Roger Waters performs without Nazi uniform in Frankfurt

At the start of his show at the Frankfurt Festhalle on Sunday, Pink Floyd co-founder Roger Waters announced he would not wear a controversial outfit that has led to a criminal investigation in Germany.

Waters is being investigated by German police on suspicion of “incitement of the people” – a legal concept often applied to trials related to Holocaust denial in Germany – for appearing on stage at concerts in Berlin on May 17 and 18 wearing a uniform. Nazi uniform while firing an imitation machine gun.

The singer claimed during his performance in Frankfurt that his decision to avoid the controversial outfit was out of respect for the concert hall’s history, noting that he knew the Frankfurt Festhalle played a central role in the deportation of the city’s Jews as part of the Holocaust.

During the pogroms of November 1938, more than 3,000 Jewish citizens of Frankfurt were arrested in the hall and later deported to concentration camps in Buchenwald and Dachau.

Character ‘an unhinged fascist demagogue’ created in the 1980s

After the investigation was launched, Waters defended his stage persona by explaining that he was intended as a symbol of resistance: “The portrayal of an unhinged fascist demagogue has been a feature of my shows since Pink Floyd’s ‘The Wall’ in 1980” , he said in a statement on social media, also noting that his father died in Italy fighting in World War II.

In fact, the character was already part of Alan Parker’s 1982 film adaptation of “The Wall,” a musical drama based on the 1979 Pink Floyd album. activist Bob Geldof wears a similar uniform when joining a neo-Nazi organization he ends up leading. In the film, the delusional rock star thinks he’s a dictator, and his concert is a fascist rally.

An attempt to ban the concert

Around 500 people gathered outside the Frankfurt concert hall on Sunday afternoon to protest Waters’ performance.

Frankfurt mayor Mike Josef was among the protesters. He accuses Waters of spreading anti-Semitic ideas “under the guise of liberty”. For the politician, one thing is certain. “We don’t want someone like that here,” he said at the protest, German news agency dpa reported. Referring to acts of terror against Jews that took place in the festival hall under the Nazis, he added: “It is unbearable that the voice of hatred of Jews is being raised again in this hall.”

Months before the event, city officials tried to cancel the show, accusing Waters of being “one of the most well-known anti-Semites in the world”. The controversial rock musician took legal action against the ban.

Citing artistic freedom in its ruling, a court ruled that the concert could be performed even if it featured different “tasteless” elements and symbols that were openly inspired by the Nazi regime.

Repeated accusations of anti-Semitism

The 79-year-old rock star was applauded by his fans as he repeated at his Sunday concert that he was not an anti-Semite, causing him to briefly cry.

Waters has been repeatedly criticized in Germany for his support of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement, which calls for boycotts of Israel. The movement was officially condemned by the German government as anti-Semitic.

In the past, the rock star has also put an inflatable pig at his concerts. Among other things, it is adorned with the Star of David. The pig balloon was part of the performance in Frankfurt, but without the star, as it also happened in previous shows in Germany.

According to a Deutschlandfunk reviewer, the show’s visuals, however, position the pig as a symbol of “evil” and are placed in relation to Israeli weapons producers and the Israeli army.

The program also includes a segment referring to different victims of violence, such as anti-Nazi activist Sophie Scholl, Jina Mahsa Amini, whose death sparked protests in Iran, African-American George Floyd and Holocaust victim Anne Frank. The fact that the Jewish teenager’s name was listed right before that of Shireen Abu Akleh, an Al-Jazeera journalist believed to have been killed by Israeli soldiers during a shootout with Palestinian militants, caused “outrage from Israeli and Jewish activists and authorities from all over the world”. according to the conservative Israeli newspaper Post Jerusalem. It also spawned a tweet from the Israeli Foreign Ministry condemning Waters.

Concerts canceled in Poland

Also contributing to his controversial image is the fact that Waters is seen as an open supporter of Russian Vladimir Putin, a position he made clear in an interview with the German daily. Berliner Zeitung which was republished on Waters’ own website, in English. In the interview, he basically quotes all of Putin’s arguments “justifying” what is defined in Russia as a “special military operation”.

After the interview, the musician was invited by the Russian Federation to speak at the UN Security Council.

His statements had an impact on his visit to Poland, one of Ukraine’s most loyal allies.

Last year, when Krakow city councilors declared Waters a “persona non grata” over the musician’s stance on Russia’s war in Ukraine, the musician canceled his shows in the country.

Update: This article was updated the day after it was published with more details related to Roger Waters’ support for Russia.