

There was quite a bit of a wait, but I was excited and knew what was coming, as the "Rammstein" intro started playing. Then Till came out with his imfamous flaming trenchcoat, and his infra red beamed goggles. They were pretty high powered, and shot quite a ways back into the crowd. I held my hands up, and he shone the laser on my hand for a little bit. It was pretty fucking hot, actually. It was cool when you could see it from the side, moving around. Till turned around, and showed us all his back, totally on fire. I was hoping that they'd do their new variation, where he takes off the jacket, like he's done, but his leg is still on fire, then Flake sprays him with gasoline, and Till TOTALLY goes up in flames, only to reveal he's wearing a perfect replica mask of his face. But they didn't do it this time. But this was stll great.

The next one was "Ich Will". It got some decent sing alongs, but people didn't totally know the crowd lines between the chorus, and Till kind of looked like "Buh." when people didn't sing it right. But after this one, they went off, and the chanting came again. It took them longer this time.

After about ten minutes or so, Flake came back out to the microphone. And started singing in English. An unknown song. Eventually a lot of people came back on stage. Rammstein AND Godhead played together. They did a song I'm presuming is "Pet Cemetery" by... someone. I don't know. But it was cool seeing both bands all play and sing together. The Godhead drummer and Schneider played the same drumset, which I thought would be hard to do. But I'm not a drummer, so I wouldn't really know. It was a fast paced, great song. All I totally remember is a chorus line that goes "I don't wanna be buried... in a pet.. cemetery.." something something blah blah. Great song and great ending to a FUCKING KICKASS show.

Postshow
We all knew this was the end, and left. I was hoping they would have played "Nebel" one of my faves. But there's always the tour with Rob Zombie, eh? We hung out by the buses for awhile, but I was tired and thirsty as fuck. Not to mention a lot of nuts wandering around, so we just left. After nearly an hour or two of waiting to get out of the pay parking lot we found, we got out and back to the motel, where I fucking crashed.

9 AM came early the next morning, where we went to Valleyfair and had an awesome time there for about five hours or so. The traffic and driving completely sucked, but the show was great. Even if you're not a big fan, I'd recommend a Rammstein show anyday. My never to be washed concert shorts now have a tinge of pyro smoke to them. Along with the sweat, weed, tobacco, vomit, beer, and who knows what else smell to them.

I don't feel like doing a lot of thanks... Just thankful I made it out alive! It was scary when I got lost and ended up in the fucking ghetto. Then some crazy dude who was crossing the street starting screaming incoherently and pounding on the side of my car. But for thanks uh... Major fucking thanks to Rammstein. They put on a hell of a show. I like the fact about them that they can just be themselves, and still have a large fanbase around the world. Like Till answered when a reporter asked why they don't sing in English, he said "Why should we? We are German."

Thanks to my sis. Even though I got annoyed with her a little, hehe. She picked a good first rock concert. Thanks to Bea for the entertaining night beforehand that kept me up all night. I still don't understand why we saw tracers on your balcony. That's nuts. THANKS TO MY CAR FOR NOT BREAKING DOWN!! I would have been fucked, man.

Fuck you to the crazy people of Minneapolis. Not saying everyone is crazy there, it was a great city. And the traffic. And the Mexican bitch at the motel.In the classic words of SOD, "Speak English or Die." Fuck you to the stupid bitch who blocked our view. If your Mexican boyfriend wasn't standing there, I would have tossed your ass out of our way.

That's about it. Keep it real. I'm out.