The Rolling Stones Fan Club of Europe It's Only Rock'n Roll

The set list

1. Street Fighting Man
2. Start Me Up
3. If You Can't Rock Me
4. Don't Stop
5. Wild Horses (with Andrea Corr)
6. You Can't Always Get What You Want
7. It's Only Rock'n Roll
8. Everybody Needs Somebody To Love
9. Tumbling Dice
   --- Introductions
   --- It's A Long Way To Tipperary (Keith + crowd singalong)
10. Slipping Away (Keith)
11. Happy (Keith)
12. Sympathy For The Devil
13. Can't You Hear Me Knocking
14. You Got Me Rocking
15. Paint It Black
16. Honky Tonk Women
17. Brown Sugar
18. Satisfaction
19. Jumping Jack Flash (encore)

 
The Cooper Temple Clause (warmup) : 8:10pm -  8:50pm   
The Rolling Stones                : 9:35pm - 11:30pm

Review by Gillian Cody

Review by Brendan Mc Ardle

• First thing first, brillant concert.
• I think that the warmup band were called "Cooper Temple Clause". They sounded like Oasis on acid, but full of energy and I think the crowd liked them.
• When the Stones came on stage they received a very warm Irish welcomed.
• Every song sounded better than the last. From the opening chords of Street Fighting Man to the closing bars of Jumpin Jack Flash, the Stones give 110%.
• With 75% of the songs played on the night from the 40 Licks album everyone song their lungs out from the hard core fans to those who were there for the experience.
• A couple of rare (Irish) treats were bestowed to us, a beautiful duet with Mick and Andrea Corr (from the popular Irish band the Corrs) on "Wild Horses", a lively version of "Everybody Needs Somebody To Love" (a song that was made famous in Ireland 13 years ago when it appeared in a Cult Irish film called The Commitments), and a singalong with Keith and the rest of the Point Depo on "It's A Long Way To Tipperary " sent the crowd mad.
• The high light of the night for me was when Keith sang "Slipping Away". A truly beautiful song thru which Keith sang from the heart.
• Everybody on stage enjoyed themselves through the quality performance that they gave and from reaction of the audience

Anyway, I'd better get back to work. Roll on Thursday night.

Review by Ingrid Rijntjes

I'll definitely return to Ireland one time, last thing I wanted was to get back to Holland this morning! We were with a hugh group of Dutch (our reviews on our Dirty Work mailinglist are all called 'Dublin Colours Orange'), added with a couple of Englishmen later on (hi again!)

After we made a roundtrip through Dublin by bus and saw a lot of the Guinness breweries, added with a couple of parks, musea, cathedrals, statues and bridges, and even a roof terrace at some point where U2 seemed to have been playing on. The names of St. Patrick, James Joyce, Bernard Shaw, Thomas Moore and Oscar Wilde were mentioned a lot as being the glorious heroes of a rich Irish history.

How many pubs we've been sitting in I can't recall anymore, but sure it was great fun. One with live music and yes, I have heard Dirty Old Town (or whatever this song is called) played live.

Ok, the purpose of all was The Stones concert of course, so around 17:30 we all went towards The Point which was situated in a harbour area. An old dock warehouse rebuilt as theatre. The doors were open already and we could just walk in and ended up at 10th, 15th row, Keith's side, which was a perfect spot. Somebody told me 'as long as you can see Charlie, you're doing just fine' and so we were.

Small venue, small stage, around 7,000 men, it all seemed promising enough for a perfect show. Nice Irish people everywhere. Although people tell me a lot of Irish went pushing along their way towards the stage, I had no trouble whatsoever thanks to a bunch of strongshouldered men behind me. So: nice Irish people.

The warm-up band was bloody awful, i don't even know who they were and don't want to know either. Horrible noise, I could see a lot of people holding their hands on their ears in order to protect them. Terrible.

And then, around 21:30, lights out. Heartbeats. Shakin' legs. And there they are, playing Street Fighting Man. Sleepy London Town is far away, and Dublin was far from sleepy! Whow. Here they are again, and the power splashes off. What a band. Oh God, what a band.

Start Me Up, If You Can't Rock Me, Don't Stop. All standards, but nevertheless all wonderful. Surprising to me was they all seemed to be enjoying themselves tonight, they really were into it, and even Mick and Keith were having a couple of interactions which I haven't seen so far this tour.

Wild Horses... and all of a sudden there's Andrea Corr singing along with Mick. Nice, I mean to witness a guest appearance on stage, but I'd rather seen her sister-with-violin doing this song. Would have been so much nicer. Somebody told me later that the sisters (en maybe brother too) Corr were spotted in the audience.

Do You Want To Sing Along? asks Mick, and of course the Irish want to. And they are! You Can't Always Get What You Want, followed by It's Only Rock 'n Roll. People around me are immensely enjoying themselves, I turn around and look at all the Dutch with whom I'm here and I see exact the same thing. All wonderful, happy faces.

Mick's coming up with coat, head and sunglasses. Oh God no, I think. No Love Train, please. Happily it's Everybody Needs Somebody To Love (1st time for me) and from this moment on I know this is goin' to be a Special Show. I increase my level of attention from 400% to 700%, but I am mistaken as would be proven later on.

Tumbling Dice. Ok, for a minute then. But after this, the Special part is to come!

Introductions, the horns in general but most of all Bobby gets applause from Keith (maybe I missed things, but I saw this for the first time), and then....

