Hi all,
just got home from the concert and I wanted to share some information with you about the gig.
The concert took place in the "Kleine Arena" of the "Tempopdrom" - a nice intimate room with a max. capacity of 350. I was quite astonished that only about 80 people came and even this little arena looked fairly empty. They played songs from John's new album "Streets of Heaven" (which is indeed really good imho) and a few classics ("So Far Away", "Two Young Lovers", "Sultans Of Swing", "Walk Of Life" and "Money For Nothing").
The guys seemed to have fun on stage and John is a very underrated guitar player, Chris White not only performed well but also looked very fit and cheerful (he was very attentive as well: he turned up John's amp and noticed that John had forgotten to plug his guitar - a bit embarassing for John
) There were some small mistakes as Polly Wood obvoiusly is no guitar player in the first place and the whole band needed some time to warm up (in contrast to the audience which seemed to be fast asleep
)
The sound was terrible - a shame for such a small and usually good sounding room - and the sound guy didn't seem to do anything about it. The band gestured from time to time and even the roadie had to go to the sound man to tell him what they wanted him to change. A few songs before the end the sound got better finally.
I'm still not quite sure if I liked it or not. It sure feels nice to hear some songs not being played by Mark for many years ("Two Young Lovers"!) and it's great to see at least two former members of a band I'd never had the chance to see live on stage. BUT: to me it feels a bit strange to hear these old hits sung and played by this band. Any DS tribute band could do better. I think John should have focussed on his solo work - he didn't get much attention from the audience anyway (some of them even didn't seem to recognise SOS and WOL
)
Cheers,
Tobi
