WHAT A DEVASTATING TWIST... | FIRST TIME REACTION to NENA – 99 Luftballons | BOTH VERSIONS!

Comments · 1.9K

• KE

  @keyboardpuncher · 3 months ago (edited)

  One thing that younger people may hear about but not fully understand is that in the 1980s, the early 1980s in particular, we were under constant threat of annihilation from nuclear war so there are lots of songs about this, many times in upbeat sounding songs... "Melt With You", "Forever Young", "99 Luftballons", etc. It may sound weird now but it was a real thing and was one of the things that drove the consumerism of the 1980s... enjoy yourself while you can because there may not be a tomorrow. It may not have been highly probable and always in the forefront of everyone's minds but it was always there even if in the back corners of everyone's minds.

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• JA

  @jacobzumbrennen3205 · 3 months ago

  The 1980s, we were dancing under the mushroom cloud.

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• DE

  @derTeilchenbeschleuniger · 3 months ago

  If I may? Here is some historical context: &quot;99 Luftballons&quot; emerged in Germany during the final phase of the Cold War in the 1980s. Following the 1979 NATO Double-Track Decision, the deployment of nuclear Pershing II missiles in Germany began in 1983. This nuclear buildup sparked fears of an escalating risk of nuclear war and consequently met with massive resistance from segments of the population—resistance that coalesced into the peace movement of the 1980s.<br>The idea for the song&apos;s lyrics came to the band&apos;s guitarist, Carlo Karges, on June 8, 1982, during a Rolling Stones concert at the Waldbühne in Berlin. He watched as a large cluster of colorful balloons was released into the sky at the start of the opening song, &quot;Under My Thumb,&quot; and wondered what might happen if the balloons drifted across the border into East Berlin and triggered a paranoid reaction there (a year later, a similar false alarm very nearly led to an actual nuclear first strike).<br>Thank`s for your reaction, I really like iit. 🫶☮🤘❤

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• OL

  @oldschool.52 · 3 months ago (edited)

  Every Boy or men was in Love with Nena in the 80..... ❤😊 Great wishes from Germany

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• KA

  @katsujinkin60 · 3 months ago (edited)

  I served in The U.S. Armored Cavalry in the late 70s and early 80s. I was stationed in Bamberg, Germany. The Berlin Wall was still up, and the threat of war was very real. We would often get bogus reports of fighter jets crossing the border from East Germany and Czechoslovakia. We had nuclear tipped artillery rounds that could be fired 50 miles. I&apos;m surprised that a war didn&apos;t start by accident. The threat was very real, and young Germans, on both sides of the wall, grew up under this threat all their lives. This song shows how quickly things can get out of control. Some of our current leaders should think about that when they casually start lobbing missiles at countries that can fire back. As The Rolling Stones said so well, &quot;It&apos;s just a shot away!&quot; &nbsp;Be Well, Sister, and Prosper! :hand-purple-blue-peace:

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• HA

  @HawkwindAus · 3 months ago

  Most of us in the English speaking part of the West didn&apos;t know German either when this song came out - but the German language version was the version that got all the radio play.

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• DR

  @drboris01 · 3 months ago (edited)

  The happiest boppiest song about inadvertently bringing about the end of the world.

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• BA

  @barrywood7322 · 3 months ago

  When this was released Germany was a different world, we called ourselves a Suicide regiment because our camp was only a couple of kilometres from the East German border and we were tasked to break any blocking of the autobahn routes to Berlin.

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• JA

  @JamesMalone-td2ky · 3 months ago (edited)

  I took German as a foreign language, in high school, specifically because of this song.🤣

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• YA

  @yakidin63 · 3 months ago

  Nena is still playing live today with her children in her band and is pretty awesome live.

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• GL

  @GlamityJean · 3 months ago

  crazy thing is, this song was released in march of 1983 in west germany, in september that same year, Stanislav Petrov believed that a missile attack reported by the computer system was a glitch and didn&apos;t follow the procedure of counter-attack that was set in case of an attack, had he believed the attack was real he would have sent missiles to counter a non existent attack and the world would have bursted into nuclear war basically just like in this song

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• DO

  @donsample1002 · 3 months ago

  The video was shot on a Dutch army training base, with the Dutch army providing the explosions. They got a little bit over enthusiastic at one point and you can see some of the band starting to run away at the end of one clip.

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