Last night it wasn’t the first time Roxette visited the Czech Republic on this tour and it wasn’t the first time the scanners didn’t work properly in this country. It seems Czech arenas should either check their scanners well before the gigs start or look for a new scanner supplier. Luckily, in the end everyone who was waiting outside the venue for a very long time could reach the well-deserved front row spots at CEZ Arena.
After not too many familiar faces in Trondheim, many longtime Roxers got back on the road and went to see Roxette in Ostrava. The gig started at 10 pm, which is not quite usual. Normally, the support act starts at 8 pm and Roxette hits the stage at around 9-9.30 pm. One could think the later they start, the shorter the setlist gets, but last night they performed their ”usual” setlist with 17 songs.
Marie, Per and the band enjoyed themselves very much, had huge smiles on their faces during the whole gig and they sounded awesome. For sure they were happy to see an active and loud crowd in front of them and that gave the band even more energy. Per was so much on a high he couldn’t stop jumping and running back and forth and left to right on stage all night. Those who had seated tickets stood up and danced during several songs and the whole arena was standing during The Look. Well done! The local tune Chris learned to play not long before the show while sipping ”apple juice” got a great crowd reaction, too.
OSTRAVA UPDATE: Oh yea! We were here in Ostrava four years ago trying to get this band going again after a very long silence and certainly had a blast. Tonight was just the same! Thanx everyone for showing up, singing along and making us sweat!!!! Love it here. See y’all next time! Cheers, P.
Next gig is on Wednesday (17th June) in Sofia, Bulgaria.
Sleeping In My Car
The Big L.
Stars
Spending My Time
Crash! Boom! Bang!
Crush On You
She’s Got Nothing On (But The Radio)
The Heart Shaped Sea
Watercolours In The Rain / Paint
Fading Like A Flower
How Do You Do!
It Must Have Been Love
Dressed For Success
Dangerous
Joyride
Tickets for Roxette’s 37th show of the XXX tour went on sale mid November last year. They were selling like hot cakes and the concert was sold out already on 1st January. So tonight, after having an almost 2-week-long tour break, the band performed in front of 10,000 people who had a picturesque view.
It was quite cold, so Marie dressed up warmly. She even had a pair of cool-looking gloves on. There were 2 heaters on stage for her and they looked more modern and probably worked better than the one in Denmark 3 weeks ago. Marie had an ear-to-ear smile on her face during the whole show, tapping the rhythm on her legs. She enjoyed the gig to the full.
Despite the fact that it was an open-air show and you would have expected Per following the routine of wearing his white outfit, he left it at home and was wearing some new black shirts instead. They have the same design with PER, ROX, XXX on the sleeve as the white set. PG was very energetic and he was even acting a bit with the camera when Åsa was filming him.
The whole band was in top shape and they did their best to animate the crowd. There were hardly any familiar faces in the front row or better said, in the whole crowd at all. People in the audience didn’t really realize they wouldn’t be freezing if they were jumping more, but they proved they knew the lyrics to all the hits and used their hands for clapping along.
Since Swedish is very similar to Norwegian and vice versa, both Marie and Per used Swedish when they were talking to the crowd.
TRONDHEIM UPDATE: Truly fab sold out (10.000+) gig tonite in this beautiful town. Band in top shape after two weeks of moonshining and jailbreaks and Miss Effe blessed us with her golden voice for 90 adorable minutes. All set in this wonderful venue under the (almost) midnight sun (yea, I know – it’s not really the m.s. but it’s so light outside it’s hard to imagine unless you’re here…). Thanx everyone for showing up. Can we come back, please? /P.
Next gig is on Monday (15th June) in Ostrava, Czech Republic.
Sleeping In My Car
The Big L.
Stars
Spending My Time
Crash! Boom! Bang!
Crush On You
She’s Got Nothing On (But The Radio)
Fading Like A Flower
How Do You Do!
It Must Have Been Love
Dressed For Success
Dangerous
Joyride
Extra:
Listen To Your Heart
The Look
Thanx for the setlist confirmation to Daniel Herden!
Last time Roxette performed in Dublin was 3 years ago and they played at the same arena which was called The O2 Arena back then. The show was one of the best gigs during that world tour according to those who attended it. Even if Irish people came late to the venue last night, no stressing about the front row at the anyway quite small standing area, the arena was fully packed already by the time Eskobar got on stage.
Just some minutes before showtime Per posted the crowd pic. We were afraid he would miss the start of the concert while being busy on Facebook, but he made it to the stage in time and they all kicked ass with Sleeping In My Car. Mr. Left Leg Stomper was in top form and Ms. Marie also enjoyed the show to the full, as well as all band members who were wearing a hat and those without a hat.
