In the 1970s, the cities and university towns of West Germany were the site of a cultural awakening. Only a few years earlier, tens of thousands of young people had taken to the streets for a revolution that never came. But the energy they released had to go somewhere, and much of it eventually flowed into the culture industry. Inspired by exciting new sounds from the United States, several West German bands began to fuse psychedelic rock, jazz, and the beginnings of electronic music. They created a dynamic music scene that soon became known as “Krautrock.”

In the midst of it all was a group of long-haired leftists who called themselves Floh de Cologne, a play on words combining “eau de cologne” with the German word for flea. Originally founded as a radical cabaret troupe in 1966, by the end of the decade they had transformed themselves into a rock band, and in 1970 they ended up playing on the same stage as Jimi Hendrix after what would end up being his last concert ever. As card-carrying members of the German Communist Party (DKP), “die Flöhe,” as their fans called them, toured tirelessly for over fifteen years, playing their unique brand of theatrical prog-rock with a revolutionary twist to enthusiastic audiences of young socialists and trade unionists across Germany and beyond.

When the band realized that the political and cultural winds had shifted, they laid down their instruments in 1983 after one last eight-hour concert full of what the Süddeutsche Zeitung called “fighting spirit and anarchic irony,” never to play together onstage ever again. Forty years after that last concert, band manager and occasional percussionist Dieter Klemm and keyboardist Vridolin “Vitti” Enxing spoke with Jacobin’s Loren Balhorn about their music, their politics, and their most memorable gig.