Concert Review: Stuttgart, Germany (Presseball) - October 17, 2003
Claudia Schreiber:
Hi folks, we really had a great evening there. I met Dany, Andrea, Chris (W) and Stewart in our hotel in Stuttgart. We had a bottle of sparkling wine for my birthday last week and then it was already time to dress up for the evening-which was a little bit more work this time, as it was a ball only visited by important people (or at least of those who thought they're important...) When we finally met in the lobby again it was hard to believe we were still the samy...Dany and Andrea with long black skirts/dress, Chris and me in red dresses and Stewart in a black suit with a cummerbund even. When we entered the taxi we agreed we were the bestlooking people in town :-))) At the venue there were already many people having a first drink, and when we went in, I saw my personal paradise: a table, at least 10 meters long, and the whole table full of filled glasses of sparkling wine-we thought about trying a bit of each, but instead we searched our table. And we were lucky enough to see it was the second nearest one to the stage! So we sat down at the side next to the stage and ordered our drinks and food. After paying about 155 Euros for each ticket we thought drinks & food must be free, but nothing! The only thing we got for free was 1 bottle of water for each table...but we decided not to worry about it and had some delicious food. Although after eating it we felt like visiting Mc Donald's to get full... Then the program started with a performance of drums and fire, and after lots of fun and laughter it was 10 pm and Chris was introduced on stage. We rushed towards the stage of course, and when Chris saw us standing there I think he could not believe his eyes to see us there :-))) With a "It's nice to see so many familiar faces here" he said thank you for it. Chris played about an hour, even longer than we hoped, and besides songs like "Peaceful waters" and "Road to freedom" he did -of course- LIR, but only a part of it. I'm not sure if he just mixed up the words or if it was meant to be, but after the song Chris said "You may have recognized that the song was shorter as usual" and explained, that he wanted to introduce us a kind of "LIR Part 2", it was a song about what happens 20 years later or so. I must admit that I was so excited that I can't remember a single word of it... During a short break the 5 of us took the chance to start singing "Happy birthday" and while we did Chris picked up the roses from us girls (And we got a little kiss for it, yep), and our present from Stewart: a huge wall clock in the shape of a guitar, with the english flag on it (Sorry Chris, we did not find the irish one). Too soon the little concert was over, and Rosanna entered the stage with flowers for her Daddy. I heard her saying "Hi, Daddy", and she seemed to be really shy to be there...she's a good looking girl, from whom does she have it? ;-)) Only kidding of course. Chris said that she's going to represent Ireland at the Miss World contest in December, and then the man who lead through the evening started to sing "Happy birthday" again. While Chris did "Missing you" a crazy old woman entered the stage, hugged Chris from behind and she had a puppet in her hand, a teddy bear or so. Chris Andrews jumped on stage and had a few problems to get her off the stage, as she grabbed Chris' shoulder. God, what if she had a knife instead of a teddy? We were really shocked by this... After the concert was over we went to a bar next door, and about 3 o'clock in the morning we drove back to our hotel where we entered a kind of VIP lounge to have a few more drinks free. It must have been after 5 o'clock when I finally felt my bed beneath me. Of course we met for breakfast and then we had to say goodbye for a long time...we did not manage to get any information about a show next year, but it was a perfect day anyway. And I loved to hear Chris saying that he will only stop singing when they carry him out of a church, feet first (Leute heute). Let's hope that will be far, far, far in the future. Claudia