Musician Marco Wanda "The only thing I want to do since these deaths is grieve"

Between hell and paradise, stage frenzy and deep sorrow: Marco Michael Wanda, frontman of the Viennese band Wanda, talks about art as a survival instinct, mourning without an expiration date - and the inestimable value of life.

Marco Michael Wanda, in your early twenties you live together with a childhood friend in a small apartment in Vienna, you write literary texts, paint and write your first songs. At the time, you didn't yet know what direction you might take. But you knew that you wanted to be an artist.

In order to write songs, you retreat to the bathroom with your acoustic guitar, sit on the folded-down toilet seat and turn on the tap so that people can't hear you. Parts of "1, 2, 3, 4" and "Stehengelassene Weinflaschen" are created.

Two songs that later appear on the first two Wanda albums "Amore" and "Bussi" and are still played at concerts today. You can't help but think of Paul McCartney, who, like you, played guitar and sang in the quiet room of his parents' house in the early days of the Beatles because the acoustics were so good there.

As a Beatles fan, were you inspired by McCartney back then - or was it mainly a way to work undisturbed?

When I was writing my book "That we existed at all", I had to smile at this point. My first thought was: "Thank God you don't have to work under these circumstances anymore." I now have my own apartment where I can work. The scene in the bathroom symbolizes a difficult time for me.

The book is not biblical - it doesn't start in a paradise from which you are expelled, but the other way around: it starts in hell and becomes paradise. If you like, it also has a happy ending: at the end there is an acknowledgement of reality and the will to live life as it is. Until then, it's just an escape. I wanted to get away from there back then. I wasn't in a good place when it all started.

At the time, you had the feeling that you were living in an empty Vienna boredom where something had to happen. You couldn't yet imagine that it would later be Wanda that would happen. During this challenging time, you meet the musician and painter Felix Jänner.

The women in your clique of painters, unemployed people and rappers are in love with him, the men appreciate or admire him. During a walk with Felix Jänner along the Danube Canal, you think to yourself: "I want to make a difference, I want to finally find something of value that I can hold up to this senseless world." When you look back today - have you succeeded?

Yes, I think so. I certainly wasn't wise in my early twenties, and I don't think I was particularly intelligent either. But I had a sense that people are meant to make a meaningful contribution to society. And I knew that my only chance was art. That I couldn't make a meaningful contribution except through art.

Wanda was founded in 2012, but the breakthrough is not yet in sight. You are more drawn to literature again. You want to write about the Arab Spring - that time of hope, protests and upheaval in the Arab world - and travel to Cairo to talk to revolutionaries of the moment.

From the balcony of your hotel room on the square in front of the al-Hussein Mosque, one of Egypt's holiest sites, you watch as a celebration turns into a dispute - and the dispute turns into an outbreak of massive violence, with fireworks, gunshots and Molotov cocktails, deaths and injuries.

In your words, you see before you the cross-section of a traumatized society - after months of revolution and weeks of fasting in unspeakable heat. That night, you write "Kairo Downtown" - a song that later becomes another Wanda hit. When you think back to that moment today - what has stayed with you?

Cairo made me question the moral authority of Europe - and it remains so to this day. We are always the good guys. We are so sure of ourselves in this role and constantly point out grievances - but always from the position that we can't be accused of anything.

And that happens at all levels of society: Those on the left are quite sure that those on the right are in the wrong. And those on the right are absolutely certain that those on the left are in the wrong. But that can't be right.

Do we lack the ability to endure contradictions, uncertainties and tensions - while remaining connected? In other words, do we lack a tolerance for ambiguity?

Yes, we can no longer tolerate ambivalence - neither in our way of thinking nor in our differences of opinion, be it private, political or societal. And that is dangerous. I have the feeling that a dangerous European identity is emerging - the identity of being right. The last good that we believe we still possess, and we defend it against each other and from each other. We must always be right.

Conversations, discourse and conflicts are never conducted with the aim of reaching a compromise, but always under the pretext of wanting to reach an agreement in the end. But in reality, you only want to lecture and rebuke the other person. And to reshape and reshape them until they fit and correspond to you and you find your own attitude mirrored.

