P.S. – Philipp Stolzl (Art Director).
T.L. – Till Lindermann (Vocalism).
R.Z.K. – Richard Z. Kruspe (Solo-guitar).
P.H.L. – Paul Heiko Landers (Rhythm-guitar).
C.S. – Christoph Schneider (Drums).
C.F.L. – Christian Flake Lorenz (Keyboard).
O.R. – Oliver Riedel (Bass-guitar).

C.S.: Our first album caused quite some controversy on its release in Germany and was discussed a lot. What will Rammstein do next? And then came "Sehnsucht". And "Sehnsucht" was almost immediately more successful, also due to the first single release "Engel". That was a relatively big production.

R.Z.K.: For the video "Engel", we pondered: Which direction shall we go? What could it be? We were always inspired by movie classics. I think it was about the time when "From Dusk Till Dawn" was in the cinemas. We were extremely inspired by this scene.

P.S.: I was a concepter then, not a director. I took this idea and built the process around it. A colleague of mine, Daniel Lwowski, helped me out with it. We all helped in fact, then drove to Hamburg together, where we shot the video.

C.S.: The atmosphere on set was great, as the location, this Hamburg bar, is very different and had a fabulous atmosphere.

T.L.: That's Hamburg harbor and that's a small and very wicked SM club.

C.S.: It has a good style and distinctiveness and especially how the two kids sing, is an absolute hook.

T.L.: The cage kids didn't belong to our circle of colleagues or friends. They were casted by the director. It was all somehow connected to this club, "Prinzenbar". Some were employees, waitresses, visitors to the "Prinzenbar". The place is in fact notorious, for its weekly SM- event. There were a few girls there too. An illustrious crew. It was fun.

P.S.: My perception is, that Rammstein is a pretty weird gig, the music and the lyrics. The lyrics remind me of German expressionism, back in the 1910's and 20's. It has something weird, surreal, twisted, bloody and erotic. If this weird, edgy, strange issue had stayed in the shadow of the Berlin avant-garde, then no one would have been surprised. Now this comes along and goes global, despite German lyrics. That's an incredible occurrence, which still fascinates me today.

R.Z.K.: The snake woman, she was cool.

P.S.: The woman's contact lenses, kept on shifting. That was a pain in the ass. The slits in snakes eyes are always upright, but contact lenses keep turning. We struggled with that on set.

P.H.L.: She wore a metal bikini. I found that very impressive. It was forged entirely out of metal, somehow threaded together.

C.S.: She was really pretty too. And then Flake was supposed to take her leg and her foot and pour Tequila over them to drink, or whatever it was he drank. I know that Flake was really nervous and trembled, trying to make this scene work really well, but it did work and looks pretty authentic.

T.L.: I think he was really scared. She came toward him with the snake and poured Tequila over her leg and into his mouth. Then he could get down to the nectar. Everyone really loved that.
He wasn't as impressed, it's not really his thing. The amateur masochist, but he didn't like it so much.

C.S.: Just try putting a pretty girl's foot in your mouth. The foot was especially styled, powdered over and then washed carefully (laugh). It was a real highlight.
I remember, that it was hard for Paul, to have to sit at the drums for the entire shoot and couldn't add input. Paul is the type of guy, who likes to be around, making suggestions, the unasked for kind. Especially telling the director, what he should or shouldn't do, if this is bright enough, or if we shouldn't use this angle. He always has extra ideas, which he can't relay from his place at the back. It was as if he was tied to his seat and it was like torture for him, to have to spend the whole day in this very limited position. It was a bit confusing, that only a part of the band performed or sang.

P.H.L.: We divided the band into two groups: One played the band and the others played visitors going to the party. That was stupid in this case. Either the singer sings or no one does. That was the first mistake, this makes it so funny, so stiff. Richard and Olli just can't sing it like it has to be sung. The initial energy is missing. And Till and Schneider and Flake, the visitors, are not properly lit and look out of place.

C.S.; Today, I would have found it better for all of us to perform and play and then edit the whole thing together. It was important for us back then, not to have any plots or scenarios, which theoretically couldn't happen simultaneously.

R.Z.K.: There was one scene, where us three boys quasi go into this bar. We had to jump up this wall and there was a nail in it. As we were filming, I couldn't shout "ouch". I had to hold onto the nail and pull myself up. I've got this huge scar here.

P.H.L.: In one scene, I throw a snare, a small drum into the crowd and we asked the biggest in the audience if he would be able to catch it. This was Schneiders real snare drum, we didn't want it to break. This guy caught it and from then on, he was our security man for a few years. He was "Herman the German". And because he looked so impressive, he was or is a wrestler, we took him with us. Those were happy times. We also noticed, that the assistant, Phillip Stolzl, was good.

P.S.: They saw me as something of a creative type, behind this video, which made me really happy. And on the next video, I'd never made a video myself, they just said: "Go on, you do it", in their brash manner.

P.H.L.: Then we gave him the chance, in our next video "Du Hast". Or, to put it another way, we thought, he would be a good director. This was then confirmed.

P.S.: I think it was a really good video. It all fit. That was a good first commercial appearance for Rammstein. But the song itself is naturally a real bitch of a number.