Venue:
Harmonie, Bonn
Date: 19/03/2026
You may be familiar with vintage YouTube videos of bands playing on German TV with the logo “Rockpalast”. Kind of like their equivalent of The Old Grey Whistle Test with rock, metal and jazz acts from the mid 70s onwards. Well apparently WDR, the host channel based in Cologne, hosts a twice yearly music festival in Bonn.
Thursday night saw two bands play the Bonn Harmonie, which can’t have a capacity of more than a few hundred. I didn’t know either band before the start of the week, but Godspeed You Black Emperor! had sold out a venue in Cologne on Friday, so I was looking for something alternative.
The headliners, Lucy Kruger & The Lost Boys*, normal rock instruments plus viola, are described variously as art pop | tender noise | post punk | minimal wave. Lucy made for an intense lead singer, coming onto the stage in a white dress, looking somewhat like Polly Harvey, to ambient guitar and viola drones and tones, prowling around voicelessly, looking out into the crowd like a general surveying her troops before grasping the microphone and, to the rising beat of the drum and the pound of the bass she launched into a Siouxsie Sioux cold calm declaration of her lyrics. This was Gothic rock as it was originally intended – post-punk angular, rhythmic noise, tightly controlled, shaped and formed to envelop the ears and vibrate the body. A thoroughly enjoyable noise.
Marathon, the support band, were more gender balanced, but also made a gloriously raucous noise – somewhat more motorik in form with some similarities to Hard Fi in the vocals and the dynamic thrust of the rhythm.
*only one boy – the drummer. The bands are from Berlin, Lucy from South Africa
The audience:
Mainly older then me nodding blokes. What is it with rock audiences? They mostly seem to stand stock still, arms folded staring at the stage like they’re in some kind of modern art exhibition and they’re trying to think of something profound to say about the installation in front of them. I just want to dance when I go to a live gig and fortunately the person I persuaded to come along with me was happy to join in.
It made me think..
I’m glad to be getting back into live music again. It doesn’t have to be extraordinary every time, but it’s good to see young bands with a future ahead of them, and 30 Euros plus 20 for a band t- shirt isn’t a lot to pay for a good night out.
Lucy Kruger & The Lost Boys
The tour goes on to the UK (without Marathon) – Manchester, Birmingham, London, Brighton – in case you’re interested.
Strong echoes of Curved Air mixed with Portishead there!
Marathon
Live music is a great way to discover new artists. I found both of my fave two bands of the last couple of years as support acts.
That’s what I’m hoping for. It’s great to experience musicians in the flesh – too see them creating the sounds.
Both bands on Thursday night had female bass players. There’s something about a Tina Weymouth, a Kim Deal or Gordon wigging out on stage that just adds immensely to the feel of the music.
As the frequent piano player at Thursday night jazz gigs I go to in Wood Green always says: “Supporting live music is a radical act!”