So, you could now nonchalantly say: we only do it with ourselves - mentally, socially, emotionally. We don't want to meet anyone as they really are, we want to change them on all levels. But how do we envision this? As long as humanity exists, there will be progressive and conservative currents, we must learn to endure this ambivalence.

In Wanda's songs, the focus is on people, the emotional, the interpersonal - political issues tend to remain in the background. How does that come about?

The band's ambition has always been socio-political. From the very beginning, we wanted to bring people together, build bridges or at least offer to do so. That's all you can do.

In these moments, the band is socio-political, but it is not "politically political". In my words and attitudes, I am not criticizing political decision-makers or those in power, but civil society. Up there - no - what can I say? That's not my world.

Would you say that a Wanda concert is a socio-political action in itself? They really do manage to establish a connection - with the audience, with each other, through looks, gestures, playfulness, energy. In the end, this "Amore" is palpable throughout the room - a wave of love, vulnerability and hunger for life, which encompasses the entire audience.

We are trying to create a level on which people can meet - in the hope that they will learn or relearn to live an intense relationship with each other instead of losing themselves further and further in their relationship with technical devices. I believe that these are now the dominant relationships in our society. At the end of the day, however, they are just devices, we mustn't forget that.

You write very openly about the self-doubt you had to deal with time and again. You doubted yourself - your music, your path, what you could even create. And then suddenly came the success - tremendous, overwhelming. How did you experience this moment?

The success was ambivalent. There were so many diametrically opposed feelings. On the one hand, success was the ticket out of the life I didn't want to lead at the time. The difficult thing about it was the fame that simply came with success - and that you can't imagine if you haven't experienced it yourself.

Swiss global hit turns 40Kurt Maloo: "The 'Captain' song still pays my rent today"

It overtook my life, I hadn't expected it. It was never a goal. And it's not something you learn at school. Nobody explains what it means when you lose part of your anonymity.

In your book, you talk about how you were suddenly praised and recognized by many, but at the same time you were far too visible - as if you were wearing a "shining feature" that "identified you as Marco Wanda and took away any mystery about his existence". At the same time, you felt like an outcast - showered with attention when in reality you needed something completely different.

Exactly. You'll never again sit in a pub among your peers and share their reality of life. You'll never experience that again. Because you have a completely different reality of life.

Is that a grieving process?

Grieving process is a very good word for it - because you lose something so quickly that you can hardly adapt to it. I can do that now, but it was difficult back then. But the good thing is that you only become famous overnight. And it's a situation that doesn't last long.

The hype we experienced stopped at some point - fortunately. Hype is something that arises and then falls apart again. For us, it lasted three years. And now this career is more a part of my natural life.

I feel like I've now reached a point that's more like a marathon than a sprint. The hype and becoming famous was a sprint. It tore my lungs out, because you can't run that fast.

A powerful image. And is it now more of a plateau that needs a certain amount of care so that it doesn't crumble?

Yes, you have to be careful with it. But at the same time, I envy young people. You're more courageous than ever before and make rash, gut decisions that you would never make again. That's also a great, very short window of opportunity.

If you don't know the risks yet and just jump in, it's trial and error and failure. You might get a few bruises, but at the same time it's incredibly exciting.

Yes, but it's the first time you bump into something. You actually think there are no limits.

Once you've been through hell, you've got nothing left to lose, right?

Actually, yes.

In 2022 and 2023, something happens that you describe in the book as your "fall from paradise". You personally - but also you as a band - are confronted with many farewells and deaths during this time:

Your father dies of leukemia, as does your friend and Wanda keyboardist Christian Hummer, and also the father of your drummer at the time, Valentin Wegscheider. Your companion Felix Jänner takes his own life ...

... and Mahir Jahmal ...

... the artist, photographer and musician, with whom you and Christian Hummer were friends, dies while playing the guitar on the sofa. An incredibly dense, emotionally painful time. Looking back, did it change anything in you?

I learned very quickly that I can't put myself under pressure to draw something wise from it and then share it like a philosopher. I don't think I've learned anything from all these losses - because I didn't want to learn anything either. The only thing I've wanted to do since these losses is grieve. And to take the space and time to do so - without pressure.

There was a very dangerous point at which we also stopped the promotion for the album that was made after these deaths because we realized: Firstly, we didn't want to commercialize deaths, and secondly, we didn't want to be under pressure to learn and report on something at high speed now. So there is no answer to this question.

