Tour Archives - Page 54 of 219

Roxette XXX Tour – Gothenburg, Sweden (Slottskogsvallen) – July 24 – #56

September 1, 2015July 25, 2015 by Patrícia Peres

Before I tell you anything else about the 3rd Swedish show, the most important thing: Gothenburg never disappoints! The concert was pure m.a.g.i.c.!

roxette_in_gbg_01 — Pic by Patrícia Peres

Many fans were there waiting all day at the venue in Gothenburg, too. This time the early entrance ticket owners were separated from the ordinary ticket owners and both teams got an own entrance. Show Security Sweden supported us here too and it was nice to see Malin, who was one of the security supervisors during the Gyllene Tider tour. The security team was very helpful in Gothenburg as well, not only during the entrance, but also during the waiting time they came and asked us if everything was fine. Inside the venue they provided us with water if we wanted.

The guys from Eskobar were kind enough to come out to the fans and have a short chat with them and take pictures while they were waiting for the gates to open. Eskobar got on the stage a bit later than 19:30. The audience, at least the international part of it went literally wild while having the band there and the guys loved it and thanked for it. As you can read it in our thank you article to them, we are really very grateful to have such a support act.

We couldn’t wait anymore for Roxette being on stage and they were suddenly there with the Sleeping In My Car intro. They all looked amazing and were much on a high since the very beginning of the show. When you think it can’t get any better, you experience an even better gig and you fall in love with Roxette again. And again.

roxette_in_gbg_02 — Pic by Patrícia Peres

Marie was in top form and her voice was absolutely amazing! She improvised quite a lot, mainly during The Big L. and Listen To Your Heart. Both songs’ ending was simply awesome! Marie looked and pointed at fans several times during the gig. We loved it! Her facial expressions and gestures were priceless!

Per was also amazingly energetic. He definitely killed all the Gessle Girls in the front with his ”I-make-eye-contact-with-the-fans” moments. His hot ’n’ sexy Gessle moves were another killer factor tonight. His ”I-kick-Chris-in-the-ass” moment gets more and more playful every time and how Christoffer reacts on it is funny. Their guitar fights were very much enjoyable.

When Per talked before Spending My Time he said Roxette played here 4 years ago and asked us if we were there. Tons of people in the audience shouted they were there. Per pointed at Marie and said: You were here! Marie: Absolut!

Crush On You was extremely good tonight, the crowd was much into it, but not more than into e.g. How Do You Do!

Before The Heart Shaped Sea Per talked about recording the Tourism album and joked that there are like 4 people in the crowd who know that album. Well, there were of course more than 4 of us.

roxette_in_gbg_03 — Pic by Patrícia Peres

After Watercolours In The Rain / Paint which sounded incredibly amazing tonight, the crowd started shouting ”Marie! Marie! Marie!” and after a while Marie also started miming 3 times Marie! Marie! Marie! Haha. Too cool she is!

Before they started playing Dressed For Success, Per shouted into the mic: ”Are you in for a little more party?” The crowd was in! Friday night party at its best!

Unfortunately, while there is the band presentation part, we are usually occupied with blowing the balloons. This time it happened again. All the fans in the front rows had balloons to throw them in the air when Roxette performed Joyride. After Joyride the band went off the stage and what happened during the break I’ve never experienced this way. The crowd started singing ”na na na na na she’s got the look” and didn’t stop until we got Roxette back on stage! It was the greatest break ever! The band got back and you could see they were amazed at the crowd reaction.

After Listen To Your Heart it was again The Look that closed the party and the audience went crazy. Towards the end of the song Marie was singing: You’ve got the look! You’ve got the look! and was pointing at the crowd and we were pointing at her.

The whole gig was magical indeed. Gothenburg knows how to enjoy a concert.

After the show many Roxers were waiting for Roxette at the back entrance of the venue. First Per came out, we applauded him and he stopped for some time and signed many autographs. Then came the band who were also very nice to us. In the end came Marie. She got a huge applause from us, too. She smiled and waved back to us. You must love all these Swedes!

