A bumpy ride down East Germany’s memory lane

With the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, East German culture disappeared practically overnight, cast aside for the newly accessible West. But today, amid dissatisfaction with the progress of German reunification, some former East Germans are taking a new look back at the past.

The World
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In 1989, the East German band Karat had it all: black leather blazers, feathered mullets and gold records, some even across the border in West Germany.

Then suddenly, everything changed for socialist East Germany, officially known as the German Democratic Republic. Massive protests brought down the Berlin Wall, along with the GDR regime.

Within a year, there was just one unified Germany — and in it, no one wanted to listen to Karat, according to the band’s guitarist Bernd Römer.

More than 1,200 people flooded the GDR-era KuK concert hall in the eastern city of Gera in Germany for Karat’s nearly sold-out show.Marcus Teply/The World

It wasn’t just Karat, or East German music. It was everything. Given access to the Western pop culture that had been forbidden for decades, East Germans dumped GDR culture for Coca-Cola and the Rolling Stones. And hundreds of thousands of people left for the West.

“Not much of the culture of the GDR survived, and that’s sad,” Römer said.

And what’s left has been treated as second-class, according to Karat singer Claudius Dreilich, the son of Karat’s original singer Herbert Dreilich, who died in 2004.

But these days, memories of former East Germany are coming back into style. 

Karat performed in the Kultur- und Kongresszentrum (KuK) concert hall located in the eastern German city of Gera.Marcus Teply/The World

Once mocked, East German Trabant and Wartburg classic cars are now registered in record numbers in Germany’s eastern states. Vita Cola, the GDR’s version of Coca-Cola, is the best-selling soda in the eastern state of Thüringen.

And a new Thüringen oldies station called Antenne Ostalgie plays hits from the days of socialism. Its name is a portmanteau of the German words for east and nostalgia — and its jingle goes, “It wasn’t all s— after all.”

Meanwhile, Karat is having its best year since the Berlin Wall came down.

On a recent Friday night, more than 1,200 people flooded the GDR-era Kultur- und Kongresszentrum concert hall in Thüringen’s city of Gera — once the GDR’s provincial capital and industrial hub — for Karat’s nearly sold-out show.

Rotkäppchen is an East German brand of sparkling wine that is another example of an old product that has made a comeback.Marcus Teply/The World

Changing times have also impacted the economy. In 2014, Gera became the first German city ever to declare bankruptcy. Former East Germany is still poorer than the former West, and people still continue to move away. Politics reflect the dark mood, with strong support for opposition parties on both the far-left and far-right.

“When capitalism came, the Wessis [West Germans] just ran us right over,” Maik Schmidt said as he drank a beer in the KuK lobby before the show. He added that reunification had drained the East dry, and that today’s German government cares more about foreigners than its own people.

“Most people would rather have the East times back,” he said. “Today people only think about themselves. … It’s all only about money, only money.”

Karat will be celebrating its 50th anniversary in 2025.Marcus Teply/The World

Surveys show that many people in what was formerly the East feel homesick for the GDR, see themselves on the losing side of history or think some things were better under socialism.

“They are creating an image of the good old past times which never existed,” said Anna Kaminsky, director of the federal foundation tasked with coming to terms with the GDR’s legacy. “Most of these people, deep inside, know that this is not correct.”

But, she agreed, the transition from the GDR was tough, especially for older people. Democracy turned out to be harder than people had hoped. Generations of bad news about the East created feelings of inferiority that still resonate today.

Karat remains one of the oldest and most popular GDR-era bands, packing concert halls in both former East and West German cities.Marcus Teply/The World

“A lot of people in the East say, ‘We don’t feel heard, we don’t feel seen,’” she said. 

But when the lights went down in Gera, and Römer’s guitar started to wail, the old days and the people who remembered them were the stars of the show.

The crowd stomped, clapped a beat and sang every word to Karat’s big hits. Ghosts of old East-West rivalries made a guest appearance when Dreilich took a break between songs to tell the audience about an interview backstage.

“Foreign press! Not from the East,” he joked, to chuckles from the crowd.

“From the West,” he intoned, “from America.” The chuckles stopped, replaced by silence and a few jeers.

Karat is going to be recording a new album, to be released on vinyl and recorded in the eastern Germany.Marcus Teply/The World

Still, 35 years after reunification, Dreilich, Römer and their bandmates agreed that Karat is not an East German or West German band, but a German one. They’re packing concert halls, not just in Gera, but in big formerly Western cities like Hamburg and Munich, too. Today they’re some of the oldest surviving rockers in the whole country — East or West.

In 2025, Karat will mark its 50th anniversary, and to celebrate, the band is cutting a new album. Dreilich told the audience in Gera that it’s going to be on vinyl, just like in the old days.

And just like in the old days, he added, Karat will record it in the East.

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