A little more than a month after South America, the tour continues in Europe. The first gig took place in Hanover at the NDR 2 Plaza Festival last night.
Schedule:
15:00 ClockClock
16:00 Blue
17:30 The BossHoss
19:00 Roxette
21:00 Peter Maffay
The crew had to set everything up very quickly for the band, but they were well prepared. There was also some confetti to clean up after the The BossHoss show (Micke N-S is a pro, haha), so that Roxette could take the stage at 19:00.
The stage was extremely high and deep, so from the front rows, Clarence and Dea were less visible from one side, while Norpan and Jonas were less visible from the other. You could only see Per, Lena, Christoffer and Magnus in full when they came to the front of the stage.
Fortunately, Lena often came to the front of the stage with her handheld mic, but Per – singing from a mic stand – couldn’t come forward as often. Thankfully, Dea brought him closer at one point, when she, Lena and Magnus were already at the front. They were clearly having a lot of fun, and so were we!
There was much less talking between the songs, but of course Per introduced Lena and asked the crowd to sing along – whether they knew the lyrics or not. And, of course, Lena dedicated It Must Have Been Love to Marie. There was no band presentation, and only a very brief intro to Joyride, but Christoffer played Soul Deep as the intro to She’s Got Nothing On, which sounded fab!
The weather forecast predicted rain and thunderstorm during the night, exactly when Roxette were scheduled to play. The organizers had already informed us in advance where to go and what to do in case that happened.
During the intro to Joyride, Per went to the side of the stage to discuss the setlist with BoJo, so he may already have been informed that the set would need to be shortened because of the weather.
Then, when we saw the organizer approaching the stage, we thought they were going to stop the concert. BoJo tried hard to signal to Per and the rest of the band that they should wrap up the show. He spoke to Christoffer as well. When Per noticed, he nodded to indicate that he got the message.
Towards the end of The Look, BoJo and the organizer were already standing at the side of the stage, urgently signaling that the show should end immediately. As a result, there was no extended outro and the band didn’t have a chance to take a bow. The organizer came to the front of the stage and announced, ”Das war Roxette, danke schön!” while the band was walking off.
Right after they left the stage, the thunderstorm arrived and the area was evacuated. Part of the people who still wanted to see Peter Maffay an hour later went inside the arena next to the open-air venue, whle others left the festival grounds in the heavy rain, strong winds and lightning. Safety first!
The setlist would have been at least a little longer if the thunderstorm hadn’t hit Hanover. It felt as though there would have been time for at least two more songs, but as it was, the show lasted only an hour.
It was a lot of fun anyway, and it was definitely a different experience from previous shows. However, I prefer Roxette to be the main – and preferably the only – act. If it’s a festival, I’d rather see them as the headliners, because the audience is more focused on them.
The good thing is that this was probably the shortest gig of the tour, so from now on the setlists should be longer. Some of the upcoming shows will still be shorter than standard concerts, but we will also get some full-length Roxette concerts this summer, where they are the main act.
Setlist
- The Big L.
- Sleeping In My Car
- Dressed For Success
- Crash! Boom! Bang!
- Fading Like A Flower
- Stars
- She’s Got Nothing On (But The Radio)
- It Must Have Been Love
- How Do You Do!
- Dangerous
- Joyride
- Listen To Your Heart
- The Look
Next stop is Olpe, Germany on 5th June! Tour dates and links to ticket sales sites HERE!
Photos in the article are taken by Patrícia Peres. More photos HERE!