Die Toten Hosen on Tour – you only live once

The german rock band “Die Toten Hosen” is a phenomenon of superlatives. Founded in 1982 with roots in the German punk movement, the band has been creating songs for the past 36 years in which politics, fun and occasional provocation are not contradictions, but reflect the present society like no other German band. For Campino, the band’s singer and songwriter, punk was originally the alternative to West Germany’s stifling reality in the late 70s and early 80s. Today, it is the band’s way of life, that hasn’t changed even with the gigantic success of over 19 million sold records.

For the band it means drawing attention to social disorder by playing spontaneously – as they did by headlining the recent concert against the Right in Chemnitz – and thus remaining in touch with in their surroundings and showing loyalty and social responsibility to their fans. Many of the band’s fans and crew members have tattoos of the band’s slogan “To the bitter end”. A tight knit community whose only enemy is aging. Campino’s sudden hearing loss led to the cancellation of some of their concerts. A warning shot that sharpened the band’s awareness: everything will end one day. YOU ONLY LIVE ONCE shows a band that appreciates every day they can still play together on the stage with that same incredible energy they had at the start.

In the meantime, the Toten Hosen have written countless hits: “Hier kommt Alex” (1988), “Wilkommen in Deutschland” (1990), “Wünsch dir was” (1993), “Bonnie & Clyde” (1996), “Auswärtsspiel” (2002 ), “Tage wie diese” (2012) and many others. The present tour began on May 24th in Essen and took place in the stadiums and open-air locations in Germany and Switzerland as well as in Argentina, where the Toten Hosen have had their most enthusiastic and loyal fans outside the German-speaking world for 26 years.

The film is directed by Cordula Kablitz-Post, who has accompanied the Toten Hosen cinematically for over ten years. The film shows the band on stage and backstage during the tour as well as in the tour bus: “access all areas”. DOP Christopher Rowe filmed the tour using the “fly on the wall” principle, to show the band as authentically as never before. Co-directing the concerts was the renowned music director Paul Dugdale, who has worked with Coldplay and the Rolling Stones. Through the high-quality DOLBY ATMOS process, the film will also be shown in the largest and most modern cinemas, so that the fans will experience the film as a special event both visually and acoustically.

YOU ONLY LIVE ONCE was produced by avanti media fiction GmbH (Cordula Kablitz-Post) in co-production with Opus R. The documentary was funded by the FFA, the DFFF und the Film- und Medienstiftung NRW.