“Starting from twenty to nine in the evening, we received a total of 8 calls from local residents,” a fire service spokesperson told the Leipziger Volkszeitung.

The paper reported that the earthquake was strong enough to rip the wall paper in houses in the Waldstrassen neighbourhood.

Even the Geophysical Observatory in nearby Collm was alerted.

At first, the alarmed locals thought that they were facing a real earthquake.

“That was quickly ruled out,” said the firefighters' spokesperson – once the actual epicentre was quickly located, it was unmistakable.

According to a reporter for the Leipziger Volkszeitung, who was present at the gig, the band's singer, Felix Brummer, ordered all the fans to stand up after he had finished the first song.

“Then it really got going,” said the reporter. “The whole hall with its 8,000 visitors jumped in time.”

The reason for the strange phenomenon was apparently the high ground water level under the venue.

“The fans made the floor panelling shake,” explained the fire services spokesperson. “The pressure waves then spread out across the ground water.”

The earthquake observatory in Collm had to calm down one panicked caller, who was convinced he was experiencing an earthquake.

An employee of the observatory told the Leipziger Volkszeitung that in her thirty years working there, she has never experienced such an event before.