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Light. They walk to the top of the steps in the new darkness and look



Down into the enormous well of buzzing Berliners—and a spotlight hits them. Uh-oh. They are illuminated like Nordic gods. A cheer rises up from the throng. They descend the stone stairs to the back of the stage, slowly sinking beneath the crowd's vision.

Looks impressive to the world, but in underworld there's panic. The elevator that raises Bono onto the stage is broken. A crew member is desperately trying to get it working. A signal is sent to the video crew to keep the intro tapes playing. The video guys flip—these opening mon­tage tapes don't last too long! Okay, the elevator's fixed! Tell the vid crew the band's going on! Where the fuck is the band? They are still standing at the foot of the steps, admiring what a good job they did walking down. The intro tape is about to run out! Get them onstage now!

The audience's attention is held by the Zoo TV screens, which are lit with the gigantic images from Leni Riefensthal's Triumph of the Will and Olympia. The crowd—the vast majority of whom could not recognize these images, which have been banned in Germany—cheer as the drum­mer boy bangs out a beat and the German bathing beauties sweep their arms in the air and a Hitler Youth (here some of the crowd may be getting the vibe that this is toxic history) pumps a baton. Beethoven's "Ode to Joy" (See, there were good Germans too) blasts louder and louder as the Nazi images give way to a cascade of symbols of Europe in the last fifty years—from the hammer and sickle to the shroud of Turin to the little sketch of a sad astronaut that is the symbol of this tour (it is basically last year's Achtung Baby baby with a space helmet drawn around his face—it represents the Soviet cosmonaut who was in orbit when the USSR fell, and who was left floating up there for weeks until the new government figured out who was responsible for getting him down). The images come faster and faster, the music swells higher and higher— and then it is broken by Edge's guitar slashing out the first chords of Zoo Station" as the video screens all turn to blue static.

As always, this drives the crowd apeshit, and climaxes with Bono rising slowly up in silhouette in front of the screen behind Edge. Bono always struts across the whole row of screens, from the left side of the stage to the right, and descends singing to take his place with the band. Tonight, though, he is not just strutting across the screens. Maurice yelps and Joe O'Herlihy shakes his head. Bono is goose-stepping. His right arm keeps trying to shoot up in a Nazi salute, like Dr. Strangelove,

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and his left hand keeps grabbing it and slapping it down. One of the slogans that flashes on the screens is "Taste is the enemy of art." If that's true, Bono is da Vinci tonight.

The band is playing like dervishes, opening on full throttle. Edge is standing with his feet far apart, holding his guitar out in front of him while he plays. Bono is singing in some strange accent, at the very edge of his throat, roaring the words. This is for them the most important show of the tour. This is where they have to get it right. Subtlety is not even in the repertoire.

Bono again dedicates "One" to the Turks. This time there is very little cheering; in fact, the crowd noise seems to drop when he says it. By the time the band gets out to the B stage for the acoustic set it's after 10:30 and the temperature is dropping fast. It's freezing. Bono seems to be losing his voice. But the climax is ahead.

It is illegal to display the swastika in Germany—that's why those in the walls of this building have been patched in with plaster. During the height of "Bullet the Blue Sky" the stage is bathed in bloodred light. On last year's tour, when Bono sang, "See the burning crosses, see the flames higher and higher," huge crosses filled with fire rose on the video screens. They do now, too—but when they reach the apex of their ascent the crosses tilt to the right and turn into flaming swastikas. There is no single reaction from the crowd—there are audible gasps and there is titillation, anger, embarrassment, excitement. Young Germans are particularly sensitive to the insult of foreigners linking them to the Nazis, so there is considerable tension in the pause before Bono says, in German, "This will never happen again!"

Then there is an explosion of applause and cheering. The German audience has been invited to identify fascism as the sin of the other, not of themselves. They are relieved and anxious to do so. Bono figures that saying those five words, spelling out U2's message, is completely con­trary to the spirit of Zoo TV—where there is supposed to be no moralizing, where symbols are held up to raise questions and examine contradictions. But at the same time U2 is aware that some things are more important than art theories, and opposition to fascism is way up on that list. The band decided that if they were going to use the swastika—the most potent semiotic of all—they had to break character and be absolutely clear that they regarded this as evil. They wanted to offer the audience, especially the audience in places where neo-Nazis are

[267]

rooting around, an opportunity to celebrate being opposed to fascism. They could not stand to risk some moron thinking they were celebrat­ing Nazism, but even more they didn't want German kids to think U2 was pushing them into a corner where they had to defend anything corrupt out of misguided national loyalty. Bono told the crowd when speaking of the Turks, that by standing for justice in the face of evil, "You have the chance to be heroes." That is, finally, all they came to Berlin to say.

After all this tension and catharsis, "Pride," complete with its Martin Luther King samples, is a celebration. Hitler must be turning in his bunker. McGuinness makes his way to the soundboard to tell Joe O'Herlihy that Mix magazine has nominated him as Sound Reinforce­ment Engineer of the Year. "This'll make you goose-step quicker," the manager says. Joe decides to celebrate by cranking up the sound to a house-shaking level. It's now too loud to talk. McGuinness passes Joe a note—a drawing of the Zoo plane with the scribble, "After 'Love Is Blindness,' " meaning, as soon as the last song is over, run for the cars— we're racing to the airport and anyone left behind can walk back to Ireland.

Joe, sensitive to the fact that he is breaking the decibel barrier, passes a note back to Paul: "They are taking me into custody after the show tonight. Yes. Arrested."

Paul scribbles on the paper and passes it back: "Can I still vote for you if you're in jail?"

Macphisto is raving mad tonight. Pointing to his platform shoes, he cries, "The last time you saw me I was five feet eight, but now look at me! I'm gigantic! Do you know who Helmut Kohl is?" There is a negative murmur, some booing. "He's becoming a friend of mine." A few cheers. "Shall I give him a telephone call?" Lots of cheers. Macphisto gestures to the stadium around him and cackles, "I love this place!" There is some applause. "All the pomp and ceremonial march­ing . . ." the crowd quiets down. "Don't you love that?"

He dials the chancellor's number and gets a busy signal. "I think I might have offended the chancellor." The devil sighs. Then he starts shouting, "Hello? Can you hear me, Helmut Kohl? I don't need the telephone lines! You know who I am! And I want to thank you for letting me back into the country! I'M BACK! I'M BAAACK.'!"


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