Last night the Golden Guys tried to top their Halmstad premiere with another Halmstad gig and my Gosh… they succeeded! If Halmstad 1 was amazing, Halmstad 2 was pure awesomeness! Premiere concerts tend to be fantastic, but there is the tension of that being the first show and then for the second gig, the tension is gone, they are all more relaxed and this makes the show even more enjoyable on and off stage.
As far as I know, Halmstad 2 wasn’t sold out, but it did feel that there were more people in the crowd than at the first gig, which was announced as sold-out. The Saturday crowd was even more active than the Friday audience. Loud sing-alongs all through!
Regarding the setlist, in a small group we were discussing if there would be any changes for the 2nd Halmstad show, since a tiny part of the crowd was the same as for the 1st show. Our guess was that the guys would change Chrissie, hur mår du? to Vandrar i ett sommarregn. We should play the lottery. Haha.
Support act Uno Svenningsson started his session at 8 pm. It was a great half an hour!
The GT show started with the cartoon on the LED wall, again at 21:15. This time we had the chance to watch it from beginning to start. Better this way. It’s a cool little cartoon!
As mentioned above, there was only one change in the setlist, so Gyllene Tider igen stayed as the show opener. They rocked it and the audience loved it!
This time Per left that white Hux Flux jacket behind, he appeared in the black Hux Flux outfit. Göran changed shirt vs. the premiere and Micke Syd also had a different T-shirt on and a denim jacket.
PG said hi to the audience and welcomed us at GT’s 8th summer tour and their 5th comeback tour. He asked if we had a good day, maybe at the beach. PG said they had a fantastic premiere the day before, but they try to top it. They opened the big jukebox with a lot of hits everyone knows.
Juni, juli, augusti was the first real sing-along song and the clapping along stayed for Det hjärta som brinner as well.
Per said they wanted to play a tribute to their favourite Dutch band. When they grew up, all music came from the US and England, but they managed to find a Dutch band they liked. Focus was not their cup of tea. For Ekseption Per showed thumbs down, but he said Anders liked them. Anders said they were damn good. Micke Syd joined in „two against one, we won”. Per: „says the one who came up with the George Baker Selection”. Micke Syd started playing and singing „una paloma blanca”. The crowd was clapping along. Then PG said there is another band they all liked and it’s Shocking Blue. He asked if the crowd remembers them. The answer was a louder „no” from the audience. Haha. Per continued that they had a mega hit called Venus. MP started to play it. This wasn’t the song Mr. G meant though. He translated Send Me A Postcard and it became Skicka ett vykort, älskling.
Fortunately, Gammal kärlek rostar aldrig from the new album stayed in the set. Amazing song!
Before Flickorna på TV2 came, Per said there was a time before Internet and Netflix, when there were only two TV channels and that went very far for a 19-year-old from Furet.
The black & blue checkered guitar was brought to Per. He said he bought a 12-string Rickenbacker in the ’80s. George Harrison in The Beatles had one like that and Roger McGuinn in The Byrds and Tom Petty. A similar one that MP holds in his hands now. He wrote a song on that one and it’s Vandrar i ett sommarregn.
It was time for more uptempo songs again. Puls and En sten vid en sjö i en skog were next.
Per picked up his mug of ginger tea and said this is his secret brew. No one knows what it is, even he doesn’t know. It’s Micke who prepares it for him before the shows. Micke Syd said he calls it „the surprise of the evening”.
Before they played Flickan i en Cole Porter-sång, PG told the story that when he moved away from home, he ended up in a tenement on Torsgatan in the beginning of the ’80s. It was at the time when he started hanging out a lot with Marie. Here the audience was cheering for Marie for long seconds. Mr. G said he played this song to Marie and she thought it was terribly cheesy.
The ukulele is the world’s most interesting instrument, Per said before Tuffa tider. He added that it’s an instrument Micke Syd takes with himself into the bathtub to cheer up his family. That’s what he read in Hemmets Journal. While Micke Syd came to the front, he nodded and started singing When I’m Cleaning Windows [an ukulele song].
Then came the best band presentation. Each and every artist on stage got a long long long cheering from the audience. It was so lovely. Introducing MP, Per said he is Harplinge’s one and only real car mechanic. Göran is the youngest and Anders needs no introduction. Micke Syd enjoyed the cheering for him so much, he asked the audience to give it more and he thought most of them were from Harplinge. His parents were also there at the show. PG and Micke hi fived and Micke introduced Per as the guy who swam 2500 metres last night, because he promised he would if it was a good premiere. Micke Syd said Per also promised if he wears this colorful T-shirt he was wearing and plays nice, he can drive one of Per’s old Ferraris next week. Haha. PG just laughed.
Micke Syd said it’s a completely different world in the front of stage. He came forward to sing Min tjej och jag. He said he is lucky that the audience knows which song it is. He said the day before they had a bride and groom and he dedicated the song to them, but today it’s even better. He said he has been very blessed in his life. He had a fantastic first girlfriend, she is here and he has a fantastic wife, who is also here. So today he dedicates this song to them. He invited Dea and Malin-My to the front and started animating the crowd. Everyone was waving their hands in the air the way Micke showed them. Much fun it was! Impossible to top, Per said.