Per’s badabam after the show:

GOTHENBURG UPDATE: Badabam! More than 15000 ppl showed up tonite and helped us having a fab evening with the Goth folks!!! Always a treat to play in Gothenburg, you know that! Vids tomorrow, y’all! /P.

Next stop is Stockholm on 25th July with no rest in between!

Articles and photos

rockfoto.nu
fotoscenen.se
Elegant Exposures
Göteborgs-Posten 1; 2; 3;
gaffa.se

Videos

Sleeping In My Car
It Must Have Been Love
Dressed For Success / Dangerous
Listen To Your Heart
The Look

Setlist

roxette_in_gbg_04 — 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 (intro: Håkan Hellström – Känn ingen sorg för mig Göteborg)

Extra
Listen To Your Heart
The Look

Thank you, Eskobar!

July 23, 2015 by Judith

Unfortunately, that Roxette 30th Anniversary tour (European leg) is coming to an end also means that we have to say bye to Eskobar. After yesterday’s show in Halmstad, it’s just 3 shows left with Eskobar as special guest, so we wanted to take the chance to thank Daniel, Frederik and Jocke for making the time before Roxette’s show feel shorter, for cheering the audience up and for performing such great versions of your songs, you have been a great opening act!

IMG_0797-1 I was very happy when I found out Eskobar would be the support act for Roxette during their European tour. I have liked the band since early 2000ies and I had never seen them live. And I was sure that Roxette fans and audience in general would like them too, who can resist their melodies?

After having seen them 4 times now and the reaction of the audience at the shows and also on social media, I think it is safe to say that the guys really enchanted us! Many have bought their albums, share their music and leave very positive comments about Eskobar everywhere. We have also got many messages of people asking if Eskobar will join Roxette in the possible continuation of the tour in other parts of the world, what Eskobar will do next, where to buy their stuff and more. So we thought of putting all the information in one article.

But before that, we also got a message from Eskobar for all of you:

Now that this tour is coming to an end we would like to send the biggest thank you to Per & Marie, but also to Christoffer, Clarence, Magnus, Dea & Pelle in the band, everyone in the amazing crew, the drivers & the bosses and everyone else. What a fantastic experience filled with so much laughs, jokes, BBQ, great music and wonderful people. Also a very big thanks to everyone all over Europe who took their time to watch Eskobar support Roxette. We have felt extremely welcome in every city thanks to you all!

Great music lives forever!!!

//Eskobar

Future plans, new album, tour, beer?

Eskobar’s upcoming album will be released in the upcoming months. The guys are also planning to release a live album recorded during this tour. And would also love to go on tour in the near future. If you want to stay up-to-date, check out Eskobar’s Facebook page, all information will be shared there.

We don’t know if Eskobar will be the support band in possible future Roxette shows in other countries. Of course, many of us would love to see that so.. let’s just keep our fingers crossed (not only for Eskobar but for more Roxette shows in 2016!).

Frederik‘s beer Svinninge Bullet is also available in Sweden at Systembolaget, so if you are there this summer and you like beer, give it a try.

IMG_0817-1

Past and discography

Eskobar has released 5 albums so far. You can buy most of them online on CDON but also Bengans or Ginza.

2000 – ‘Till We Are Dead

2001 – There’s Only Now

2004 – A Thousand Last Chances

2006 – Eskobar

2008 – Death In Athens

If you want to get more of their discography – Eskobar has released about 20+ singles… try your luck in second-hand stores or check Amazon out.
And in our interview from May you can read about how they started and their career so far.

Videos and rare stuff

Eskobar also has a YouTube channel with videos to their singles as well as unreleased songs and demos from “The Complete B-side collection 1999-2006”.

