Round 1 – Olympic Stadium, Munich: ”What’s Left of them?”

That was the question that started the trip on Saturday morning with me. My mom and my aunt, both witnesses in 2008 and 2011 in Munich, joined as well. Originally there was a fourth ticket that we had purchased, but it seemed as if it was cursed somehow. In the first place my cousin (who usually also joins in on the concerts at the Olypmic Stadium) bought it, but needed to get rid of it due to having to work. We passed it on to a friend of mine, Johnny, but he forgot about a wedding he had to attend and couldn’t come with us either. At last my dad planned on going to see the show with us (he has already tickets for Cologne), but due to personal issues (see even here stuff like this happens) he bailed out of it 2 days before as well.
So it was the three of us heading to Munich and to say that I wasn’t overly excited would be an understatement. I pretty much expected nothing, had no anticipation for the concert at all and only ended up going because I wanted to meet a few friends I pretty much never see except on Jovi tours.

From where I live it’s a four-hour drive to Munich and we started at around 9:30 in the morning since we expected a lot of traffic due to the Pentecost holidays in Bavaria, which began on Saturday. But to our surprise we arrived at the stadium in less than four hours and decided to spend some time lying in the sun at the park that surrounds the stadium before heading to the entrances.
Around 4 pm we went to the beer garden which is located right between the stadium and the Olympiahalle (where Pink was set to play to a sold out crowd at the same time). I met Ronny there who in fact is the only one I somehow constantly see between Bon Jovi tours as well (usually on concerts of the German punk band Die Toten Hosen, the Richie Sambora solo tour or a couple of weeks earlier at the Champions League semi-final Bayern Munich against Barcelona).
After we just had finished our first beer Marc and Mark appeared. This was actually some kind of a special moment since I felt like I knew Marc pretty well since late 2008, but in fact we had never met before. We already did some multicam compilations (both of Munich 2008 and the entire Circle tour / he’s DonWaldone on Youtube) which some of you might know and since he and Mark have a band called Back To Fate and we’ve written some songs before it all felt very familiar right from start. We lined up in the burning sun, sold our spare ticket (for a lot less than face value) and entered the stadium at around 5:30. Our tickets were GA since I experienced in the past (especially in Munich) that you have a better time on the infield with people who are much more into the show.
We ended up on the left side pretty close the back of the Golden Circle and now it was all about killing time. Both concerts (Pink and Bon Jovi) were sponsored by the local radio station “Bayern 3” and a band consisting of workers from there opened. They weren’t as bad as I feared and since they only covered well known songs the crowd responded quite well. After half an hour they were off and I decided that I needed to get rid of some of that beer I had drunk outside. Going to the toilet is a bitch and it took me almost 45 minutes to return to my spot, also due to me having to war a special ASO orthosis on my right foot which had been absolutely fine since the 2011 tour (where I had a bone broken) and decided to get injured just before this tour (in fact the timing of it is so well that my foot could fit right into the Bon Jovi family regarding their clever and well-timed choices with this album and tour…). In retrospect it was a good thing I was out of the stadium that long since, by the time I returned, Christina Stürmer was almost done and everyone seemed already annoyed by her. The last two songs of her set were still to be played and that was already more than enough for me. Thinking about having to sit through this two more times this tour didn’t really cheer me up. So we waited for the band to kick off the concert. We kept sending messages back and forth with Johny, but as the connection was poor all night long and most of our texts arrived 40 minutes late we failed to meet that night.

While waiting for the band I took some pictures of that stage which already looked cool in the daylight, but would turn out to be just killer as soon as it darkens.
5 minutes after 8 the intro started and the band hit the stage with That’s What The Water Made Me. First thing I noticed, besides the GC being half empty at the back (the stadium was pretty much packed otherwise) was that the crowd once again showed more enthusiasm in the GA area where we were standing. The song isn’t bad as an opener, people clap and go along with the well-driven chorus but the end bored the audience. This outro “solo” by Bobby was more or less a variation of two notes, holding each one for like forever. There was no punch or tempo behind it and Jon kept standing next to him smiling like a kid the entire time. Another “downer” was the sound at that point. The volume was nice but it was just a wall of everything. Tico’s drums were pretty unclear und muddy, in fact, I sometimes saw him hitting them on the screen but couldn’t hear it. Furthermore you couldn’t make out David or Phil over anything Bobby played, but I noticed how happy the band’s replacement guitarist was to be up on stage.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature...&v=I2rTmbJE9Jg
Anyway, the song was done and since Marc and I have probably listened to hundreds of live versions for the Ultimate Live Collection on the Circle tour we knew Jon’s standard phrases by heart. I started by saying “somebody take me to the C” and he went on with “oh Munich on a Saturday night”. I added “get up out of your seats, this ain’t television” and each of those predictions were pretty much correct – word by word. Bad Name followed up and by the verses you could tell that Jon was willing to put more into it than usually. The crowd loved it and Bobby didn’t butcher the solo as much as I had feared before. They went on with Born To Me Baby which sounded way slower to me than two years ago and got me a little concerned since Jon didn’t go for any of the “na na na’s” in the end. Raise Your Hands was next and at that point I didn’t enjoy the concert at all. Tons of the neat licks Richie places here and there were missing and Phil sounded like he was totally out of grove – it all came over quite staccato-like. Near the end of the song the time machine appeared and I really enjoyed it (first time I saw that live), plus they put some effects over Jon on the screen which enhanced it. He shouted “Stop!”, all the lights went out and with a reverb effect you heard it a few more times before he started talking about “some young punk kid” and David launched into the song. The reaction was immense, but completely faded on the next song: Lost Highway. In my memory that one worked quite well on the Lost Highway tour but here it stank. Really did. No one cared and the image on the screen above the Buick showing some landscape passing by in slow motion the whole time seemed to put the audience asleep. Afterwards Jon asked the audience: “Are you with me out there?” and from where I was standing there was close to zero reaction at first. He repeated the question and it was obvious his smile was forced. At that point I turned to Marc telling him I wasn’t enjoying it at all and that the not-responding audience might lead to this turning into a nightmare (we all know where Jon’s mood usually goes in those kinds of situations).
It was obvious “It’s My Life” was needed to get it all back on track and halfway through the song the majority of the fans woke up and the stadium got louder and louder. Jon seemed to notice it and it was like he flipped a switch and turned into the “I’m-showin’-you-how-a-****in’-rockstar-does-this” mode. From then my mood turned quite fast, even though my much-hated song Because We Can was next. The audience went with it and also didn’t drown out on What About Now (which I personally quite like). By that time the mix kept getting better, which leads me to the question why I heard them trying out their instruments for one hour (Jon only sang half of Because We Can during the soundcheck) if the needed another 60 or so minutes during the show to figure it out properly…
Jon’s vocals were quite average but every time the band hit a chorus you could hear David and Bobby coming in at an almost equal volume level which gave many songs a bit more energy and dynamics.