A Greek neo-Nazi group holds two secret concerts in Mexico City and Ciudad Juárez

Der Stürmer, a black metal band of National Socialist ideology from Athens (Greece) offered a secret concert in front of some 60 people last weekend in Mexico City, according to attendees who were at the event and who prefer to remain anonymous for security reasons. .

It happened at dawn from Saturday to Sunday, after one in the morning, in the San Diablo bar in the Roma neighborhood, according to the same people.

Together with them, two Mexican groups also shared the bill, Tlateotocani, from Zacatecas, and Wolves Of AhPuch, from Chiapas.

Before the event, in the streets adjacent to the venue there were clashes between far-right groups and anti-fascist groups that were trying to prevent the recital from taking place.

A day later, the Greeks played in Ciudad Juárez,

The first poster that was released indicated that the concert was going to be held in the HDX Circus room, in Azcapotzalco, but two days before the owners of the establishment denied it and assured that they had no knowledge of the event.

The promoters, Azermedoth Records and Blood Productions, also disassociated themselves.

The two production companies regularly organize metal concerts, although according to the people interviewed, they had not dared before with musical groups of fascist ideology.

Given the popular outrage caused by the call, they decided to disassociate themselves from the recital.

Those responsible for Azermedoth Records have declared to EL PAÍS: "We do not support these ways of thinking or any type of discrimination against anyone."

They assure that they were unaware of Der Stürmer's ideology and the message they spread in their songs.

It was then, according to the interviews carried out, when members of the Mexican neo-Nazi scene decided to take control of the situation and redirected the concert to San Diablo, a regular meeting point for fascist groups.

Since the change of venue was not the initiative of Azermedoth Records and Blood Productions, many of the people who had bought tickets were not notified.

The final location of the event was spread by word of mouth, only to trusted people from the far-right environment, which explains why in the end only between 50 and 60 attendees attended, according to the testimony that one of them has provided to EL PAÍS.

The neo-Nazi band Execution 1980 during a presentation at the San Diablo bar, in Mexico City.RR.

H.H.

When the concert began, a group of people dressed in black formed a security cordon at the entrance to the San Diablo.

The lock on the door was down and the neighbors consulted ensure that there were groups of men watching on the corners of the street to make sure that the anti-fascist groups did not break in again.

"They were monitoring from corner to corner to see if they were going to boycott the event again," says a neighbor who passed by the place several times, alerted to the presence of neo-Nazis.

Inside the bar, the organizers prohibited attendees from taking out their mobile phones, recording videos or taking pictures, although a source present in the room assures that there was a photographer with professional equipment.

Between song and song, the public sang fascist chants such as

, the salute that Nazi officers performed before Adolf Hitler.

A Der Stürmer banner festooned with far-right symbology dominated the stage.

“First the stellar band played, because they said they already felt threatened.

They arrived in an Uber, just as they arrived they put them in a small room and took them out to play.

They finished their set, a lot of people wanted to take a photo with them outside, there were maybe 10 people who made it, then they got in the car and went to the hotel.

They left the other two bands playing, but a lot of people were already leaving, they played for 15 or 20 people”, narrates the same attendee.

Rodolfo Rojas, one of the concert attendees and host of a kind of home podcast that spreads fascist ideas, described the evening on his social networks: "We all continue, between beers, themes and good NSBM [National Socialist black metal, for its acronym in English] to listen to, until it is finally time to leave, we are excited to know that we will have the bands live and in full color.

Damn, we're notified that it's canceled (...) Someone yells... Wait!!!

That we always do already have Der Stürmer on stage, bravo!!!

(...) We arrived at the place.

There are police, ambulances and hanging cables that nobody seems to care about, they just want to see the special guests of the night (...) The time has come, no cell phones, the stage lights up, the time has come to see and listen to the Greek ...”.

Fascist concerts, an increasingly common reality in Mexico

The San Diablo is a regular meeting point for the local neo-Nazi scene.

Despite looking like a rock and roll bar offering beers, burgers, and tribute concerts to 1980s bands, a quick look online reveals obvious links to fascist ideology, such as a concert photo of Execution 1980, a Mexican group. from the extreme right that already played at another event last November, in the Pentathlon Hall, which was later closed.