And of course, if you search by Eskobar, you will find videos of performances and concerts. Here is a selection of videos you may want to check out:

Starlight, from the upcoming album

Performance and interview from 2008

“Someone new” featuring Eva Dahlgren

Once again, thank you for your music and wonderful performances!

Roxette XXX Tour – Halmstad, Sweden (Örjans Vall) – July 22 – #55

September 1, 2015July 23, 2015 by Patrícia Peres

Last time Roxette played in Halmstad was 5 years ago, so it was high time for them to do their 6th Halmstad Rox show of all time. Many international Roxers thought they would love to see the band playing in their hometown, so some bought a ticket for only this show in Sweden, others are there at more Swedish shows, but definitely didn’t give the Halmstad gig a miss. There were fans from the US, Argentina, Russia, Spain, the UK, Poland, Finland, Germany, Hungary, Switzerland, Austria, Greece and probably more.

The waiting in front of the venue started in the morning and local people were smiling at us during the day, taking pictures of us, posting it on Facebook and wished us a great evening. Lovely! Even the police guys driving by every now and then showed thumbs up for us from their car. SVT, Hallandsposten and P4 Radio were also there with us. They did some interviews with the fans and shot some cuts. (See links in the Articles and photos section.)

This time there were approximately 100 early entrance ticket owners, but only a bit more than half of them showed up by the time the entrance started. There were also fans who didn’t respect those who were waiting there all day and wanted to do the trick at the inlet. Fortunately, Show Security Sweden was there again to support us and Atli (head of the security team) made it clear how the entrance should work and those who wanted to cheat faced a very correct and fair security supervisor. He got applauded by us for his fairness. The whole security team was very polite and helpful this time, too. Thanks a lot again, Show Security Sweden for assisting us! You rule!

Once we were inside, we found our spots in the front rows and couldn’t wait for the show to start. God was good all day and night and there was no rain at all, but sunshine.

Tonight there were 2 support acts. Besides Eskobar it was Mariette who got on stage first. Her performance started at 19:30. We wished for a far much better crowd in Halmstad than the Kalmar gang and already during the support act performances one could see the audience would be more active than the usually reserved Swedish crowds. Mariette and her band did a great job, the Swedes loved them and yes, I think the international fans liked them, too.

Eskobar hit the stage after Mariette. They communicated even more with the audience than in Kalmar and there were more crowd reactions to their songs than in the previous Swedish city. They enjoyed being on stage and playing for us to the full. Daniel even thanked for the cheering to the ”international guests” before performing Freedom. For Someone New they called Mariette back to the stage and performed the song as a duet. It sounded marvellous!

roxette_in_halmstad_01 — Pic by Patrícia Peres

After setting up the stage and instruments for Roxette, those almost 15000 people in the audience couldn’t wait anymore to hear the first tunes of Sleeping In My Car and have much fun during the next almost 2 hours. When Roxette came up on stage you just saw on both Marie’s and Per’s face that it was going to be a fantastic show. Being on home turf, enjoying their home crowd was all written on their faces. The band was in great mood and in top top top shape. Everyone was really on a high. Marie was shining like a real star! She was the pearl and the audience painted their love all over her world. You could feel everyone was grateful to see her on stage and cheered her during the whole concert. Per was very much into being on stage tonight. His presence was incredibly strong with all the Gessle moves and his way of performing. Both him and Marie acted a lot with the crowd, having eye contact with the fans in the front and animating them during the sing along parts which turned out to be very loud tonight. The band was also very active. Christoffer was running around like hell with his guitar, having his cool ”fights” with Per, getting kicked in the ass by Per again. There was now a new funny moment, when Per touched Christoffer’s hat while starting with Crash! Boom! Bang! Magnus was having his Baladas en español moments while charming us with his bass playing. Dea was animating the audience very enthusiastically and she was supporting Marie the lovely way she always does. Regarding Pelle and Clarence, who are always in the background, I just want to mention that without their amazing drum and fabulous keyboard playing this band is just nothing. They enjoyed being there on Örjans Vall’s stage very much.

