Two Emotional Days

Olympiastadion, Munich, Germany – June 7 & 8, 2023

We had set list changes, we had emotions, we had tears, we had a storm warning – Rammstein’s two first concerts in Munich were two days that we will remember and treasure forever.

By Sez and KidArctica

Olympiastadion in Munich was built for the 1972 Olympic Summer Games. For many years, it was the home stadium of local football club FC Bayern München, until Allianz Arena was opened in 2005. Olympiastadion is still a main arena for athletics, and it has become a very popular concert venue. The stadium is located in the Olympiapark, a huge park with good infrastructure to accommodate lots of visitors as well as plenty of space for setting up booths and trucks for sale of food, drink, and merchandise.

In 2019, Rammstein played two shows at the Olympiastadion, and this year, they have returned for a whopping four shows which were all sold out in a matter of hours. A total of around 240,000 visitors are expected through the gates over the course of these four shows, meaning an average of about 60,000 fans per show.

Considering this, you’d think that the Germans, who are stereotypically labelled as very organised people, would have a great system for lining up and entry. Guess what. They don’t.

07.06.2023

As usual, the first fans showed up early to start queuing for the first of the four Munich shows. With pretty much no information from the event organiser, it was down to scouting to figure out where to actually line up. The one thing we knew, was that there would be no separate Feuerzone entrance. Any entrance that would give you access to the general admission area, could also be used for Feuerzone. There are several entrances to the Olympiastadion, but one of them seemed more likely to get us in faster, and that’s where we set up camp.

While the first people started numbering themselves, it soon became clear that Germany is not that positive to this fan-made queue organisation. One guy even said that “numbering is fascism” and refused to get one (although he was later spotted with a number on his hand). Others jumped the barrier to cut in the waiting line, and some got obnoxiously drunk hours before doors. Because of this, making sure we kept our spots up front became the most important task.

Entry in Munich was scheduled for 3:30 pm. This is early compared to most other shows. Tension rose as time was nearly there, especially when security informed us that the event organiser had given out wrongful information on Facebook. They had written that a small powerbank would be allowed inside, which contradicted the instructions security employees were given. Luckily, a friend helped us deposit our powerbanks, or else we would have had to throw them away.

It took quite a while before the actual entry started. Around ten minutes after the planned start, we noticed that the entrance to our right had opened, with people already moving inside. Only after loudly making security aware of this, we were finally allowed to start entering as well.

Cue chaos.

After passing through security and ticket and ID check, we were stopped by another gate just short of the stairs leading down to the pit. It seemed that security wanted to gather up a larger group of people to then walk down the stairs – which had always worked out so well in past concerts (Berlin 2022, anyone?). After a while and a second ticket scan, we were finally let through the gates just to be stopped again at the top of the stairs, where we were told that security would slowly walk us all to the Feuerzone and General Admission gates.

Walking down the stairs and then across the pit worked fairly well – until it didn’t. Security stopped everyone in the middle of the pit to loudly exclaim that the Feuerzone entry was to the left, while General Admission had to steer to the right. The pushing from the back had increased with every stop we took and at this point, it got extremely bad, making the people at the front have more close personal contact with the security staff than they would have probably wanted. Suddenly, impatient people started separating from the group – and as soon as one person starts running, the mob follows.

We arrived at the gates to Feuerzone only to have to fight not to be completely squished while trying to get through the gates. There was a total of one security employee stationed inside every gate for a third ticket scan and they were visibly struggling to keep people from breaking through. Finally, after some struggle, this last gate was also passed, and we could run the rest of the way to front row, where some of us kept loudly vocalizing their strong opinions of this horribly organised concert entry.

Throughout this whole ordeal, nobody had handed out Feuerzone bracelets, which was very confusing. In fact, the guards started handing out the bracelets to people in front row after they had arrived there. It turns out that you were supposed to be given a bracelet at a designated spot at the back of Feuerzone, which was so well placed that almost everyone completely ignored it. The stressful situation probably affected the guards as well, with one of them somehow having a problem with a friend of ours and refusing to hand out a bracelet to him. He received one from a different guard later, but this only increased the overall negative experience of this concert entry.