Kung av sand was the next song they played and then came Ljudet av ett annat hjärta, a song they released as a single to Parkliv!, the 1981 GT movie directed by Lasse Hallström. They got no Oscar for that, haha.
The uptempo session started with Ska vi älska, så ska vi älska till Buddy Holly and then came the medley of (Kom så ska vi) Leva livet / (Dansar inte lika bra som) Sjömän / Tylö Sun. Still a bit strange to call it a medley when almost the complete songs are played, but that’s the way it is. The transition into Sjömän is a bit dreamy, I first thought at the premiere gig that something went wrong with the sound, but suddenly realized Leva livet turned into another song. Haha.
The gang went off stage and just like at the premiere gig, the audience started singing Sommartider, clapping and screaming. The band came back and they played Billy. When the song ended, Micke Syd started playing Det är över nu without a break and Göran joined in immediately, but suddenly they realized it was too early, so they stopped. Haha. Per said this is how they do it in Halmstad. Micke said: in Harplinge. Everyone was laughing. Per asked the audience if they were ready for Det är över nu. Of course, we were!
Before they went off stage again, they played Gå & fiska!
Coming back for the second encore, Per asked the crowd if they wanted more. Yes! They played När vi två blir en and then came the Sommartider party.
Before playing the last song, Per thanked the audience for coming. He said he hopes everyone will have a fantastic summer. Here one of the mics got too close to the speaker, so we got a weird sound. Per’s reaction to that was fun. He also said if we read it anywhere that they said they quit, we shouldn’t believe it. The crowd was cheering.
När alla vännerna gått hem closed the concert with Micke Syd and Dea in the front.
I forgot to mention in my previous review that Per was of course throwing lots of guitar picks during the gig and Micke threw some drumsticks at the end of the show. Same thing happened at the second concert. Good luck with catching them at the upcoming shows!
Next stop is Helsingborg on Monday.
Setlist
1. Gyllene Tider igen
2. Juni, juli, augusti
3. Det hjärta som brinner
4. Skicka ett vykort, älskling
5. Gammal kärlek rostar aldrig
6. Flickorna på TV2
7. Vandrar i ett sommarregn
8. (Hon vill ha) Puls
9. En sten vid en sjö i en skog
10. Flickan i en Cole Porter-sång
11. Tuffa tider
Band presentation
12. Min tjej och jag
13. Kung av sand
14. Ljudet av ett annat hjärta
15. Ska vi älska, så ska vi älska till Buddy Holly
16. (Kom så ska vi) Leva livet / (Dansar inte lika bra som) Sjömän / Tylö Sun medley
Encore 1
17. Billy
18. Det är över nu
19. Gå & fiska!
Encore 2
20. När vi två blir en
21. Sommartider
22. När alla vännerna gått hem
All photos in the article by Patrícia Peres
PG after the show:
Thanx for yet another amazing evening in Halmstad!!! We’re blessed playing for crowds like you tonight!!!! Stay safe and sound everyone!
During the day, Lars Winnerbäck turned up in town, so we could sense there was a surprise guest appearance planned for the night. It became 100% sure when we heard Per and Lars rehearsing Småstadsprat and Honung och guld at the soundcheck in the afternoon (from 16:15). We were curious how they would rearrange the setlist if at all, now that Lars joined them for these 2 songs. These 2 songs they rehearsed for appr. 15 minutes and then came Min plats and a little Puls. Woohoo, so we were happy that the setlist might be longer, since Puls got back on it.
The SVT cameras for the show weren’t enough, Anders Roos was also there to take thousands of photos of this hometown show and of course, Åsa was also there filming a lot. This time she just couldn’t come to the front row, because the TV guys were moving there with the cameras too, so they would have bumped into each other. This way she was filming from the sides of the stage (and maybe from somewhere else in the crowd too? We will see when the vids are up on GessleHomeVids, YouTube).
Per’s concert kicked off some minutes after 21:00. To hear På promenad genom stan in Halmstad is a real pleasure, here it made even more sense to start the show with this song. It Must Have Been Love was a success and Helena got cheered loudly. Right after IMHBL came Småstadsprat, so there was the first change in the setlist. For the part which is sung by Lars Winnerbäck on the album, Lasse came up on stage and he was singing it. He got a loud applause from the crowd when he appeared. The song sounded beautiful. No other version sounds as wonderful as the one with the original duet, Per and Lars. What a delight! The crowd cheered the duo loudly during the song too and when they finished it as well and Mr. G told the audience it wasn’t bad. Per and Lasse hugged each other after the song ended. Then Per was talking about the rehearsals and that he tried to find songs which he didn’t play live before and he found there were 470 of such songs. He decided for a song off Gyllene Tider’s 1982 album, Puls. He said he knows Lars likes this song too and so they decided to sing it together. So they went on with Honung och guld. Lasse’s favourite album from GT is Puls and HOG is his favourite song off it. It sounded great in this duet version. After they ended the song, Per and Lasse hugged each other again and Lars went off stage. Per told the crowd it’s hard to top now. I have recorded the whole Lars Winnerbäck guest appearance in Halmstad (not the best quality video because of the smoke and lights, but still you might enjoy it). 😉 Watch it 
For the second encore, Andreas went real wild on the Sommartider drum intro. This caught the audience too. Was cool to watch it on the big screens too!