Live Review: Laibach - Bochum 2022

Christuskirche, Bochum, Germany
29th October 2022
Laibach - “The Coming Race” Tour 2022

It was a Saturday evening in October and we went to a special location, the Christuskirche (Christ Church) in Bochum, a place of worship that has also been used for concerts for years. When you enter this place, you look at pews and a big high wall with a cross hanging on it. The only special feature was that there were musical instruments in the place of the altar. The Slovenian artist collective LAIBACH could not have chosen a better place. The high ceiling and the high walls provide the perfect surface for the elaborate projection.

The band LAIBACH was founded in 1984 as part of the Slovenian art collective “Neue Slowenische Kunst”. Named after the German name of the Slovenian city of Ljubljana, the band polarised early on with their provocative use of military uniforms and symbols. Musically, LAIBACH belongs to the experimental bands that combine classical music, choirs and industrial sounds. Today, the music of LAIBACH seems a bit more reserved, but due to the unique voice of Milan Fras it remains a total work of art of LAIBACH. https://www.laibach.org / https://www.facebook.com/Laibach



Music & Performance
At the beginning, the band played a few bars alone until the enchanting singer Marina Martensson with her curly red hair and an acoustic guitar entered the stage and sang the song ‘Love Is Still Alive (Moon, Euphoria)’. While the music video for the song played on the big wall in the background, singer Milan Fras entered the stage in a glittering silver suit and Stetson Western hat. After this song, both left the stage again and until a break, the band played very ambient electronic sounding music, but still showing the signature of LAIBACH.



After a 15-minute break, the complete band came back to perform the song ‘Ordnung Und Disziplin’. During the song ‘Angel of Despair’, photos of old sculptures were projected over the walls. With Milan Fras’ particularly distinctive voice, the audience heard ‘Nachtlied’ and ‘Ein Untergang’ from the album ‘Also Sprach Zarathustra’. The whole concert was an audio-visual treat. Besides the excellent music with its typical epic sounds, the clear vocals of Marina Martensson, the deep voice of Milan Fras, there were projection of stars, splashing water, an oversized moon or two crossed hammers.



As part of the last two encores, the whole stage turned red and the cross of the church hung in the background. In this atmosphere LAIBACH played the well-known cover version of the ROLLING STONES song ‘Sympathy For The Devil’. Also this evening LAIBACH showed that they do not only cling to well-known songs and interpret themselves every time anew.

Rating
Music: 9
Performance: 8.5
Light: 9
Sound: 8.5
Total: 8.8 / 10

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All Pictures by Andreas Klüppelberg