Claire Berlinski, International Herald Tribune:
>>...In the early 1990s, when Rammstein burst onto the scene, resurgent nationalism had given rise to an efflorescence of politically strident "Fascho-rock." Rammstein's innovation was to look and sound very much like Fascho-rock while denying any political opinions at all. "Rammstein's music," said the band's publicist, "has no political content whatsoever. Their songs are about love." Rammstein's lyrics and imagery were just close enough to the line to arouse very uneasy emotions, but just far enough that their game could be plausibly denied and the critics dismissed as humorless hysterics.
[...]
Most compelling is the band's lead singer. Dressed in an imperial German military uniform, Lindemann gave off an air of such brute masculinity and barely contained violence that it seemed he could have reached into the crowd, snatched up a fan, and bitten off his head. He commands a low, powerful bass rarely used in contemporary pop music, untrained but electrifying.
The band then introduced one of its most notorious songs, "Links," with the sound of metrically precise, marching jackboots. Links means left, and the band claims this song is an expression of its left-wing sensibilities. The language lent itself to the powerful, rhythmic song. The keyboardist stomped about in a German military helmet. Lindemann performed an exaggerated goose step. The crowd shouted "Hi!" in unison, which sounded just different enough from "Heil" that the resemblance could be denied.
The musicians, wearing flame-throwing gas masks, sprayed fire over the stage. They burst explosives in the air and shot balls of flames over the audience, generating heat so intense that fans began to pass out. Medics strapped the fallen to gurneys and carted them away. I emerged profoundly relieved that the band declares itself to be against war: If this is their pacifism, the mind boggles at what their aggression might look like.<<
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