One of the highlights of the night was It Must Have Been Love with the ’80s band intro from Per, remembering the funny hairdos and shoulder pads from those years, as well as the fantastic bands like Roxette, Milli Vanilli and Modern Talking. Another highlight was Watercolours In The Rain / Paint. Marie and Dea together can only mean a perfect duet!

roxette_in_halmstad_02 — Pic by Patrícia Peres

All the international fans brought their balloons, so there were many and people in the crowd loved playing with them during Joyride. After the song the band went off the stage and the only strange thing during the whole show to me was when there were those appr. 5 minutes while they were away. It felt like the audience wasn’t sure they would come back and wasn’t sure they should be cheering. We in the front were very loud, as usual, but it took some time until the rest of the crowd joined in shouting ”en gång till” or screaming. Fortunately, the band heard it quite well, so they got back to us and oh what a Listen To Your Heart performance it was as the first extra song! How Marie ended it was out of this world!

The uptempo songs, mainly How Do You Do!, She’s Got Nothing On (But The Radio), Dressed For Success and Dangerous got the audience dance and clap along during the whole songs while singing along loud and The Look at the end left the crowd wanting more. When Per said goodbye at the end of the show, he shouted in the mic in Swedish: ”See you soon again! We are very sure about it!”

Marie got 2 heaters on stage and this time it was again BoJo himself who tested if they worked well. In the end only one of them was working during the whole show. But the weather was really nice and rather warm, so we hope that 1 functioning heater was really enough for Marie.

Many in the crowd expected Gyllene Tider to appear on stage as a surprise, but those who are following Roxette and the related artists closely knew that Micke Syd had to be on stage with his Syd & Ekman project at another place, so it was predictable the fab five won’t be seen together in Halmstad tonight. BUT! We weren’t left without a GT tune! Christoffer played ”När vi två blir en” as the local intro to Joyride and it got a fab crowd reaction. We all loved it!

Per after the show:

HALMSTAD UPDATE: Yea! Very nice show at Örjans Vall. Very nice indeed. This place is so cool, just by the water, and tonight our home crowd was in terrific shape. Around 15000 joined the joyride and made a lot of beautiful noise! Vids tomorrow! Cheers, P.

Next stop is Gothenburg on 24th July.

Articles and photos

Hallandsposten:

SVT during the waiting time
SVT concert cuts

Videos

Sleeping In My Car / The Big L.
Spending My Time / Crash! Boom! Bang!
Crush On You
The Look

Setlist

roxette_in_halmstad_03 — Halmstad setlist – Pic by Patrícia Peres

Extra
Listen To Your Heart
The Look

Is it time for a Roxette musical?

July 22, 2015 by Patrícia Peres

Hallandsposten (Jan-Owe Wikström) did an interview with Per in relation to the Roxette concert in Halmstad tomorrow. It’s going to be the 6th time they play in Halmstad. After 1988, 1989, 1991, 1994 and 2010 tomorrow it’s time for them to play again in the band’s hometown. It will be their first time at Örjans vall though.

According to the interview, the tour will continue in 2016, however, nothing is planned after the September concert (company gig) in Warsaw. Per says since they turn 30 next year, the tour should last until then and they haven’t played South Africa, Asia, North America and South America yet on this tour. At the same time it is Marie’s health they are depending on, how much she can do.

Screenshot is from the making of video of The Look 2015 remake

Regarding the tour Per mentions it’s quite typical nowadays that as no artist can earn money on album sales, they go on tour. When Roxette played in Madrid, there were posters from Katy Perry via Mark Knopfler till the Foo Fighters. Since there is this big competition, he says it’s fantastic that they still have sold out shows and can sell 8000-18000 tickets per concert. In Halmstad there will be approximately 15000 people in the audience. The plan for the 5 concerts in Sweden was to sell 50000 tickets altogether and it seems it will work.