The early entry time made the wait inside the stadium quite long, with the burning afternoon sun not exactly helping people have a pleasant waiting experience. One good thing to note about this concert entry system is that – while powerbanks are apparently evil – small water bottles up to 0.5 l were allowed in as long as they were sealed. That meant that we could at least hydrate ourselves while waiting until 7:30 pm, when Abélard entered the B-Stage, playing their usual set.

After Abélard, fans waited in anticipation to finally rejoice when the familiar gong gonged at around 8:40 pm. Music for the Royal Fireworks followed, with the screen showing the Rammstein logo as usual. Usually, this would transition into the intro for the song Rammlied with a big light appearing on screen and slowly zooming out to reveal Till Lindemann, but this time, the screen stayed black, possibly due to a malfunction. This did nothing to decrease the excitement of fans though, as Till was met with loud cheers when descending in the stage elevator.

The rest of the band ascended on the ramp in the center of the stage. Christoph Schneider seemed to struggle a bit with getting into the song as he started playing the drum rhythm for the main riff too early. The rest of the song was played as usual. Overall, there were no big surprises in the setlist or the song performances up until the Deutschland Remix. Oliver Riedel, Paul Landers, Flake Lorenz and Christoph Schneider were performing their stickman dance routine, an element of the show which is loved by some and ridiculed by others. Suddenly, Till entered the stage as well and sat down on Richard’s footrest to the right of the stage, watching his band mates’s questionable attempts at doing a human wave dance move. After this, the band kicked into the normal version of Deutschland, with Richard sporting a fancy new off-white guitar.

The following songs were performed as usual. After Sonne, fans were curious to see if the setlist change from the previous concert in Odense would persist. There, the band transitioned into Ausländer instead of taking a bow. However, this time, the old song order seemed to have been restored as the band gathered at the front of the stage together to take a bow and end the main set.

Rammstein have been under immense pressure recently due to allegations made and spread in the media. This was probably the reason why especially Schneider seemed very emotional when standing there after Sonne. The fans gave it their everything to reassure the band of their support by cheering them on and screaming “Schneider!” from the top of their lungs. Maybe this was the final push that tipped Schneider over the edge, as he started openly crying and kneeling down instead of just bowing. As fans, it was next to impossible not to get very emotional when watching this. There were tears, and there were lots of them.

The fan cam followed and the band appeared together on the B-Stage, revealing a new setlist change: Only Engel was performed on the B-Stage, omitting Ohne dich, which had previously been sung mostly by Till alone before Engel. After the boat ride back to the main stage, Ausländer was back in its original spot, transitioning into Du riechst so gut and then… Ohne dich?! We were already really surprised when only Engel was played on the B-Stage, but were completely taken aback when the intro to the full band version of Ohne dich was suddenly sounding across the stadium from the main stage. This was yet another very emotional moment for many fans who could not hold back their tears any longer.

After Ohne dich, the stage lighting took on the familiar orange to red colour scheme of Pussy. However, instead of starting the song, the lighting remained unchanged for about a minute, accompanied only by the confused voices of many fans. When Flake appeared at his keyboard and the stage went completely dark, it became apparent that Pussy was not going to be played. Indeed, the intro to Rammstein started playing instead.

After Rammstein came Ich will. Most of the song was performed as usual, however there was a small moment at the end which again pulled at the heartstrings of fans when Till changed the lyrics from “Wir verstehen euch” to a heartfelt “München, dankeschön!” (Munich, thank you!). When Adieu started playing as the last song, tears were streaming down the faces of some very emotional fans once more, resulting in Paul signalling to those fans to just breathe and calm down (Spoiler: We did not really calm down). After kneeling for their crazily loudly cheering fans, Till thanked the audience by saying “München, danke, dass ihr hier und dass ihr bei uns seid” (Munich, thank you for being here and being with us).

