Roxette

Roxette XXX Tour – Madrid, Spain (Palacio Vistalegre) – May 13 – #27

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After a most awesome opening gig in Milan last Sunday, the European tour leg’s second show happened in Madrid. Many started wondering if Spain can beat Italy. People are loud there, too, but it felt like Milan was a tough act to follow. Not that it makes sense to compare one concert to another, since each gig is special and unique. The venue in the Spanish capital was a much bigger one, appr. 6000 people attended the show. The concert wasn’t sold out, but the arena looked quite packed.

Lots of fans had been waiting all day outside the venue to be the first ones to enter Palacio Vistalegre in the evening. This was the first Euro show with the support act Eskobar. (Read the interview Judith did with them some days ago.)

Roxette was to hit the stage at 21:30, but the show started only appr. 30 minutes later. Mañana (=tomorrow) is a frequently used word in Spain, they love taking it easy, but you shouldn’t be late when there is another show mañana in another city. Fans started worrying about the setlist being shortened because of the delayed start and they were right. 17 songs were played, the band skipped Almost Unreal.

The most common expressions regarding the concert used by the Spaniards are ”grandes” and ”conciertazo” meaning the band was absolutely great and it was an awesome concert. Per was extremely energetic, jumping and stomping even more than in Milan and joking all the time. Marie and Dea charmed the audience with a perfect Watercolours In The Rain performance. Magnus and Chris were so much on a high that at a point Magnus even fell on his bum and Chris dropped his guitar. Haha, pure rock & roll! Christoffer played ”Viva España” as the intro to Joyride and it worked very well with the cheering Spanish crowd.

Spanish fans never disappoint, they were singing their hearts out during the whole show and all the international fans who also attended the concert joined them. They were onehelluva loud crowd! As usual, Spanish hardcore Roxers prepared some fun. Instead of wigs this time they were wearing chicken hats. It surely made the band smile and we’ll probably get to see them in some short vids on Roxette’s Facebook page.

Per & Co. after the show:

MADRID! OH YEA! Fab gig tonite in front of the loudest crowd since I don’t know when! We had a blast and even did a jam session at the very end of Listen To Your Heart. Unexpected. Even for us!!! Thank you everyone who made this an everlasting memory for all of us!!!! Vids tomorrow. Barcelona as well. Cheers! /P&Co

Next gig is on Thursday (14th May) in Barcelona, Spain.

Articles and photos

Instagram: 1; 2; 3; 4; 5; 6; 7; 8; 9; 10; 11; 12; 13; 14;

diariovasco.com
es.noticias.yahoo.com
mercadeopop
Live Nation ES
hola.com

Videos

It Must Have Been Love
Watercolours In The Rain / Paint
Fading Like A Flower

Instavideos
Sleeping In My Car
Spending My Time
The Look

The bow

 

Setlist

roxette_in_madrid
Pics by Tiina Pitkänen (1; 2)

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

Extra:
Listen To Your Heart
The Look

 

Thanx for the contribution, Nina Wolfframm.

Roxette XXX Tour – Milan, Italy (Teatro Arcimboldi) – May 10 – #26

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The long-awaited European leg of the XXX tour kicked off in Milan last night. Good sign to start a tour leg with a sold out gig, isn’t it? First the band, then Marie and Per arrived to the venue for a soundcheck in the afternoon. They were all smiles, so one could see they loved the fact the tour continues. After the F1 race had ended, they got on stage and did a more than 1-hour long soundcheck with the following songs: 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, Fading Like A Flower, How Do You Do!, Dangerous, Almost Unreal. So we could be really happy that they kept Crush On You.

When we were all checking our seats and it was almost show time, we realized the organizers took some VIP people to the very front, to the orchestra part of the theater. This way they were like in 0 or -1 rows. The show was to start at 9 pm, but there were a lot of people entering the venue late to take their seats, so Roxette got on stage only a bit later than 21:15.