Per tells Jan-Owe the tour is one of the reasons why the new album is delayed. The other reason is the EMI – Warner merger. There are too many new people and Per wants to work with people he likes and who respect their history and the new songs. 5 songs off the new album are ready and as Per says, it is 65-70% of the total album. This would mean the album has 8 songs? Hm.

With Addeboy vs. Cliff, who mixed the 2015 remake of The Look, Per wrote some songs together. He says to Hallandsposten that it’s hard to find people who are talented in what he is not too good at, ie. programming.

There are still unknown collaborations on the new album, but Per told Hallandsposten he and Mats MP Persson wrote some songs together now for the first time since long and they might turn up on the new album. Mr. G says he would never be able to write “Fading Like A Flower” today, simply because he has moved on as a songwriter.

Regarding the changes in music consumption Per says nowadays it’s less important to people who wrote the songs or who plays the drums. Today’s pop music reflects the society today, so most of it is made on laptops where everything can be fixed in the end.

This time he says again that social media is a unique way to get close to the fans.

Jan-Owe Wikström asked Per what is left to do after that he has done almost everything with Roxette, Gyllene Tider, his solo projects and soundtrack. Maybe a musical? Per can imagine that there could be a musical built on Roxette’s, Gyllene Tider’s hits or his solo songs just like ABBA’s “Mamma Mia” and the Queen musical, but only if the right way is found. Something new. Maybe with Jonas Åkerlund as a director.

From the Hallandsposten interview it turns out that Per is still writing his diaries after each show, so it’s not only the Facebook posts he writes about them. And they film a lot. Probably, a lot more than what we get to see after each gig on Facebook.

Roxette XXX Tour – Kalmar, Sweden (Fredriksskans) – July 18 – #54

September 5, 2015July 19, 2015 by Patrícia Peres

The Swedish tour leg with 5 shows started tonight in Kalmar, where Roxette had never played before. Many posters welcomed us in town everywhere we walked, either the poster of the Kalmar show or the one with all the Swedish dates on it. All 5 concerts are open air gigs, so we prayed for good weather for the start. It worked so-so, because during the waiting time we had some heavy summer showers, but all in all the temperature was fine and the sun came out to shine on us in the afternoon.

You know you are in Sweden when the first thing organized at the entrance is the toilet. Haha. It may sound stupid, but no other country can tell they have a security team thinking about those who are waiting all day in front of the venue. And you know you are in Sweden when Show Security Sweden is in charge, with good old Atli as the head of the team. They are really the world’s best security team! Helpful, patient and kind all the time. Not only the supervisors, but the whole bunch of people they are working together with at the venues. Thanks for all your support, guys!

Swedish shows got a bit different vs. earlier years because of Live Nation’s Early Entrance ticket policy. Actually, today there were approximately 30 people showing up with an early entrance ticket, but most of them just wanted to have a calm walk inside and find a place at the bar, on the grass or at the very side of the venue, more in the middle, not in the front. They first had to register, appr. 1 hour before the inlet and they got their merch stuff which was a tour programme signed by Marie and Per and a Roxette XXX tour bag. Then they were let in 15 minutes before all those with normal tickets. Even if there were hundreds of people waiting for getting let in, everything was calm and no one was really nervous about the entrance. It feels good when after all the inlet mess in other countries you get to experience this.

Eskobar hit the stage a bit later than 19:30 and it was very nice to hear them in their homeland. For me the best they were in Vienna so far, but their tonight’s show comes very close after that. You could feel they were comfortable playing at home, however Daniel, the singer of the band enjoyed the German-speaking countries so much that he used the expression ”ein bisschen” several times.

After they went off the stage, the crew was setting it up for Roxette. While looking around and checking the seats where guests had their places, we spotted Crown Princess Victoria with her husband Daniel and Prince Carl Philip with his wife Sofia, who are on holiday in Öland now. They were sitting in the last row, which was at the highest place. They disappeared for some minutes during the break and as you could see on Eskobar’s Facebook page, they visited them in background. Victoria is a Roxer, so surely, they met Roxette backstage, too.

