At a pub in the center of Munich, in the mid-1970s, Willy and a few friends are drinking beer and from their cheerful conversation, anyone can gather that they are leftists who are ready to fight against neo-Nazis.

Suddenly, someone from the next table gets up and starts provoking the group. He sings an old Nazi song, and the rest of the pub starts humming along. Willy jumps up and shouts “Shut up, fascist!” A series of insults leads to a bar fight, and Willy is killed with a broken glass.

This is the story singer-songwriter Konstantin Wecker tells in his 1977 song, “Willy,” which is dedicated to one of his friends. “Yesterday they killed Willy, and today he will be buried”: Half a century later, the song’s lyrics remain relevant, as the far right has never completely disappeared from Germany since the end of World War II, and is now confidently creeping back into mainstream society.

This type of confrontation could happen in any bar — especially in areas where people feel left behind by the rest of society. As Konstantin Wecker warns his friend in the song, these are the “real people” who’ve been beaten so often that they’re also ready to hit back.

At least nine different versions of “Willy” have been recorded. In the first version from 1977, Wecker performs the song in Bavarian dialect, whereas the later versions are in High German.

Konstantin Wecker in the 1980s

Over the years, he returned to the song in reaction to various hate crimes, whether the murder of Angolan Antonio Amadeu by neo-Nazis in Eberswalde in 1990 or the September 11, 2001 attacks.

In 2015, Wecker’s anger was directed against the Islamophobic, xenophobic, racist and far-right movement PEGIDA, while in 2018, he sang against the election of the right-wing populist party Alternative for Germany (AfD), whose leader, Alexander Gauland, had dismissed the Nazi era as “bird shit in the over 1,000 years of successful German history.”

In his “Conversations with Willy” — as Wecker calls the series of songs — he repeatedly denounces the authorities’ lack of willingness to investigate racist attacks, and how police sometimes don’t even react to emergency calls. He also criticizes politicians, demanding that they go beyond expressions of dismay; “their words should be followed by deeds,” he sings.

Fascism is not an opinion, but a crime, says Wecker in one of his interviews — a crime that must be fought everywhere and at all times.

An anarchist’s solidarity in pandemic times

In 2020, the COVID pandemic broke out and changed life in radical ways.

Here, too, Wecker reacted to the restrictions on personal freedoms in “Willy 2020,” pointing out that for him the protective measures, such as canceled concerts, parties and group meetings, should be seen as a gesture of solidarity and done out of a sense of responsibility for everyone, and not because politicians have decided so. As “an old anarchist,” he sang, he feels responsible for his own freedom.

But even if he was critical of political decisions affecting the cultural scene, he clearly distanced himself from those who denied or downplayed the pandemic itself, criticizing the “Querdenker” movement for allowing far-right groups to join their demonstrations.

Konstantin Wecker’s latest conversation with Willy was recorded in 2021, and reacted to the neo-Nazi massacre in Hanau, where a 43-year-old far-right extremist shot in cold blood nine people with migrant roots.

A staunch pacifist

Now, the staunch pacifist is worried by the war in Ukraine and the Western world’s response to the conflict.

At the end of April, together with other well-known German intellectuals and cultural figures, he signed an open letter urging German Chancellor Olaf Scholz not to send heavy weapons to Ukraine.

The letter was highly controversial, with many critics of the letter calling the signers’ pacifist stance luxurious and totally inappropriate given the plight of the Ukrainian people.

In an interview with German public broadcaster Norddeutscher Rundfunk (NDR), Wecker defended his position: “The problem is that — with very few exceptions — a truly non-violent resistance has never really been tried.” Above all, he added, he is an artist and not a politician, allowing him to “keep standing for this position, because it is a position for the salvation of all mankind. At some point, we have to start making peace without guns.”

As he turns 75 on June 1, Konstantin Wecker is going on an anniversary tour through Germany, Austria and Switzerland beginning July 3. The motto of the tour: “I sing because I have a song” — “Willy” is bound to be among them.

This article was originally written in German.