Many fans have expressed their disappointment over the missing kiss between Paul and Richard during the Ausländer outro. As consolation, we can happily report that the two guitarists shared a kiss after bowing to the crowd on the right side of the stage. The band finally slowly ascended in the stage elevator, waving goodbye to their fans, and disappearing with the usual bang. This ended what was probably one of if not the most emotional concert that many fans have ever experienced.

08.06.2023

After what had been such a phenomenal concert the previous day, many fans who were planning on staying in Munich for multiple concerts were excited for the second show. Queuing went as usual, with our diet consisting mostly of various snack-foods like crackers and Oreos. The weather in Munich stepped up the heat from the previous day, going up to about 25 degrees Celcius. Thankfully, the entrance we were queuing at was surrounded by trees, so we were not completely melting in the sun. Despite being worried about the concert entry from the experiences of the first day, mood was fairly high… and then came the one thing to make the entry even worse than before: hello, rain!

As if the weather gods had just decided to screw with us, a big storm cloud emptied itself above us pretty much exactly for the duration of the entry. With this came slippery ground, soaked clothes and dissolving tickets. Thankfully, our tickets could still be scanned – other people were not as lucky. The pushing was not quite as bad as the first day, although getting through the final gates into the Feuerzone was still a nightmare. In the end, we managed to secure a front row spot again.

After both Helsinki and Odense showed massive improvements in the entry systems after the first day, fans were hoping Munich would follow this pattern. However, after two concerts, it became apparent that Germans are resistant to learning from bad entry experiences. Although not really surprising, it was still disappointing.

The rain stopped just in time for the almost four hour wait inside the stadium, letting the sun boil down on the people instead. After Abélard’s set, an announcement was made through the stadium speakers, telling the audience that a severe weather warning had been issued, that they would keep everyone posted and that the show would continue as normal until further notice. This sounded quite worrying for a lot of people, some already imagining a “second time in Rammstein history” scenario where the show would need to be stopped because of extreme weather like in Leipzig last year (bonus points for people who got that reference).

The sky, although being lit up by several lightning strikes, stayed calm, and so the concert could begin – with no gong! Music for the Royal Fireworks simply started playing at around 8:40 pm. This time, the screen worked as intended for the Rammlied intro, showing the light zooming out and revealing Till.

This concert held less surprises than the first one. The setlist was the same as the previous day, meaning that Ohne dich was played as a full band version on the main stage after Du riechst so gut and that Pussy has been omitted from the set. Till did not appear on stage during the stickman dance this time.

We would like to mention a few noteworthy things that stuck out during the show. Paul went up to Schneider during Mein Teil and seemed to talk to him about something. Later, Richard and Paul were walking hand in hand to the B-Stage after the main set. During the boat ride back, an enthusiastic fan climbed into Schneider’s boat and rode along to the main stage, where Till helped him off the boat and a security guard awaited him – one can only speculate what happens to such people after they are taken away from stage. A different fan tried the same on Paul’s boat, however Paul politely but firmly refused to let the fan hijack the boat. Lastly, another thing worth noting is that Paul’s guitar flamethrower didn’t work during Rammstein, leading to him making sad faces and rubbing his eyes as if to suggest he was crying. Poor, poor Paul.

After the band kneeled down at the end of the show, Till got up to speak and we all expected him to say a few words to thank the audience, as he usually does. What he said instead was not only unexpected, but hit extremely deep for many fans who have been very emotionally invested into recent media storms. We think this is also the perfect way to end these two reports of concerts that were not only fantastic, but also incredibly emotional for both the band and their fans.

“München, wir hatten ein Riesenglück mit dem angekündigten Unwetter. Glaubt mir, das andere wird auch vorbeiziehen.” (Munich, we were extremely lucky with the announced thunderstorm. Believe me, the other one will pass as well.)

Sez and KidArctica are RammWiki editors. They have been part of the website for years, working in the background with edits and content. Fun fact: After last year‘s show in Düsseldorf, Sez had an empty water bottle with Till‘s dried up saliva on it standing around in her room for multiple months.