It’s summer, but Swedish summers are unpredictable, so it was a good option to install a heater for Marie on the stage. BoJo tested it himself to see it was working properly. After all guitars and other instruments were tested, the mics were set to the proper height and Åsa set the iPhone to video mode, it was time for Roxette to come up stage. One of the characteristics of Swedish summer is that the sun goes down quite late, so it was still daylight when they started the show. The intro didn’t have the same adrenalin kick effect on the crowd this way, but still it was very energetic how the band hit the stage.

Being at home, both Marie and Per talked in Swedish. The talks in between the songs were more or less the same as the English version, but one huge difference was that Marie talked much more than usual. She felt very comfortable and it was easy for her to talk. We all loved it so much!

The crowd did well on the sing along parts, but it wasn’t the most enthusiastic audience of all. There were however Roxers from several countries (Argentina, Chile, Brazil, Spain, Poland, Finland, Germany, Hungary, Switzerland, Austria, Denmark, Greece, etc.) who made more noise and moves. I tend to believe Swedish crowds are really this reserved most of the time. Or maybe tonight it was because they thought the royal family members were watching them and taking notes of who behaves how. By the way, they showed how to party, during The Look. HERE you can watch Svenska Nyheter’s video about it.

Crush On You was very cool this time again, however, the effect of stopping after ”no Elvis in the leather / I want you now or never” was a bit strange with the sun still being up on the sky. Nevertheless, the crowd reaction sounded the same as in any other country where it was complete darkness at this point.

During The Heart Shaped Sea, in the era of smartphones with flashlight app, someone lit a real sparkler, but as it’s quite dangerous in the middle of the audience, Atli had to take it away.

After THSS Marie and Dea were preparing for Watercolours In The Rain / Paint and Marie started talking. That was the funniest of all. HERE you can watch it in a video. She said (in Swedish):

Now we’re going to play a really really old song. It means so much to me. Micke… ah … no, he’s my husband… it was a little mistake, but Per wrote the lyrics and I wrote the music and I’m so proud of it.

One must love her! It was such a cute little mistake!

I must mention Marie’s talking during another song, too. During Dressed For Success, when it comes to the crowd clapping choreography, she usually shouts into the mic: ”C’mon and clap your hands, everybody!” When she got to this point tonight, she wanted to shout it again in English, but before she did that, she realized she was in Sweden and shouldn’t talk in English, so she just started laughing instead. Then she made the crowd clap along.

After the balloon song, Roxette went off the stage and the audience didn’t want to stop shouting ”En gång till! En gång till!” to have them back on stage. They didn’t let us wait for long and came back with the usual 2 extra songs.

It was a nice first gig in Sweden during the XXX tour with 14612 people in the crowd. Hopefully, the next 4 shows will get the crowd into party mood and it won’t be ”only” the band on fire.

Per’s badabam after the show:

KALMAR UPDATE: Oh yea, the Swedish tour has finally started. Almost 15000 showed up tonite at Fredriksskans and sang along. And no rain in sight. Thank you!!! The band was sooo tight, have to love that!!!! Badabam from P.

Next stop should be Borgholm tomorrow (and for many of us Roxers it will be a sightseeing stop at least), but the next gig is in Halmstad on 22nd July. Can’t wait!

Articles and photos

Göteborgs-Posten
24kalmar.se video report from the queueing
24kalmar.se during the concert
24kalmar.se about the concert
barometern.se about the stage
Expressen
TV4
svenskdam.se
vaxjonytt.se review, photos
FotoRoddan blog article; FB album of photos

Videos

Roxette hitting the stage
It Must Have Been Love
Royal crowd members having fun
Most boring audience ever?

Setlist

Roxette_in_Kalmar — Pic by Patrícia Peres

Extra
Listen To Your Heart
The Look