'Wind of Change': Germany's history in songs
Music makes people happy, it has the power to move the masses. But some pop and rock songs have also made history, as a new exhibition in Bonn shows.
Sound of a time machine
Anyone who's ever heard the sound of a portable analog radio made by brands such as Admiral or Clipper will immediately feel transported to the postwar era. All of Germany was bombed out, the cities fields of ruins. In the early 1950s, Germans were drawn to the countryside: Picnics with portable radios were the order of the day. Travel was an unaffordable luxury, but camping was possible!
On the moped to the ice cream parlor
Members of the occupying US Army brought new sounds with them in the form of jazz, and then rock 'n' roll. Soon there were jukeboxes at the ice cream parlors in West Germany. In front of them were mopeds owned by young men with James Dean jackets and Elvis quiffs. They danced to music by Elvis Presley, Bill Haley, Chuck Berry and Little Richard. The main thing: "Rock Around the Clock."
Protest Culture
In the 1960s, a singer-songwriter scene established itself at demonstrations against nuclear power, squats and peace concerts. Political anthems conquered the charts, including the 1969 song "Macht Kaputt, Was Euch Kaputt Macht" (Destroy What Destroys You) by Berlin rebel band Ton, Steine, Scherben. Soon after, German Krautrock bands such as Can (pictured) and Tangerine Dream became export hits.
Punk rockers against the far right
Die Toten Hosen have long been known for taking a stand, whether against right-wingers or nuclear power, or by posing naked for an anti-fur campaign. They performed at the 2019 concert Rock gegen Rechts (Rock Against the Right) in Chemnitz in the wake of the neo-Nazi riots in the city. With such albums as "Opium fürs Volk" (Opium for the People), they have been the vanguard of political punk.
'99 Red Balloons'
The Cold War still determined the social and cultural climate in the 1980s. The 1983 song "99 Luftballons" by West German pop star Nena was inspired by the image of balloons floating over the Berlin Wall, which the song describes as triggering 99 years of apocalyptic war that leaves the planet in ruins. The anti-war anthem was an international hit.
Rock star meets head of state
When the East German leader Erich Honecker visited the birthplace of Friedrich Engels in Wuppertal in 1987, the rock star Udo Lindenberg took advantage of the opportunity to make a political statement, as he had done with much of his music: He gave "Honni" a guitar with the inscription "Gitarren statt Knarren" (Guitars Instead of Guns).
"Born in the GDR"
Soon, a crack formed in the Iron Curtain. To the delight of music fans, the GDR suddenly allowed concerts by stars from the "capitalist West." The performance by the US rock singer Bruce Springsteen in July 1988 was the biggest concert event in GDR history. More than 160,000 fans cheered him on the cycling track in Berlin-Weissensee — and painted banners such as this one.
'Wind of Change'
In 1989, the German rockers Scorpions were on tour playing concerts in Moscow and Leningrad. The Moscow Music Peace Festival was considered the "Woodstock of the East." It was here, backstage, that they wrote their ballad "Wind of Change," just before the fall of the Berlin Wall in November. The massive hit went down in history as the anthem of German reunification.
'Hits and Hymns'
Music history also includes national anthems. In East Germany, citizens sang "Risen From Ruins". Despite associations with the Nazi past, the rest of Germany continued to sing the third verse verse of the historic national anthem. The exhibition at Bonn's Haus der Geschichte runs through October 10.