Italy doesn’t get a Roxette concert each day, even Per mentioned it during the show that the last time they played in Milan was in 1989 at the Rolling Stone club. He asked if anyone was there from the crowd and said there were like 40 people or maybe 70. So it was extremely exciting to have the band playing live in Milan during the actual tour. Even if the venue was quite small (appr. 2300 people), it felt like we were in a huge arena. Believe it or not, the whole audience (even the VIP people) stood up even before the concert started and they didn’t really want to use their seats at all. The only song where the crowd was sitting was Watercolours In The Rain / Paint, but it changed quite fast with the next song, Fading Like A Flower when all people were on their feet again.

The audience was so active and loud! Everyone knew the lyrics to almost each and every song and was singing along all the time. The band, seeing all the happy party people in the audience put even more energy into the opening gig of the European tour. All of them were on a high. Marie was sitting during the whole show, but this didn’t stop her dancing on her chair and acting with the audience. Per was so happy to hear everyone singing along that he jumped and ran around the stage so much. Once he even ”kicked” Chris in the ass while playing the guitar. Chris went so crazy during The Look that he ran off the stage to the front row of the crowd and played the guitar there. Magnus joined him in some seconds and they went wild down there.

There was a funny conversation between Marie and Per before It Must Have Been Love about how Marie felt herself, if it was warm and that they didn’t really like the song in the beginning, but then it changed quite a lot in their lives. When IMHBL started, Marie was singing, then there was the crowd sing-along part and Marie liked it so much she asked the audience to sing more. She shouted into the mic several times ”I want to hear you sing!” Not only during It Must Have Been Love, but also during Listen To Your Heart. At the latter song, she had some problems with the lyrics and asked Dea to come closer to the front, so she could support her even more. Dea came to the front and they were singing together. Sounded fab! Actually, all songs sounded wonderful. All voices were in top shape and everyone on the stage was just shining. We loved seeing how the band enjoyed themselves and it was awesome to be part of such a fantastic crowd. Italy rulez!

Before we could enter the venue, we saw lots of firemen. Now we know they had to be there because they were afraid of Teatro Arcimboldi being burnt down. Gosh! Roxette put the theater on fire and it was burning from the very beginning till the very end.

After Joyride, the band went off the stage, but the crowd was shouting loud: Roxette! Roxette! and clapping and whistling and doing everything to get them back on stage. We didn’t have to wait for a long time. They happily got back to us and further entertained us with the 3 extra songs.

When Marie stood up at the end of the concert, she got a standing ovation. The crowd didn’t let them go off stage and it seemed like Marie and Per wanted to stay there forever. Then they started walking off and Marie looked at and waved back to the audience before they disappeared in the dark.

Åsa was filming a lot and even Micke grabbed the iPhone to take some videos, so we surely get some video updates on Roxette’s Facebook page.

Regarding the merchandise, a new item is a phone charger for 45 euros. One of the VIP presents in Oz was a similar equipment and Per liked it so much he promised to try to have it in the merchandise. Now there it is.

Per’s comment on the concert:

MILAN UPDATE: Thanx everyone for making the XXX Euro Tour start so good! The opening show in Milan was a blast!!! Wonderful crowd and a very jolly band enjoying every second of every song. We love Italy, we certainly hope we can come back to do some gigs here!! Thanx for making this happen, y’all! Grazie, P&M&Co
PS. Vids tomorrow…

Next gig is on Wednesday (13th May) in Madrid, Spain.

 

Articles and photos

Instagram: 1; 2; 3; 4; 5; 6;

demotix.com
jaymag.it
lifestyle.tiscali.it
onstageweb.com
cubemagazine.it
impattosonoro.it
tuttorock.net
flickr – Alberto Pezzali
flickr – Francesco Prandoni
flickr – Mairo Cinquetti
flickr – Sergione Infuso

Roxetteblog Photo album on Facebook

Videos

Fading Like A Flower
Spending My Time
How Do You Do!
The Look

Video clip from Notorius

Setlist

roxette_in_milan
Pic by Patrícia Peres

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

Extra:
Almost Unreal
Listen To Your Heart
The Look

 

Roxette Diaries – a movie coming soon!

