It's Only Rock'n Roll
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It's Only Rock'n Roll |
At 9.40 p.m. the great moment had come. Keith Richards made the first riffs on Satisfaction and the audience went wild. What a great start. As a surprise for me the Stones continued with It�s Only Rock�n�Roll as second song (omitting Let�s Spend The Night Together). Wow! Two songs normally saved for the final part of their concerts. Then came Flip The Switch from Bridges To Babylon. The song fitted very well between It�s Only Rock�n�Roll and song no 4, which was Gimmie Shelter. Lisa Fischer has been credited with much praise in previus reviews here in IORR and I must fully agree. What a fine version of Gimmie Shelter.
The first half of the concert included 5 songs from Bridges To Babylon and I believe they fitted very well. Better than the new songs did in the Voodoo Lounge Tour back in 1995. Song no 5 was Anybody Seen My Baby followed by Paint It Black, which had been the webbchoise for many concerts in a row some weeks ago. It looks as it now will be put in the setlist permanently. A somewhat different version, than on the 1990 tour of Europe. Much more guitar. But I must say I liked the 1990 version as much. Then they played Saint Of Me and a very fine version of Out Of Control. The cameramen on the stage made fine footage, seen on the enormous screen above the stage. It matched the song perfectly. Song no 9 was the webchoise. My wote went to Star Star, but when we drove to Gothenburg in the morning, the song was second to Time Is On My Side. But when Mick Jagger presented the results Starfucker, as he said, had won by a small margin. It seemed to me that the guys had been longing for this song because they made a very strong version. Then came Miss You, the bands favourite song, in recent years, for singalong with the audience. A good performance with a lot of improvisation from the band and singing from the audience. Great!
The band and backing musicians were presented by Mick Jagger and Charlie Watts got the biggest applauces as usual. Now it was time for Keith Richards on vocals. His first choise was Thief In The Night, from Bridges To Babylon, not the best song on the album, but he made a very good version this night. His vocals were backed up formidable by the backup- singers Lisa Fischer, Bernard Fowler, Blondie Chaplin and Ronnie Woods 20 years old daughter Leah. Leah made a good singing, in a wonderful white dress, and it was nice to see how proud Ronnie was. Keiths next song was Wanna Hold You. A somewhat average performance.
The next three songs were performed in the middle of the stadium, at the center stage. Via a bridge the Stones reached the stage, which was small and intimate. There they played a fantastic coverversion of Chuck Berry�s Little Queenie (probably much better than Chuck himself did in Gothenburg the night before with pals Little Richard and Jerry Lee Lewis). Then came You Got Me Rockin�, from Voodoo Lounge, and their hit from the 1995 tour, Like A Rolling Stone, a Bob Dylan cover. Great versions both.
Back on the big stage they started the crescendo with six immortal songs; Sympathy For The Devil, Tumbling Dice, Honky Tonk Women, Start Me Up, Jumping Jack Flash and as encore Brown Sugar. Fantastic! This can�t be beaten by anyone, only be repeated by the Stones themselves. As so many others who have reviewed the tour I had very much wanted that they had performed You Can�t Always Get What You Want, but you just can�t always get what you want.
But we did get very much this night in Gothenburg (My wife did get a plectrum from Keith; so now she has one from Keith and one from John Fogerty!). Thank you Rolling Stones and welcome back in a few years. See you!
Start time: 21:40 End time : 24:00
The set list:
We arrived at the arena some two hours before the gates were to be open. Promptly at 5PM the gates were opened and we rushed in. I had my camera hidden in my pants and I was very nervous about it. I had to ajust it few times. I went thru first search I went thru second search, yes I made it!!!It�s very hard to run with camera in your pants! Anyway, we got close to the stage (about 4-5 meters)standing next to the catwalk on Keiths side.
