Diana Kaulitz
Forum Admin
Number of posts : 912
Age : 30
Location : With Bill
Registration date : 2008-02-02
 | | Subject: Geneva Review Wed Jul 16, 2008 2:19 pm | |
| Bill & Co. let down their fans
Tokio Hotel: Apathetic at Geneva
Yesterday Tokio Hotel played in front of 10,000 fans in Geneva. The cheering of the crowd was incredible, as was the self-restraining of the stars.
The first beats sound throughout Geneva Arena at 19:30. 10,000 fans scream as the biggest hits such as ‘Schrei’ or ‘Übers Ende der Welt’ ring out. Tokio Hotel delivers a professional show – and yet, the enthusiasm is missing.
The four Magdeburg boys keep some distance from the crowd. There’s no lack of the thousands of longing hands raised in the air. Above all, Bill, who girls are passionate about, seems as though he can’t keep enough distance between himself and the fans. He sings from a platform behind the drums for the most part of the concert.
The quartet has managed to do what hardly any German-singing bands have succeeded in doing: They’ve made it abroad. With ‘Schrei’ (2005), they found success as being the first German band to get into the French Top 20. The English version climbed to no.39 in the USA Billboard charts, and even to 6th place in Canada. Tokio Hotel has earned 60 million Swiss Francs since their debut. Long since they’ve been laughed at as one-hit wonders, they’ve become out-of-reach superstars.
At the same time, Tokio Hotel always stands for genuineness. They’re no artificial band; they got together by themselves and they’ve all played their instruments since early childhood. In the band’s (mostly self-written) lyrics, they deal with every teen problem – from lovesickness to suicidal thoughts to the separation of parents.
It arrives. Just like Bill’s look. Despite animosity and sneering remarks, he’s never been put off. It’s his style – he already had his first piercing at 12 years old, which was shortly followed by his first tattoos. With success, his appearance became more extreme, his hair longer (his styling recommendation: “Using a can of hairspray every day and never washing your hair”), his eyeliner thicker and his nail varnish more eccentric.
“Always more” seems to have become the band’s motto. But not in one aspect – Tokio Hotel isn’t the approachable band any more. They seal themselves off. “They don’t give any autographs anymore or pose with the fans for photos,” says Andrea (16), from Olden.
A good hundred teenagers were already camping on the sidewalk days before yesterday’s concert so that they would be admitted into the concert hall first. “I haven’t seen anything like it since Michael Jackson or Pink Floyd played here twenty years ago,” says Michael Drieberg, the concert organiser.
Yet, the times in which fans gathered outside the hotels the boys stayed in are over. “Now they stay as far away from the concert hall as possible; sometimes in other areas, so that they won’t get annoyed by us,” complains Manuela (14), from Berne. The distancing from the fans hasn’t been the only consequence of their success – Bill had to have an operation in March due to a cyst in his vocal chords, which interrupted the tour.
Polo Hofer (63) and Marc Dietrich (59) from the Swiss band Peter, Sue & Marc had to undergo this operation, after which their voices got worn thin through the decades. Bill is forty years younger.
The girls fall down row by row
200 security forces such as nurses and Samaritans were offered at the sold-out Tokio Hotel concert in Geneva – and they were needed, too.
The German rock band played for 90 minutes in front of 10,000 fans at the Geneva Arena and the medical staff had their hands full. They had to be called out up to 250 times in order to nurse the young girls who became unwell back to health.
The run-up to the concert caused some confusion due to the tickets. Originally, the Magdeburg band’s concert was announced for March. However, because the 18-year-old singer Bill Kaulitz had to be subjected to a vocal chord operation early on in the year, some concerts were cancelled, including the one in Geneva.
As a result, the organisers planned to let Tokio Hotel appear at the Stade de Genève this Saturday. But then this venue, with its 25,000 places, was out of the organisers’ league. The tickets for the Stade de Genève were valid for the Geneva Arena. The ones for the cancelled concert in March weren’t, though. | |
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