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You might remember that a bit more than a year ago, April 2014 Per posted updates (1; 2) about a cooperation with Jonas Åkerlund involving old video tapes related to Roxette. This was what he wrote back then:

MONDAY UPDATE w/ EXCITING NEWS: Going through loads of old Hi-8 and DV videotapes (mainly shot by Åsa) from 1988-2001 with Jonas Åkerlund and his gang.
Backstage, in the studio, video shootings, photo shoots – you name it. Have an idea to make a proper film out of it. What do you think? Cool or what? /P.

It seems the project is now very close to take form of a movie. Cool or what?

A trailer has been shared by the movie’s editor, Emma Backman. (Update: the trailer has been set (back?) to private. Probably, it was too early to publish it.) The film is directed by the most awesome Jonas Åkerlund and this fact itself guarantees a most amazing result. But that you’ll see already from the trailer.

The film will include tons of forgotten home videos and real behind the scenes of video clip shootings, photo and studio sessions, interviews, concerts, etc. More than you could ever think about! As Per says, all videos are from the years 1986-1995, so the quality of them is not compatible with the 21st century. But who cares, really? It’s so fantastic to have that many funny and magical moments documented in the past and now we will have access to them. Speechless is the word!

This is what Per says about the project:

Everything (and more) happened to Roxette between 1986 and 1995. This was the era where a videocamera wasn’t something you saw every day. The technical quality you would get was so-so but today I’m really happy we covered hundreds of hours of film from these magic years.

The ambition was to shoot everything. Studio-sessions, back-stage-parties, rehearsals. My wife, Åsa, was the commander-in-chief when it came to capture promo- and TV-shows as well as the extensive touring all over the world.

All in all I gave about 180 Hi-8/VHS-tapes to director Jonas Åkerlund and asked him if he and his team could do something special with it. Maybe create a movie that captured the spirit of Roxette in the early days as well as being honest, silly and fun to watch. Hey, I think they succeeded. Enjoy the Roxette Diaries.

Huge thanks to Åsa for filming so much over the years and that she still hasn’t got tired of it, using the camera for shooting more and more magic! We highly appreciate it!

As you can see, Jonas got appr. 180 tapes, a huge amount of material to go through. I’m sure there would have been many volunteers to help Mr. Åkerlund. The first updates were about tapes from 1988-2001, but now Per says what you’ll see in the movie is from 1986-1995. Does it mean it’s just a first part and later on there will be a vol. 2 with 1996-2001 videos? Then a 3rd part? Who’s in for a neverending movie?

Release date is unknown yet, but the film is coming soon! Whose soon? Hopefully, not Per’s. 😉

Roxette_Diaries_trailer_stills_rs

Stills are from the trailer. (Update: the trailer is set to private now, probably, because it was too early to publish it. Business as usual. 😉 )

Thanx to Roxette Diaries for googling “Roxette Diaries” and finding the trailer!

Update: So it’s Per’s soon. 🙂

ROXETTE DIARIES. Yep, it’s done. Waiting for subtitles. Release date? Soon! Cheers, P.

 

The new album: You might be surprised!

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Interview ScreenshotAnd yet another interview with Per popped up, this time by German music blog laut.de. Between other things Per talks about current studio work, the greatest hits album and world tour. When interviewed he’s in the studio creating demos and „hopes“ to have a new single ready for the European live shows.

The title „Marie needs much drama“ refers to Maries preference for big melodies when singing, in contrast to rather flat bubblegum pop. Per reveals that Marie and him had many disagreements during Roxette’s career, but they always kept it out of the public. In the past he could be grumpy when Marie only stepped into the studio to sing her vocal parts, but her illness changed everything and now he’s just happy to look into her eyes.

About current influences and Roxette’s forthcoming album, Per says that he’s interested in music that he couldn’t create himself and that puzzles him, like the work of Daft Punk. He thinks some people will be surprised by the sound of Roxette’s new album. While the foundation stays the same there’ll also be new things to discover…

Read the whole Interview in German here!

New Per Gessle interview from Hungary

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During the past months many interviews with Per popped up in several countries. Anyone in for a little Hungarian this time? Piece of cake. OK, if you’d like to skip the lesson, just read the summary in English below.