At 8 PM "Seahorses" begun their 50min. set. Not worth mentioning. At 9 Pm it started raining, luckily it stoped after 20min. 9.45 lights out, it�s time ot rock! Huge roar sweeps across the sell-out stadium, we are about to enter a new dimansion. Keith is right there in front of me and as he hits first riff of "Satisfaction" we are on!!!
Huge show from the very first minute. We are dancing, singing, jumping up and down haaving a time of our lifes. First suprise came already after 1st song, "IORR" in stead of of "LSTNT". Mick is working the crowd, Keith chooses to stay back and play for Charlie. Lisa was great on "Gimme Shelter" dressed in long black tight dress she looked very very sexy tonight. Swedish crowd is the best, the arena in boiling, comming apart of all that rocking, 57000 people in huge sing along with the greatest band in the world. This was "one of those night" a perfect chemistry between the band and crowd.
Mick speaking swedish "Ni �r fanstastiska" (You are fantastic), he is having a good time he enjoys playing in Sweden. "Den h�r �r ny l�t" (this is a new song) says Mick before "ASMB". We got "Paint it black" too "Out of Control" and "Saint of me" were great as always and got great response from the crowd.
During the introductions Mick introduced Ronnie as "Den vilde och tokige" (the wild and crazy), Keith forgot to introduce Mick before he did his "Thief in the night", the only lowpoint of the evening. "Wanna hold you" was much better. "Star star" was the webchoice great version oce again. "Like a rolling stones" was one of the best songs that night with the band on the center stage stadium fell in extasy, woman next to me cried, what a great song.
During "Start me up" Ronnie was freezing so Mick got him a jacket. The rest of the set was just amazing, creme de la creme. Tonight the time in on our side. Keith messed up the intro of "Honky tong woman" and coverd his eyes in shame, but he made up to us with extra long intro. The arena exploded with "Jumpin�Jack Flash" and "Brown Sugar". Extending them to the maximum they wanted to give us more and more.
After 2.20 hours the final bow, it�s over, way too soon. Leaving the stadium I could see happy faces everywhere, this was a night I�ll never forget. For a little while we were on another planet, planet of rock with The Rolling Stones as it�s undisputed rulers. I took some great shots with my amateur camera, you can view them on: my web pages!
Tonight we got Satisfaction and so much more!!!:-))) Wooohoooo!!!
Just before Stones should go on stage we could see some very black clouds coming and then it started to rain a bit, but luckily enough it stopped after a little while. Then the show was on!! The sound was not very good on the first songs but it got much better further on and after a while it was almost perfect. I had hoped for "Memory motel" or " Starfucker " for the webchoice and and it was the latter that won. Mick introduced Ron in swedish as "Ron, den vilda och tokiga" wich means "Ron, the the wild and crazy". On "Miss you" Mick was sucking on one of Lisa's toes and the both of them seemed to enjoy it. I had heard so much about Leah Wood and now I at last got to see her when keith did "Like a thief in the night" and sure it's a nice girl.
Then it was time for the three songs on the b-stage and my highlight of the concert. I was hanging over the fence had just 1,5 meters to the stageborder and I also had my little compactcamera with me. I have hardly any memory of "Little Queenie" because i was so thrilled of the moment to have the guys so close. At one moment when I screamed to Ronnie and reached out my arm towards him to make him grab my hand, he looked just into my eyes and in that very moment I shot a picture of him with my little camera. And I can tell you that I got an extremely good picture of him among several other good pictures from these three songs on the b-stage.
"You got me rocking" is not one of my favourites but tonight it was a thrill. "Like a rolling stone" was amazing as always. It was quite odd to see Mick standing a couple of meters from you changing clothes before "S.F.T.D".
The rest of the show was just magic even if the show died a bit for me when they got off the small stage. "Jumpin Jack Flash" was better then I ever heard it before, just fantastic!!!!!!!!
It was a great evening, one of the greatest.....ever!!!!!!!! The morning after when I was taking a shower some of the confetti fell out of my underwears as a memory!
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It's Only Rock'n Roll 1998 -
© The Rolling Stones Fan Club Of Europe |