The crowd was loud and it wasn’t necessary to ask them to sing along. They loved the setlist and sang along all songs happily by themselves. Great atmosphere, rocking band, noise-making crowd. What else could you ask for? Some balloons maybe? Oh yeah. No surprise there were balloons during Joyride, but it’s always much fun when they get close to Per. Now he picked up one landing in the front part of the stage and threw it back to the crowd when they came back for the extra songs. See it in this video.
At the end of the concert someone threw a bra on stage. Magnus picked it up and handed it over to Per. Mr. G took it and when he saw what it was he gave it right back. LOL. Poor guy. 😉 You can see it at the end of this The Look video.
DUBLIN UPDATE: Oh the land of Guiness and U2. It’s always a pleasure being here. Truly fantastic evening at the 3 Arena (last time we were here it was called O2 Arena, the first time around it was The Point… what’s happening to this world?).
Beautiful crowd tonite + a decent band, we certainly had a good time. Hope you enjoyed it too, folks!
Chris sneeked in both Jailbreak and Dirty Old Town as well as the Irish Rover. Well done, professor O’Lundquist! Next stop: Trondheim, Norway. Cheers, P.
Now comes a little break until the next gig, which is on 13th June in Trondheim, Norway. That is a sold out show by the way.
Sleeping In My Car
The Big L.
Stars
Spending My Time
Crash! Boom! Bang!
Crush On You
She’s Got Nothing On (But The Radio)
The Heart Shaped Sea
Watercolours In The Rain / Paint
Fading Like A Flower
How Do You Do!
It Must Have Been Love
Dressed For Success
Dangerous
Joyride
Tonight it was already the 35th show on this tour. Last time Roxette played in Antwerp was 6 years ago, during the Night of the Proms happening in 2009.
The band hit the stage with much energy and got the huge crowd of Lotto Arena sing along already with Sleeping In My Car. Marie was on a high, acting much with the fans during the whole show and Per had his batteries fully charged, too.
The crowd was getting wilder and wilder and burst out in a la-la-la-loud sing along. Actually, the party audience made their voice heard all night. Just to quote some of their comments regarding how much they enjoyed the show: ”They still have it!”; ”Still top!”; ”Forever the best!”; ”Roxette is still rocking!”; ”Lots of respect!”; ”Man, I’m reliving my childhood right at this moment! They’re brilliant!!!!” etc. Great to hear all the positive vibes.
One die hard German Roxer, Astrid Lenhard even called her friend, another hardcore fan in Austria, Karin Lessjak (who couldn’t be there at the concert) when Marie and Dea performed Watercolours In The Rain / Paint to let her hear Marie singing via the phone at least. Emotional!
The great Anton Corbijn was there in Antwerp, too. The new monitor engineer, according to Per. Didn’t he mention in an interview that they might make a video for the upcoming single? Hm. Could it be that they will work together with Anton on that? Would be fab! What we know for sure is that he took photos during the concert. Hopefully, we get to see them soon.
After Mr. G found his lost password to Facebook or the internet connection in Belgium got better or just took his time off (it’s not too common he doesn’t post for more than 24 hours 😉 ), he posted this after the show:
ANTWERP UPDATE: Yeehaa! Fab evening in front of a pumped up crowd in a sold out Lotto Arena. Great vibe, lots of familiar faces everywhere. Thanx for making this yet another everlasting memory from Belgium!!!! And hey, now it’s Marie’s beeday!! Cheers! /P
It’s indeed Marie’s birthday already. Hip hip! Some Roxers had the chance to sing her Happy birthday after the show, when she was leaving. They made Marie very happy about it. She smiled while they were singing, waved and thanked the fans so much. She said: “You’re always the best, remember that!” Watch the video of it. Thanx for filming and sharing it, Gyöngyvér Simon!
Next gig is on Monday (1st June) in Dublin, Ireland.
Sleeping In My Car
The Big L.
Stars
Spending My Time
Crash! Boom! Bang!
Crush On You
She’s Got Nothing On (But The Radio)
The Heart Shaped Sea
Watercolours In The Rain / Paint
Fading Like A Flower
How Do You Do!
It Must Have Been Love
Dressed For Success
Dangerous
Joyride
As we mentioned it in our latest review, Sandra Knospe celebrated her 200th gig in Amsterdam 2 days ago. 200! What an impressive number! Hard to beat it except if you are member of the band or at least the crew. 😉 It’s not only Roxette, but also Marie and Per solo, as well as Gyllene Tider, but most of the shows she attended were Roxette gigs. She followed the band from South America to Australia, but being a German girl, she of course went to the most shows in Europe. And why I use past tense here I have no clue… she followed the band from here to there and she’ll never stop. Well, she was truly born to follow.
