Thursday 14/07/05 Rammstein @ Metroradio Arena, Newcastle

The circus has come to town – and man, what a circus! Tonight, Teutonic rockers Rammstein prove that after more than a decade of setting fire to things and generally scaring the shit out of respectable citizens the world over, they remain the unchallenged masters of the theatrical rock show.  This is a band famed for the sheer epic scale of its live performances, and many of the several thousand-strong crowd at the Metroradio Arena are here purely on the basis of Rammstein’s reputation for putting on a show.

And ‘kinell, do they put on a show!  Onstage histrionics, pyro, a lighting rig of Biblical proportions and a stage set that must have cost more than Luxemburg – they’ve got it all, and more.  The three hour set is a visual and musical masterpiece, jets of flame shooting high into the air, portable flamethrowers, mortars, arm-mounted flamethrowers, head-mounted flamethrowers - in fact, lets just say Rammstein have thoroughly thought through the whole business of flamethrowers.  Those in the crowd who aren’t moshing like crazy people simply stand, gawping, open-mouthed in sheer awestruck wonderment.

Vocalist and chief nutter Till Lindemann is one scary dude. The former olympic swimmer prowls the stage,  his deep, menacing voice, brick-shithouse-like constitution and evident predeliction for playing with matches making him an utterly captivating frontman.  Moreover, in keeping with the band’s motto of “do your own thing – and overdo it”, Rammstein even manage to take the simple and time-honoured practice of crowd-surfing to new levels, bassist Oliver Riedel surfing the moshpit in a large inflatable dingy.

Not only are Rammstein visually amazing, musically they are flawless. Their unique breed of Tanz-Metal, synthesising metal, industrial and electronic music is absolutely at home in an arena of this size. Heavy, dark, often rather disturbing (for some reason, the sight of Flake Lorenz in leiderhosen is fairly freaky in itself), the evil-sounding stomp of songs like ‘Links 2 3 4’ and ‘Stripped’ as well as singalong classics like ‘Amerika’ get the moshpit well and truly going. ‘Mein Teil’ sees Lorenz taking a break from keyboard duties to be boiled alive in a massive cauldron by a flamethrower-weilding Lindemann clad in a blood-smeared butchers’ outfit, a darkly comic allusion to the Armin Meiwes cannibalism case on which the song is based.

“Whereas other bands play”, say Rammstein fans, “Rammstein burns”.  It is only when you witness the awe-inspiring spectacle of Rammstein’s live show that you’ll fully understand how true that is.