That recital, which received the name "The Empire Strikes Back", had a pre-party at the San Diablo, as EL PAÍS was able to confirm.

The venue also organized, among other events, a workshop with Grace Amabile, a "producer, director and screenwriter", in her own words, who can be seen on her social networks wearing clothes with the solar cross printed on them. ,

a symbol used by white supremacists.

This newspaper has tried to contact those responsible for the establishment, but at the close of this note it has not received a response.

The concert poster began to circulate on social networks in mid-June 2022. Different promoters and blogs specialized in the metal genre, as well as in the neo-Nazi scene, were in charge of disseminating the information.

Originally, Der Stürmer had planned to give three recitals in the country: in the capital, Guadalajara and Ciudad Juárez.

For Mexico City, tickets could only be obtained at three points: Necrosis Metal Store, in the San Rafael neighborhood;

La Cueva Metal Shop, in Buenavista;

and two stalls in the El Chopo cultural flea market, where you had to ask for a man named Richard.

A phone number was also shared to contact the organizers and purchase tickets directly with them.

The price of each ticket was 600 Mexican pesos.

The poster broadcast on social networks of the concert of the Greek neo-Nazi band Der Stürmer, which was to be held in Azcapotzalco and ended up being held in the Roma neighborhood, in Mexico City.RR.

H.H.

The protests of different social groups got in the way and managed to paralyze the concert in Guadalajara, where the Government even intervened in the face of the commotion.

The media noise was growing.

The HDX Circus of Mexico City published a statement in which it assured that its establishment was not going to host the recital and that no one had even rented the space.

Charlie Salgado, responsible for the forum, explains: “We did not cancel as such because we were not aware of it.

We weren't even very well aware of gang ideology.

We simply decided against it because we had no plans to hold an event until January 21.

On Saturday they came from the City Hall to check the place because they had information that an event was going to take place that was not allowed,

Given the suspension of the event, some of the people who had purchased their tickets requested a refund of the amount.

They were not informed of a possible relocation.

An employee of La Cueva Metal Shop has assured this newspaper that they were not notified of any change: “We returned the money to whoever came to ask for it.

The organizers did not inform us that the concert was always going to take place.

“Too extreme to be allowed in the United States”

The concert in Ciudad Juárez was held on Sunday in a venue near El Paso.

The organization was carried out by Return to Evil Booking, a promoter that had already coordinated neo-Nazi concerts across the border, in states like California and Illinois.

For the presentation of Der Stürmer, the company announced that the event was "too extreme to be allowed in the United States", and that the group "has been prohibited from performing in the US since 2016", so this would be the best opportunity to see Der Stürmer. the Greek gang near US territory.

Tickets were priced at $35 in advance and $40 on the day of the concert.

Days before, the municipal president of Ciudad Juárez, Cruz Pérez Cuellar, assured the local press that he did not know where the event was going to take place, and that the municipality was waiting to cancel it if it was finally a recital of neo-Nazi ideology: " If it is propaganda that discriminates against people, that states that some are superior to others, then yes [it is suspended].

If it's a heavy rock song or things like that, that exist and that we've dealt with all our lives, then no”.

Covers of four albums by the Greek band Der Stürmer, with visible neo-Nazi symbology.

Der Stürmer was formed in Athens in 1998 by a musician identified in specialized forums as Jarl Von Hagall.

Since then he has released numerous recordings, all full of fascist, anti-Semitic or homophobic messages.

His lyrics are highly aggressive and often resort to war rhetoric.

One of their best-known songs reads: "My weapons will be bloody again / to end your misery, I will sharpen my ax / blacks, Jews, yellows and fucking reds / your dirt will soon end in blood."

The name of the band comes from a popular Nazi propaganda newspaper based in Nuremberg, Germany, which ran from 1923 to 1945.

The group has given concerts at events of Golden Dawn, the Greek party of neo-Nazi ideology whose supporters murdered the anti-fascist rapper Pavlos Fyssas in 2013 and were declared a criminal organization by the Greek courts in 2020. In that trial, one of those sentenced to prison terms of 13 years in prison was the deputy Giorgos Germenis, nicknamed

in the fascist music scene, who appears credited as studio bassist on the band's first album,

(2001), according to the specialized portal Discogs.

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