At this year’s Zermatt Unplugged 90 concerts and after show parties took place. Many of the bands and musicians still unknown to me. So what are you going to listen to? That’s why I went through the detailed band descriptions on the festival page and thereby came across Antiheld. Sounded good when listening. In the last years I like German-speaking pop even more. I’d go see them. Yes, and unlike their name reveals, the Stuttgart band turned a bit into the festival heroes.
Big run on the Cervo terrace
Half an hour before the concert started, I was late. There was a big rush. I just made it to the terrace of the Hotel Cervo, before the security woman said – enough! The venue was packed, even the balcony was very crowded.
The people stood on each other’s feet and crowded around the tables where they were still eating. One tried as far as possible not to take the view of the seated guests. Nice, but a bit impractical with all the tables. The band came quite like a real bombshell the day before and were now on this Saturday afternoon even more sought after.
The audience was still standing quite reserved in front of the stage during the first few songs. Many even sat. Everyone was listening to the band, bobbing along a bit when they started with the catchy “Wenn die Welt brennt”. Then they let themselves teach the counting in Swiss German to continue with “Ein Bisschen grosse Liebe”.
Stray dog pop from Stuttgart
Their music style named the band on their Facebook page as “stray dog pop”. It sounds like a lot of pop mixed with rock and somehow punk. I could even make out folky sounds. Their lyrics proved to be very honest and totally direct. Since they had been a bit afraid that “Ficken für Weltfrieden” would not really go well with us Swiss. Already at the first concert they had noticed though, that they were wrong and had a wrong picture of our country.
Antiheroes are frontman Luca Opifanti, André Zweifel, Tito Balboa, Arne Brien and Henry Kasper. In addition to the usual instruments such as guitars, drums and keyboards, they stood on stage with bass violin and accordion. The band is from Stuttgart and have released their debut album “Keine Legenden” last year. On Friday they played their first Swiss concert on the Taste Village stage and were already really celebrated there. As soon as frontman Luca has made the VIPs to get up and get closer – that was definitely the way it was at Antihero concerts – it was no different at Hotel Cervo.
Whether there are 90s children in the audience? Luca asked. I was so excited about their Echt cover of “Du trägst keine Liebe in dir”. Antihero sing about aimless generations, address in “Presidenten” the current political world situation and directly everything that keeps them thinking and moving.
They know how, with a lot of humor and their charm, the catchy melodies and lyrics, they can inspire the audience and set the vibes. They spread good vibes from start to the end. Only they were not as total punk as they might partly seem, grinned Luca. They were actually really nice guys.
It may have shown, when some in the audience were having fun serving them booze. “Yeah, making the stupid Germans drunk …” the frontman laughed and shook himself after they had poured down the stuff. He is rather schnaps abstinent and would rather drink a beer.
Whereupon he told the story to “Sonnenkind” and one had to endure. “Sonnenkind” is a song about Luca’s best friend who drowned in a tragic accident with too much alcohol involved. But despite all the tragedy Luca wants to bring the song to the stages in a positive sense as a memory of him.
Here’s a look at the Zermatt Unplugged Daily Summary on Friday:
Festival hero
The audience did not want to let the band go at the end of the concert and was going wild. Despite having been over running too much time, they repeated one of the songs. Quite moved, they asserted that they had never experienced such storms of enthusiasm, but out of respect for the other bands here, they couldn’t throw their own privat party now.
Antihero was somehow the festival hero. For me definitely THE find. Fortunately, the band will soon be back in Switzerland: on June 2, 2018, they will perform at the Schaffhausen Hallau Openair. So I seem to throw off all my 2 June plans. Especially because The Souls will be there the same day 😉
Info about the band you get here : www.antiheldmusik.de
Info about the upcoming Openair Hallau you get here: www.openair-hallau.ch
You can find info about Zermatt Unplugged under the following link: www.zermatt-unplugged.ch
