A few, more detailed, thoughts and impressions from my side. Let’s start with: anybody who was there, really loved it and doesn’t like that mood to be destroyed, don’t necessarily keep reading it.
Well, 2 days before the show something like the “old anticipation” came up and I was eagerly awaiting that day. We took off in the morning and after an odyssey of traffic jams and overcrowded train stations in the sweltering heat of Munich, we finally made it to the Olympic Park. It’s gotta be said that, at the same time, Elton John was playing to a sold out crowd in the Olympic Hall right next to it and there was the big “Tollwood” festival in the park with James Morrison playing, so over 100,000 people were trying to get there.
Def Leppard started at 6:30 precisely as we were making our way into the stadium. They were good, probably one of the best opening acts Bon Jovi have had here in quite a while, but their frontman was somewhat lacking energy. Still, it was great that they were allowed to use the full screen technology as it was easier to follow their set. I made my way to the front left side in the infield where I’ve seen every Munich show since 2003 (except for 2006 as I had missed that one). Someone had told me before that Def Leppard were allowed a 90-minute slot to play Hysteria in full, so I was surprised when they left the stage after exactly 60 minutes, thinking (hoping) it was due to Bon Jovi wanting more time since the curfew is at 11pm in Munich.
Well, one hour passed without anything happening. Every show since 2003, they didn’t start later than 8:10, maybe 8:15 and it was obvious that it was to be more of the same already. At around 8:30, the crowd to the left started roaring. That’s because the cars with the band members are driven into the stadium in Munich and it can be seen from the seats on the very left side. The intro rushed over the screen (which always kind of kills the anticipation a bit since everybody knows that they’re already there beforehand and just waiting for the intro to be over with) and they kicked off with THINFS. Shanks guitar was very edgy and loud from the beginning which made for a good start, but already here Jon didn’t leave the microphone stand once though the vocals were ok. Same story with Raise Your Hands where he was glued to it almost until the end, but the screens were great and Phil was rocking that thing. The crowd was good and I was enjoying that start. Bad Name was good as well, on the bigger hits the crowd was drowning him out quite a lot which saved many songs in hindsight, but it was fun and Shanks playing decent. Born To Be My Baby was the first one where I noticed him having a hard time in terms of keeping up with the music, but it was still okay and he didn’t try to get the crowd going with the “na na na” part in the end. He just smiled, held the microphone into the audience like “you know what to sing”, went back and finished the song off. What followed was the standard “it’s good to be back in Munich” speech and that he wasn’t gonna talk much because of the curfew. Well, if he didn’t want to get beaten by that, they just should’ve started at the same time they usually did!
Roller Coaster was next and the chorus actually went over well with Tico’s drums having a nice sharp sound and it’s the one I wanted to hear in that spot instead of WLOL, so I liked singing along to that overly cheesy pop tune. The overall sound was good for Munich standards, though they raised the volume later on a bit which then lead to Shanks’s guitar and Jon’s mic having too much treble and sounding a bit annoying at parts.
Next was, of course, Lost Highway: I’ve heard people claiming that he rearranged the melody to fit his current voice. Actually, they play it the same way, but his singing was shockingly off here! Way too slow and the band had one hell of a hard time adjusting to it since they’re backing vocals were always rushing past what Jon was singing. It also proofed to be the first lead balloon of the night since no one really cared for it. Runaway was about to follow and he tried his usual “if you’re really nice to me” to which the crowd didn’t change their reaction which lead to him starting it right away. I had actually wanted to hear that time machine thing, so that was a downer, but the crowd was phenomenal on the song!
Born To Follow killed the momentum they’ve had with Runaway right again and I agree with what others have said before. There are by now just too many shallow lead singles or title tracks crammed into there that really no one gives a shit about. All these albums had a few good tracks, but instead of digging into an album cut here and there, be it a newer or an older record, it’s always the same. The whole main set was so close to what we got in 2013 as well.
HAND was amazing due to the animation and the crowd singing the chorus, Jon was actually okay for today’s standards and then KTF started. Jon went to Hugh, having his arm around his should and telling him to start the song. Tico started one beat too late and the camera (on the left side at least) kept focusing on Hugh playing along with a confused look whereas the whole band was trying to get it back together again. It was an awkward moment since it was the only time the whole night where Hugh actually had been the focus of the screen camera during a song. The song went over well, though the audience seemed to care more about the choruses than the instrumental outro. It’s the only more demanding rhythm wise and it wasn’t too tight in terms of the band either. Not only Jon, but they all went from good to cover band level and back again a few times throughout the night.
I was about to leave for the beer stand, expecting Amen to come up, but to my surprise it was These Days. Jon’s vocals were horrendous at the start and the audience noticeably started chatting about it right away. They covered it up by the chorus and “wooohoo” outros on catwalk were kind of cool! Who Says followed, making me hope that there were actually some setlist shake-ups to come! The intro, albeit being sung with a rusty voice, was nice in it’s acoustic way and somewhat more sincere than most of the night. The song was okay, not too long like in 2006 or 2008, though Jon could hardly hit the “it’s alright” parts, having to rely on the band to “guide” the audience. In These Arms was next, the usual gimmick included: letting David sing and by the time the sound mixers had turned up his microphone, Jon had taken over lead again. But the crowd was really loud on the chorus. The south of Germany certainly has a good choir. Up to the “let’s turn up the heat in here” part and IML! Best moment of the night! But only in terms of the crowd screaming their lungs out which made it actually almost impossible to hear Jon on the infield. From the few spots I could catch, the best thing possible!
Now, I had only listened to three shows beforehand – Nijmegen, Dublin and Dusseldorf – since I had prepared them for my YT channel. On each of the occasions, Jon introduced the band after this song and he did it again here which made it hard to overcome the feeling that it was all like witnessing a scripted play. Pretty much the wording of every speech had been the same as on previous shows. I was hoping for We Don’t Run to follow up instead of God Bless This Mess and we got it. Even though most of the audience probably didn’t know the track, it went over really well due to its powerful sound and fast-paced rhythm. In fact, it’s the first “new unknown” song to work live this No Apologies back in Dresden and Mannheim 2011.
Wanted had great screen animations, but the whole thing felt off. I used to criticize Bounce for playing it and not getting it right, after this concert I realized that this song is just so much about the Jon/Richie combination that you can’t recreate the feeling anymore. Well, moving on to Lay Your Hands On Me and the animations with the giant church windows were damn cool! Haven’t listened to a video afterwards, but the band really sounded like a cover band and off in parts here and others from our group (who were at various spots in the stadium) stated the same afterwards. The exciting trio Crash/Sleep/Medicine rounded out the main set. No covers anymore and, while Crash actually felt okay, I think Sleep and Medicine were bad by Jon. But the crowd was insanely loud during these two and the band sang their asses off in the chorus to keep it on the right track. In 2013, Jon blew the roof of the Olympic Stadium when he started a great 3-song-cover-section in Sleep, this time around I felt he couldn’t get it done fast enough. Bad Medicine had already been done with one reprise in it when Jon made Tico start that “drum spin” which once used to lead into Shout, but we just had to bare through another reprise here.
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07-08-2019, 02:51 PM
F*ck...