When Sandra enjoyed her 100th show she surely didn’t expect she would have such a special treatment 100 concerts later. The crew offered her to see the venue from a different perspective and showed her around the stage. Then on the concert the band mentioned her anniversary. What a night!
Here are Sandra’s thoughts about her 200th gig:
A Rox gig with a different perspective
Pic by Sandra Knospe
Another day another concert. After Rox had played in the famous L’Olympia just the other night it was Amsterdam’s turn now. Approaching the venue at around 5pm I have to say I was surprised to see way less people queuing in front of it than usually. There were two entries, one for people who had bought the expensive Early Entrance tix and one for the remaining concert visitors. I expected to see more “hardcores” in any of the queues, but I guess some just decided to come late since it didn’t make sense to queue the whole day with a normal ticket and no big chances of front row anymore. And other Roxers probably have decided to skip the concert completely and boycott the EE ticket policy from Live Nation. So maybe one doesn’t need to wonder that it felt a bit different outside this time. And in a way it continued inside.
The entrance for EE ticket owners was around 6.15pm and the others followed shortly afterwards. I can’t really tell how the entry was outside, because a friend of mine and I were lucky enough to get to see the stage from the other side of the fence while the doors opened. That evening I celebrated my anniversary of 200 concerts including Rox, P&M solo and GT and a very kind person suggested that maybe it would be interesting for me to see the things from a different perspective. And it was!! I am very happy and extremely thankful that we got this little special treatment!!
After that my friend and I found our places in the front and we were eager to see the show. Some chit chat with people around us and then Eskobar started to play. As a fan who has seen a few shows you can already sense during the supporting act what mood the crowd is in and if they will get infected by the vibe and atmosphere on stage. At least to 90% you can guess that already before Rox enter the stage. And this time it felt as if it would be a bit of a tough job to get the crowd into it. And it turned out to be like that. Of course Rox got a warm welcome when they finally entered the stage and people surely clapped and sang along to the choruses of the oh so well known hits, but in between it felt a bit quiet and the enthusiasm was, well, let’s say limited compared to all other shows of this leg so far. But that only goes for the audience. On stage the glorious 7 had a top night. Marie delivering a great performance, Per bouncing, spinning and dancing around. Lyrics where they belonged. Only Per with a cock-eyed brain once, when singing this line twice in a row during “Crush on You”. And speaking of Per I have to take the opportunity to mention here that there is a noticeable change since this leg in the way Per interacts with the audience. There is much more contact with the people in the front rows than before. Keeping eye contact for more than just a millisecond and checking out the first few rows quite often is not that usual for him. It feels nice to see him being so relaxed and acting and reacting to the crowd in a more open way on stage. And it’s not just me who has noticed it. So whatever has happened that made him change this I hope he keeps it and I am sure all other Roxers hope that, too. Because it adds some extra kix to every gig.
The band was in top shape as well. What I really like a lot is that meanwhile the short dialogues on stage are alternating. It’s not always the same every night and it looks and sounds more spontaneous and not that practiced anymore. Really funny. They should keep that. It adds a lot to the atmosphere. And if not for the normal concert visitors then for sure for the hardcore Roxers. OK, I have to admit I am probably not very objective now since I got a little extra mentioning on stage that night. And THAT surely made my anniversary even more special!! So unexpected and freaking amazing. You simply have to love them all. Not only for the music. But before going into raptures now I’ll rather stick to the review.
I enjoyed the concert to the full and the energy and mood on stage made it exciting for me. So after the gig I was all smiles. The only question I’ve asked myself was “Would it have been different audience wise without EE tix?” I tend to say yes, because I think more hardcores would have shown up and been in front row, partying and jumping all the time. But with 150,-€ per ticket one simply has to cross out some shows when you have planned to see them more than just once during their tour. So I really hope that EE ticket policy won’t become a regular thing. But that’s just my personal impression. And even if most of the visitors weren’t physically active, the general opinion of the people who were standing next to me was positive. They all enjoyed the concert. The only thing some mentioned was the feeling that the concert was too short. Well, what can I say? Surely, I agree on that and all of us would love to get more than 17 songs on a gig, but nevertheless, we enjoyed what we’ve got to the max. So thanks for playing and cheers to the next 200!!
The audience could have been more active, but anyway, even if there is a standing still crowd, you can always be sure there is at least one person jumping in the front during the complete show. And it’s Sandra Knospe. Indeed, to the next 200, Sandra!