I just grieve. Actually, that's the only answer. I am grieving - and can only call on people to take the time to grieve. Grief has no expiration date. It doesn't have to be good. Nor does it ever have to be good. The American writer Jack Kerouac wrote this down in his beliefs and techniques for modern prose: "Recognize that losses are forever." That's a very, very good rule.

"Bei niemand anders", one of the most touching Wanda songs, was written at this time. On New Year's Eve before your father's death, he texts you: "I love you forever and ever." While people count down from ten under your window, fall into each other's arms in the alley and waltz, you lie on your sofa and cry.

The next morning, you sit down at your keyboard and start singing - one line follows the next until a song emerges: "Because your fear of the end is as old as humanity itself, and when you think it's ending, I'll be there, and I'll hold you tight..."

Your bandmates Manu Poppe and Ray Weber and also your producer Zebo Adam - everyone immediately understands what this song means. With great care, you make "Bei niemand anders" what it is today: a song that goes deep and connects people as well as moving them to tears. What does this song mean to you?

The whole process of creating the song was wild. Recording the album "Ende nie" was wild in general. I don't think we'll ever experience anything like that again as a band, as artists and as people. And if we did, it would be the second time - and it will never be comparable to the first time.

What do you mean by "wild"?

The four of us sat in this basement studio at Zebo's - for over eight months. It was an incredible process: to sit there and be so human in front of each other - on the one hand - and on the other hand to maintain this role play of band and producer, at least in appearance.

We made music for maybe an hour a day and spent five, six, seven, eight hours just talking: about life, death, finiteness. It was an incredible time. At no point did it feel like work or like practicing a profession. This boundary was blown wide open. But there is also a lot that lies in the fog and eludes my memory because this album was created under such shock.

The trigger points of your song lyrics don't leave you untouched, you write in your book. And that life experiences, both positive and negative energies, flow into your music. At the same time, you say that you try to "exorcize" your anger and the hidden anger of the audience like a demon. How do you manage this process on stage - and how do you deal with the strong emotions without them overwhelming you?

The big advantage - and at the same time the big disadvantage - that I have compared to a performer or an actor is that I don't speak other people's texts, but sing my own. The advantage of this is that it takes me along emotionally and can therefore be performed quite honestly. And that is also sometimes a disadvantage.

But after ten or twelve years, I'm simply used to dealing with these energies. That's part of it for me, and I never take energies that arise on stage with me. As soon as I leave the stage, these energies are gone. It's like a ritual: by allowing and expelling something in a controlled way, I'm freed from it to a certain extent.

Is it a mixture of catharsis and self-soothing - a conscious way of dealing with what happens to you on stage?

I'm sure there are a lot of psychological techniques going on, but I only use them intuitively. I can't explain or justify them. You could almost approach it scientifically if you wanted to. But I also think it's important for me as an artist to know very little about it. I can't even be aware of these processes. I keep myself stupid in a controlled way (laughs). Very important in my profession. Just don't get too clever.

Does that mean the stage is not a place for therapy?

I think therapy is therapy. There's no substitute for therapy. But it is an arena for the psyche. And probably by far the wildest in my life. And then it's also good when it's quiet afterwards. That's great.

What have all the years of working to the point of exhaustion, the highs and lows, given you - and what have they taken away?

I think the conclusion about my life, and especially the life I've led over the last ten years, is a positive one. I have been given far more than I have been deprived of. I am grateful that I can do what I love. It's not something you take for granted.

It's what you dream of when you're young - but it's not a given that you'll achieve it. And I achieved it through a chain of very strange coincidences. It feels like no one can ever take that away from me again.

And even if they did - it happened. It will have happened forever. As dramatic and tragic as much of what is in this book is, it was a great time and I wouldn't want to miss it. I know that it will never happen again. Fortunately on the one hand, but a shame on the other.

"That we existed at all", the title of your book, sounds like an obituary, but also like a bow to life. What does the title mean to you?

The title is ambivalent, that's true. But it also wants to say to the reader: Wow. We are alive. What a gift! Have you ever thought about it - really thought about it? Have you ever really realized that you are alive - and only once? In other words, the title means: Wow - call sign!

More videos from the department