France declared on Monday that the show must go on, with the public urged to go back out to bars, concerts and restaurants in defiance of the terror attacks on Paris.
Culture minister Fleur Pellerin said musicians would “never stop putting on concerts” and claimed that in the face of “barbarism... Culture is our biggest shield and our artists our best weapon”. The city’s symbol, the Eiffel tower, closed since Friday’s attacks, will be lit up in the red, white and blue colours of the French flag for the next three nights, the company running it said.
As the French capital still reeled from the shootings and suicide bombings that left 129 people dead, some were coming up with inventive ways of thumbing their noses at the extremists. Music fans shared their favourite memories of the Bataclan rock venue, where most of the victims died, on Twitter, while others started a social media campaign to get the US group on stage at the time, Eagles of Death Metal, to the top of the UK charts.
Amid emotional declarations that live music must go on in the shocked city, the hashtag #MonPlusBeauSouvenirDuBataclan (My most beautiful memory of the Bataclan) became one of the top trending topics on Twitter in France, with many sharing photos and videos of singers and bands who had played there such as Ed Sheeran, Arctic Monkeys and the late Jeff Buckley. Pellerin said the government was preparing a special fund to help get live entertainment up and running again and to aid with the cost of new security measures. “French people will not stop going to concerts and sharing these moments of joy together which bind us all together,” she said.
“We have to turn the lights back on,” Alexandre Cammas of the trendy Fooding guide said, as made he made a plea with Parisians to return to cafes, restaurants and entertainment venues as the city’s museums and concert halls began to reopen.
