Last night I went to see Roger Waters' "The Wall" with my dad and it was the most epic concert I have ever been to (and I have been to many!).
My mother and I bought the tickets over a year ago already and we gave them to my dad for his birthday this year.
He's the biggest Pink Floyd fan I know and I remember, when I was a child he watched the "The Wall" movie with me and the open air live show in Berlin (on tv) and tried to explain the whole complex story to me, which of course at that time I couldn't understand, but ever since then I've loved the band as well.
I got the tickets in the Fanclub pre-sale and paid a fortune for them, but the amazing seats we had (7th row, slightly to the right) were worth all the money.
If we had sat just a couple of seats more to the left it would have been even more perfect, but to be honest, it was already perfect enough like this. It would be an insolence if I "demanded" more...
Anyway, my dad had to pick up the tickets from the Fanclub ticket booth at 5 p.m. so I told him to be at the arena at 4 p.m. so we needn't rush and then a stupid heavy rainfall made ME be late!
And then, once I arrived, I had to walk aaaaall the way around the arena to meet up with him because the shortcut was obstructed by the VIP area. Grrrr!
At around half past 5 I finally arrived where my dad was already waiting for me and I was pleased to find that he had already collected the tickets!
We then bought two programmes, one for us and one for an old classmate of mine who didn't get
tickets and went in. We were both very excited, obviously, my dad had never been to a Pink Floyd concert before (neither had I, obviously) and we talked about the songs for a bit. Unlike him, I had spent the morning listening to all the songs whereas he had decided to keep his mind clear.
We walked around for a bit, checking the food stalls (and buying and eating said food, of course ;D). While casually strolling around I even walked into one of my lecturers! Interesting surprise.
At around half past six we went inside to check our seats and I honestly let out a small yelp when I saw just HOW amazing they were.
We sat down for a bit and took in the atmosphere, admired the HUGE (over 100 meters) stage, the big round centre screen and wall, took pictures and enjoyed the music which was playing. My dad even took some pictures with his blackberry so he could show them to his colleagues.
Funny enough, that morning I had thought to myself, "Seeing as the reason why Roger Waters decided to go on tour with The Wall again are the current Irak and Afghanistan etc. wars, I wonder if he'll play 'The Times Are A-Changing' by Bob Dylan before the show" and what did we hear?
A "Best Of" Bob Dylan!! Lovely.
My dad jokingly said "When you blog about this you can say that we went to two concerts, one by Bob Dylan and one by Roger Waters!"
The show was scheduled to start at 8 so we left our seats again for some more food and air and a last cigarette but we were both a bit anxious to go back in early to avoid the crowds. At quarter to 8 the arena was still quite empty but within 15 minutes it seemed that every last seat had been occupied.
The show eventually started at 20 past 8, and it started with a BANG!
Red fireworks and white blasts, men in uniform carrying the big red "crossed hammer" flags, a hydraulic stage and complete with the "plane crash" at the end of "In The Flesh" (the first song). Roger himself was dressed in a long black leather coat and sunglassses and looked mighty intimidating.
I was flabberghasted!
Music and voices and background sound appeared from everywhere, front, left, right, behind us, bright searchlights searched the entire arena and you really couldn't tell if it was the audience chanting in unison or if it was part of the show. It caused goosebumps to erupt all over my skin.
After the grande opening they played "Another Brick In The Wall (part I)" and started projecting the pictures of people, both soldiers and civilians, who died due to war and violence.
Their basic information (name, date of birth, date and location of death, cause of death etc.) was displayed in the big round screen in the middle of the stage and afterwards they became "just another brick in the wall". It was very moving and although I knew about this (Roger Waters had asked his fans to send pictures of fallen loved ones) I couldn't help but cry a little.
For "Another Brick In The Wall (part II)" - the one song everybody
knows - the first puppet was released from its confines, the School Master!
The wall was coloured deep red and a big, bold "F" appeared behind the School Master while his glowing eyes scanned the audience.
A group of children appeared on stage during the chorus of "We don't need no education" and did their little dance and eventually made the School Master go away again.
