Jul 14, Hamburg, Show

Shazam! In a puff of smoke, the hard questions get answered; like everyone at Fox News is on a crack high, here’s all you need to know about ta-nite’s gig.

We started right on time — the usual 15-minute delay. The first set transpired as it did in Lucca, with the disappearance of Anthem, and the introduction of the band in Lover Lover Lover. There was a wee bit of slip-up at the end of that song; we had a definite ending, but when Leonard began introducing the band, they quickly started up again and all hands played  until the main man skipped off the stage for the intermission.

The second set began à la mode, with the dumping of Tower of Song; we started with Suzanne, and at song’s end, when Mickey took Leonard’s guitar from him, the boss had a funny look in his eye, and armed with a smile, he seemed to suggest, ‘Let’s have some fun.’ From there we weren’t sure what songs were going to come next, but it wasn’t the roller coaster ride one might expect. Like fishing from a barrel, the songs to follow weren’t far from the beaten track, and behind Suzanne were Sisters of Mercy, Partisan, Waiting for the Miracle, Alexandra Leaving, and the usual triumvirate to oversee the end of the main show, I’m Your Man, Hallelujah, and Take this Waltz.

We’re running early tonight; with the encores beginning at 10.30pm, there’s still an hour to go until curfew, so we on stage left scratch our heads in conjecture as to the form of the remaining night. At the end of Take This Waltz, there was the usual crowd-rush to the stage edge, and this causes a ripple effect: because those surging forward are on their feet, everyone behind must also rise, that they may see the rest of the show — if we go to curfew, that’s a whole hour upright for the folks in the floor seats.

Strangely — well, we’ve had a few strange change-ups lately, so really, strange is the new normal — we finished before curfew. I can’t remember the last time we did this; normally, if we go on 15 minutes late, the house will tack on an extra 15 minutes to the curfew. But tonight we finished 14 minutes before the original curfew, at 11.16pm. All in all, it was a three hour show, nothing to be sneezed at, but for us it’s a shorty. Not that I’m complaining; it gives me a bit of extra time to get this blog done before my own self-imposed curfew of 2am. (The WordPress friend-bot will post it automatically at 2pm BST.)  Night night everyone; next entry, Berlin.