Guitarist Wolf Hoffmann and the band Accept are currently on the Full Metal Assault Tour with K.K.’s Priest as they travel across North America to promote their latest album Humanoid. It’s a reunion in a way as Hoffmann and fellow axeslinger K.K. Downing toured Europe together on the Judas Priest/Accept package in 1981. Back then, however, Accept were known as a West German metal band, and they later played behind the Iron Curtain in Poland in support of their Russian Roulette album in 1986.
“We weren’t allowed to call it Russian Roulette—we were asked to kindly call it Roulette of Life,” Hoffmann remarks, laughing. “They didn’t think it was flattering. They didn’t want us to do that, and I’m pretty sure we had to send in lyrics beforehand.” One wonders what officials there thought of some of the lyrics that dealt with military dehumanization and fighting against media manipulation, themes that still resonate today.
Stirring Polish Ire
Accept actually created a bigger problem for themselves once they played in Poland. The thrashing “Fast as a Shark,” the blistering serial-killer anthem from their Restless and Wild album, opens with what sounds like an old-fashioned German song. Then a needle scratches across vinyl, disrupting the tune before Udo Dirkschneider screams the start of the actual Accept song.
“We caused quite a controversy in Poland because we had this intro—Heidi heido heida,” Hoffmann explains of “Fast as a Shark.” “We played that over there like we did everywhere, and they f–king hated it because in a lot of those World War II movies, German soldiers were marching into Poland singing that song. Whether that historically really happened that often or whether it was just something that was featured in the movies. … To them that heidi heido heida thing was like the essential Nazi song. So here we are like dumbasses, not knowing any of that. That caused a big controversy.”
The playing of the German song in question, called “Ein Heller und ein Batzen” (“A Farthing and a Penny”), still stings today among the Polish people. But as Hoffmann notes, the song didn’t have anything to do with Nazis. Lyrically, it’s a German drinking song from 1830, but it took on a sinister significance with the marching Wehrmacht during World War II. “To this day, out of respect, we don’t use that intro when we play in Poland because it’s still a thing, believe it or not,” Hoffmann adds.
Russia in Monochrome
Accept’s first Russian concert was in Moscow in 1993, and an even though the Berlin Wall had come down and glasnost of transparency had begun in 1986, the country still felt different back then.
“It was all black and white over there compared to the West,” Hoffmann recalls. “But definitely the fans were amazing. They were definitely hungry for that kind of music, for sure.”
When asked to elaborate on the “black and white” comment, Hoffmann replies, “There was no advertising, for instance. A world without advertising, it’s hard to imagine. So you went to Moscow, and it was just dimly lit, hardly any people on the streets at night. There was just no Adidas and Prada [signs] and all that kind of stuff. It wasn’t there because they didn’t have it, so it was a completely different vibe. Even in Poland, I remember people were dressed a little different. It was just a different society altogether.”
As one might expect, surveillance of foreigners was common too.
“I remember we had people following us,” Hoffmann says. “There were always handlers around. And I remember even when you went into a hotel they basically watched everything you did. They didn’t just turn you loose and leave you unattended. I’m sure there were always agents watching our every move and making sure we didn’t do anything stupid.”
A West German Metal Band in East German Territory
Fans today might forget, and younger fans might not know, that when Accept formed in 1976 they were a West German metal band, given that the eastern part of the country was under Russian control. Berlin itself was a strange city. It was divided between the West German-controlled western part of the city, while the east was under Communist rule. But West Berlin itself was an island of democracy located within East Germany, and the only ways in and out were by plane or highly regulated transit corridors where drivers had to stick to the road and not make contact with the local population.
Hoffmann says visiting and playing in West Berlin had a similar feeling to visiting Russia. “Because West Berlin was surrounded by the Communist part of the world, it always had this spirit of ‘we’re dancing on the edge of the volcano, it could be over any day,’” he recollects. “There was a certain amount of ‘don’t give a damn’ attitude there. The bars were open all night long, and there was a legendary free spirit in Berlin because of that political situation. It’s a weird vibe when you have a wall going right through the middle of the city that you can’t cross. You’re basically walled in. I remember the really weird feeling.”
Things changed in late 1989 when the Berlin Wall came down and capitalism started to influence Russian culture into the 21st century. While western bands are not touring Russia right now due to the war in Ukraine, Hoffmann has fond memories of his tours there.
“It is a fabulous place to tour,” he says. “We’ve been really popular there, and we’ve toured a ton of times. I’ve always really liked the Russian fans, the Russian people, the Russian culture. … I’ve been a big fan of touring Russia. A few years ago, there were supposedly more millionaires in Moscow than anywhere else in the world. So when they changed, they changed drastically. It’s very pricey, very glitzy. It’s over the top.”
At least they still like to rock.
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