Keith. Man of Men. He's standing at the microphone, guitar around his neck, I pray in a second for Nearness, and what do I hear? Ahhhhh! More beautiful than beauty can ever get: Keith sings It's A Long Way To Tipperary, and all 7,000 in The Point go wild. Completely! Including me, including the Irish, the Dutch, everybody, and the roof is blown off. Keith likes it more than anybody, he's shining light. Charlie joins in with a marching beat and it is wonderful. WONDERFUL! It only lasts a minute, but it was magic. At this moment I love Ireland, the Irish, (not to mention Keith) more than anything in the world.

Slipping Away, Happy..., ouch.... missing the clue at start. We'll do that again, says Keith. Man, who cares, everything is alright as long as you're singing. I sent the thought 'this is the 3rd time within a month that I'm hearing this' back to eternity and make room for the thought 'Keith, boy, I don't give a damn. I adore you anyhow. Even without Nearness. As far as I'm concerned you'll sing Christmas songs, as long as you're the one who's singing them. And even if you're just standing there, even if you don't open your mouth at all, it's fine with me. You can do anything. I'll love you just the same, whatever you do.

Sympathy, without fireworks cause The Point is too small a venue. Only on screen is a burning flame reflected. Nice to see were Lisa and Bernard up front, on either side of Mick, taking care of the whoo-whoo's.

Can't You Hear Me Kncking... YesYesYes! It's goin' to happen! No b-stage, just a small piece of stagefloor coming out in the middle. First Mick of course, then Bobby, then again Mick on harmonica, then Ronnie. Fantastic. Bobby got a overwhelming applause when his solo was done, Mick was a little low down en tried again to encourage the audience with his free hand, Ronnie who was really, really great during his solo, crawling like a tiger, pointing his guitar towards us like a rifle. Oh yeah, sure, phenomenal! Really super. Really Stones. From start to finish.

You Got Me Rocking, Hey, Hey, the Irish know it too. From the first time on. Right arm in the air, throwing imaginary fistsfull of air on stage. Paint It Black, nothing against this song, and it was beautifully played as well, but .... SHIT!!! Again, no Rambler for me. I always choose wrong, it seems. They only play Rambler while I'm not there. Wanna bet they play it the other night?

Honky Tonk Women, with a terrific Lisa, sensational. Very sexy, very attractive (first Darryl, then Mick). Her hair tight in ponytail this time, her legs very prominently close-up on screen, high Tina Turner level, tiger out of the cage for a minute, superb! Out of pure greatfulness she got a lick from Mick on the mouth and a discrete little kiss on the forehead afterwards.

Brown Sugar, Satisfaction, Jumpin' Jack Flash. Yeah, yeah, as if we didn't know. Fantastic, nevertheless. Each song, the whole show through, from beginning to the very end, ABSOLUTELY MAGIC!!! And am I glad I was there. A wonderful show, and I have been completely flying way up in the air like an idiot.

But...! Because of the fact that I had missed Vredenburg, and Dublin had to be the making-up for that, and because I had hoped so desperately for a) No Expectations, or b) That's How Strong My Love Is, or c) Nearness Of You.... still a tiny little disappointment. Perfect Stones, perfect show, but considering the setlist: pfffffffff, too bad. In the Kuip 11/8 and Arena 19/8 I had 95% of what I got in Dublin, except for Everybody Needs Somebody To Love.

But no doubt about it, I'm still flying. I had a magnificent 3-day tour to Ireland, and what I saw was fantastic. Dublin was great, it was gold. One of the Dutch friends got a plectrum from Keith and I had a little interaction with Keith myself. If you don't believe me, alright. But he'll know, if you're asking him. And I'm dreaming on for a couple of days.... Zzzzz

Review by Sebastian Fedler

The Stones came on stage with Street fighting man, Start me up, If you can`t rock me and Don`t Stop. When they played Wild Horses a beautiful woman went on stage: Andrea Corr. The duet with Mick was outstanding, I think. A better choice than Dave Matthews at the last tour. You can`t always get what you want was the crowd pleaser. The hole Point Theatre was singing. Everybody needs somebody to love was played a little bit slower like I heard it at the Circus Krone, but very great.

After the Introductions Keith started to sing an irish song. The hole audience was singing. After Keith`s Solo part they played Sympathy for the Devil. While playing the song Mick and Keith stood on the small platform only 1,5 meters away from me. Great! At Can`t you hear me knocking Ronnie celebrates his Guitar Solo much longer and better, than I heard it at other shows. When Mick did his Harp Solo on the small platform, he touched my hand. The greatest moment of my life. Paint it Black was played with more energy and power like I heard it at the last tours. Keith played the first riffs of Jumping Jack Flash a little bit slower.

In closing I`ve seen one of the greatest concerts of my life. This Band has so much energy and power that this tour couldn`t be the end of the road. Hope they will come back in the next few years.

News links

• Jagger swaggers as Stones turn back the years by Irish Examiner
• Stones are rock of ages by Belfast Telegraph
• Concert photos by MCD.ie

Thanks to Joelle Bonnet and Olof Ekelundh for news links!

This page will change over the next few days, as you and other fans send reviews, set lists and reports. Please send your e-mail to IORR. Thanks! For details and great photos from the Rolling Stones and their World Tour get the IORR magazines.

It's Only Rock'n Roll 2003 -
© The Rolling Stones Fan Club Of Europe