Lángoló Gitárok is a well-known Hungarian music blog. Ádám Magyar, one of the LG bloggers did a quite nice interview with Mr G, having some interesting questions to him. There is nothing really new for a hardcore Roxer in it, but still, I’m always happy to read anything Rox-related in Hungarian newspapers or on websites. And yeah, I could read about / listen to Per’s thoughts and views on music 24/7. I know there are many more out there sharing this feeling. 😉

rox_int_langolo_gitarokIn the interview, to the question what motivates him being constantly on stage Per replied he’s not constantly on stage, but is constantly working. He writes, re-writes and re-re-writes songs, planning or he’s just in the studio. Touring is another part of the creative work, but he really likes it, because it feels wonderful to stand on stage in front of tons of people who love what they’re doing.

To the question what inspires him when writing songs he replied writing songs is just natural for him, since he started writing already as a teenager. He could not live without writing, it’s an important part of his personality. Per is writing constantly, but it doesn’t mean he finishes all the songs or that the audience will get to hear all of his songs.

Per says today’s mainstream pop music is very one-sided and he blames it on the major record companies and radio stations. He thinks it’s much easier to follow in the footsteps of an already successful production than to do something fresh and innovative. His favorite songwriters are those who still try to move out of the ordinary frames, while writing great melodies and doing interesting albums. He says he loves well-written songs.

Of current music trends Per says sometimes things don’t come through, because he thinks those songs don’t speak to him. But that’s just the way it should be. Pop music should always reflect the actual era and so it does.

To Lángoló Gitárok‘s question, if he ever recognized the impact of Roxette on today’s music Per replied he is not used to think about it at all. Music works like you hear something, you find inspiration in it and then write something new.

Lángoló Gitárok asked Per what kind of music he is listening to nowadays. He says he is listening to different kinds of music. He returns to Joni Mitchell or 70’s pop songs quite often, but he also likes new stuff, such as Lana Del Rey, Röyksopp, José González, Nine Inch Nails and Daft Punk. He finds French bands usually very good. But according to Per, there are good songs of Katy Perry, Tove Lo or Ellie Goulding, too.

To the question what he thinks of the future of music Per replied pop and rock music have changed a lot in his life. When he was a child, music played a huge role in their daily lives, but today there is much more competition in the entertainment business. There is the internet, the fantastic computer games, etc.

The point is that the possibilities are endless and this is a huge difference compared to earlier times. Sometimes I feel that the role of music in everyday life in today’s society is not as dominant as it was decades ago. On the other hand, more people listen to music today than ever before, and it‘s amazing how much easier it is to access music. Of course, pop and rock music will live on, but who knows what role they will play in the future.

Per talks about his great memories from the tours. He says they are very lucky and grateful that they could attract so many people to their shows all around the world over the years.

To the question when he thinks he will retire from music he replied:

There are no such plans, as it has just started for me.

When asked about his free time, Per mentions he likes car sports, especially F1. He talks about his hotel being also an entertaining thing to deal with. He tells he’s interested in architecture and art in general.

But actually, I’m an incredibly boring person. I spend 99% of my time with my family and music.

Regarding travelling Per says he loves Europe and when he’s travelling he feels really European. Australia is a very good place, especially Melbourne. Brazil and Argentina are also super. His favorite cities are probably New York and London, he has a lot of his friends living there.

Lángoló Gitárok asked Per whether Chris plays local songs also in other countries or it was only Hungary where he played a local tune (Tavaszi szél) in 2011. Per explains Christoffer plays some local tunes every night. He says Chris is a great musician and learns extremely fast. He’d never be able to do what Professor Lundquist is doing.

Per mentions he was in Budapest only a couple of times so far and they only came to play here, but he saw that Budapest is a beautiful city and of course, he is excited to be there again.

Regarding the new album Per says it will be out in autumn and that they plan to make a classic Roxette album, but at the same time they want it to sound fresh.

Regarding further plans for the future Per says he will follow his gut feeling.

Thanx a lot for this interview, Lángoló Gitárok!

Roxette plays in Budapest 19th May. Tickets are selling very well, but there are still some available HERE.