The Next puppet already appeared during "Mother", a beautiful song, sung by Roger in a duet with himself from 30 years ago.
He played the accoustic guitar while video footage from back then was projected onto the round centre screen and the wall.
When he sang the line "Mother, should we trust the government" the words on our side of the wall spelled "No Fucking Way" and on the other "Auf Keinen" (the same thing in German) and everybody laughed and cheered.
The next songs were "Goodbye Blue Sky", where planes dropped "bombs" in the shapes of
Dollar symbols, Crosses, David's Stars, Hammer and Sicle, the Shell symbol etc., "Young Lust", "On Of My Turns", "Don't Leave Me Now" where yet another puppet - a green woman with red hair and arms like a Praying Mantis - appeared, and the first half of the show was ended with "Another Brick In The Wall (part III)" and the short but nontheless very emotional "Goodbye Cruel World"
(a song I want played at my funeral btw.).
During all the songs, the wall was gradually "completed", brick by brick, until at the end only one little opening was left in the wall.
When Roger sang the last "Goodbye" the lights went out and the last brick was put into the wall.
During the intermission we remained seated and read the obituaries which were projected onto the wall.
Many of them were soldiers in either WWI, WWII, Vietnam or the more recent Irak and Afghanistan wars, but some of them were also "just" civilians or people who stood up for something, e.g. human rights, the rainforest, or who were just at the wrong place at the wrong time.
The first song after the break was - of course - "Hey You", performed entirely behind the wall, no footage was projected onto the wall, we just sat there and listened to the band play without seeing them. It was eerie and amazing and cool.
Then came "Is There Anybody Out There?".
A deep voice sung those first words as a searchlight appeared on top of the wall and 2 bricks were removed behind which Roger and the guitarist sat and played, illuminated by blue light.
"Vera" is, with a run time of 1 and a half minutes, a rather short song which was accompanied by footage of soldier fathers returning home to their children, crying and hugging them.
Again, very emotional, especially the last video in which a girl seems to have been surprised by her father's return on her birthday, staring at him in disbelief for a moment before bursting into (happy) tears.
Of course the next song was "Bring The Boys Back Home" during which a quote of Dwight D. Eisenhower was put over footage of war and suffering.
Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired, signifies in the final sense a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed.
- Dwight D. Eisenhower
"Comfortably Numb" is one of my favourite songs EVER (together with "Run Like Hell" and "High Hopes". Aaaand all the other Pink Floyd songs, actually XD).
Roger stood and sang in front of the wall while the other vocalist stood on top of the wall for the chorus (I assume Roger isn't able to sing the high notes any more, old man that he is) and for the guitar solo the guitarist took the place on top of the wall while the whole crowd cheered for him.
To be honest, I really don't remember what happened during "The Show Must Go On", apart from the fact that there were searchlights searching the audience again, but for the second "In the Flesh", the Hogs Of War were released!!!
Well, ONE hog, but it was a mighty impressive hog!
Covered with graffiti and with its evil, glowing red eyes it floated freely through the darkness, over the heads of the people in the crowd, slowly from left to right.
The last songs were "Run Like Hell" with some amazing and - again - thought provoking video footage,
"Waiting For The Worms" during which Roger's leather coat and the ensigns with their big red crossed-hammer bearing flags returned and the whole crowd rose from their seats to clap and cheer,
"The Trial" during which the wall was torn down again and then, ultimately, "Outside The Wall".
The whole band gathered at the foot of the rubble with their instruments and sang the song together while red confetti poured into the crowd from above.
Roger introduced the band and then, one by one, they all left the stage.
After some final words and goodbyes, Roger, too, left the stage and that was it.
The concept of "The Wall" doesn't really include any encores, so we weren't even disappointed, just very, very, very happy.
All in all it was an absolutely stunning show, both my dad and I were lost for words afterwards and had big fat smiles on our faces.
Over all I took almost 500 pictures during the concert, 122 of which I - of course - uploaded to my flickr account here.
Phew, now I am exhausted.
Yesterday I went to the Tutankhamun exhibition in Cologne with my dear friend Julia.
