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Tina Märkert: hi folks Last night was the last of the 4 concerts I went to. I didn't find time for a review previously but if still somebody's interested, here it goes: May 15 Aachen Eurogress: For this concert the 'girls gang' met again. Nugie, Anke, Sandra and Diana had gathered at Dani's house in Aachen in the afternoon for coffee (Nugie tea, I presume? :-) and cake and were met later by Heike, Astrid and me for a meal in town. Then "as usual" a bottle of sparkling wine before the hall, cheers to the first of our concerts!! - From the reviews I knew (couldn't resist reading the "spoilers" ;-) this tour was going to be interesting! The hall was a rather not-so-nice building from the sixties. Inside we met the other friendly (list) faces - let's see whom I remember: Chris & Stewart from England, Claudia, Ilka, Dany, Anja, later in the upper stalls I could see Jutta and Ela waving the Irish flag. Surely I forgot some names, sorry, well the usual crowd *g* (please no offense taken ;-)) - Writing this now I realise, after 4 concerts my memories of the concerts are mixing, so I better make it a overall review (can't remember the order of the songs anyway): Great impressive opening with 'When Winter Comes' from the speakers - but why only from CD? would have been great if Chris had joined live into it. Lights completely down, Chris coming out of the dark from the middle of the stage - starting with 'Road to Freedom' - Wow! yeah! it's concert season again!!! Interesting version of 'Sight and Touch' played very fast on guitar (oops, I can't remember the lyrics, it's been ages since last listening to it) 'Five Past Dreams' - didn't quite like the sound of the electrical piano, sounded a bit like playing a melody on glasses of water with a teaspoon. But with the following concerts got used to it and in the end even liked it. Great blues like(?) version of 'Rainy Night in Paris'. Before playing 'Last Night' Chris talks about the horrors of war, how young men are changed by the terrible things they see and do in a war, that they will never be the same again, and that Mr. Bush should consider this next time when he wants to start a war! Chris got tremendous applause for this statement. And he repeated it in all 4 concerts I saw. Would have thought Chris being more of an unpolitical person, so my greatest respect for him for saying this!!! And inevitable 'Natasha Dance'. Although I like fast songs, but for my liking he could finally change that one for another upbeat song. The "Britney part" when he walks around the audience singing with headset: you can see so many faces brighten up, people sitting way behind, not believing that suddenly Chris is moving along them! Everyone's on his/her feet, lots of cameras flashing. He even walks up to the upper circle, the people there are delighted! So wonderful to hear "Tender Hands" again, I LOVE that song. Such a pity that he's not doing it anymore in the later concerts. In Aachen he was also still doing 'I Want It', throwing chocolates into the audience (even manages to reach the upper circle at the and of the hall - good throw guy!) In the later concerts it's replaced by 'Nothing ever happens round here' which I find an equal great song. Great to hear Living In The World again - I LOVE that song! Reminds me so much of the QR tour when I joined the list and from then on my concerts tripled, no multiplied from 1 to 10 or so it seemed LOL Then 'Read my Name': Up to then I didn't like the song much (in fact always skipped it when listening to RTF). Now of course I was very excited to see what there would be with "the names" as talked about on the list. And wow! Such a tremendously nice idea!!! I don't know if anybody in the audience beside us knows what to make of it, but it's such a nice gesture to the fans! Thankyou again everyone involved in the making, mostly Astrid for providing the fans' names! :-))) (I tried to take photos of it, but the names flash so fast, my camera isn't able to focus on the screens) It was also in Aachen, where Chris rushed through LIR. Never heard it played so fast. It seemed as if he was longing to get to the end most quickly. New version or is he really sick of it? ;-)) Maybe in Aachen Chris really was in a hurry. I don't know if it's only my impression but somehow Chris seemed to want to get through the concert to be finished with it. Of course musically the concert was excellent! But somewhat was missing. Sitting front row we could see every facial expression, every movement of Chris. He seemed very concentrated, didn't look into the audience much and didn't smile so much, looked very often at the set list, concentrated very much on the songs in getting the chords right, often frowning and relaxing his eyes again. We got the impression this concert was a real effort for him. (And true, later at home I listened to the Mainz radio recording. What a difference!!! There he really was in a relaxed good mood, very talkative and funny.) Of course a solo concert is hard work. He needs to know all the chords, the lyrics, the set list etc. by himself. No band to start the first tunes and Chris just falling into them. And with Aachen being just the 3rd show of a new tour, he probably wasn't used to the set yet. The overall impression: this time it's going to be a much more quieter tour: not much moving, a bit of quiet singing, a bit of clapping, and only the last half hour we were able to rush to the stage and celebrate the concert as usual with dancing, clapping, singing, all the list friends together, waving hands at Peaceful Waters, holding hands at SONY. A bit strange at first hearing the instrumental part of SONY from tape while Chris is going along the front row shaking hands and saying goodbye. Only for the last words he return to the microphone and sings them himself. After the concert we think, yeah, it's concert time again!!! cu Tina
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File last modified on November 20th, 2004