The Frankfurt and Mark Owen Concert Post
Jul. 1st, 2013 12:44 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
przedI've finally had some time to write up my fab trip to Frankfurt and my Mark Owen concert experience.
This is the ticket for the show. I've got to say, European concert tickets are very pretty objects. Though it's also lucky I could get the tix mailed to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
soundofthesurf, since the courier fees to Canada were more than the price of the ticket.
My flight landed Saturday morning, and I was lucky enough to spend all day Saturday withsoundofthesurf. We checked out the concert venue, then went to the Römer, the old city hall, and had a lovely lunch in the neighbouring square.
Then we checked out the Palmengarten, the botanical garden in the city.
We checked into the hotel, and the Villa Orange was a really great little hotel. The staff recommended a nifty little restaurant in the neighbourhood for good German food--my request, since you can't get good wiener schnitzel in Toronto anymore--and we spent the rest of the evening there in their open air courtyard. Mostly we talked, about Mark and Take That and all sorts of other things. It was a fantastic day.
Sunday morning, we hooked up withrangerke in front of the venue. rangerke was planning on lining up all day, and I figured since I was already mad enough to fly over from Canada for the show, I might as well go all the way and do the all-day lineup. (soundofthesurf went off to visit a friend in the outskirts of the city.) This is the front of the line. The people at the front got there just after 4 a.m. They were really well-organized, and were giving everyone who arrived numbers so the line stayed reasonably organized.
I was number 32.
I have to say, that waiting in line was anything but a hardship. It was a lovely day--not too hot, not too cold--and I got to talk more Mark and TT and concerts in general withrangerke. In fact, the whole weekend was sort of like a TT convention in miniature, and it was great to be able to talk about Mark and the band with people who really got it and who shared the same level of knowledge/passion/obsession.
The hardcore fans who'd been there all day were entirely civilized, but an hour before the doors were due to open a whole bunch of people arrived who decided that they were going to jump the queue, and then it turned into complete chaos. The venue security were less than useless, andrangerke and I got swept up in the crowd. I have to say that there were a few minutes where I was honestly afraid that we were going to get crushed. But they finally started letting people in, and the crush eased.
If the queue hadn't got screwed up, we would have been first or second row, but by the time we got to the floor we would have been fifth row, and behind a bunch of tall people. That would have been impossible for 5-feet-nothing me, but then I noticed a riser right behind the last row. We got right at the front of it, and it gave us a completely unobstructed view at close to the same level as the stage. It was a brilliant place to watch from, and possibly even better than front row. Here's a screen cap of an interview Mark did inside the venue with were we were stood.
The opening act was a guitar-based German duo, Kids of Adelaide, and they were absolutely killer, and a great warm up for Mark.
By the time Mark hit the stage, the crowd was ready, and we all went totally berserk. Mark was wearing this really awesome white jacket. He looked happy and confident and really seemed to bask in the attention when he came out. (rangerke is convinced he's looking at me in this shot, and I'm going to go with that.)
One of the many highlights was when Mark did his new single, Stars. Some of the fans had bought a ton of star glow sticks, and they were selling them at cost to everyone in line. When Mark hit the chorus of the song, we all pulled out our glow sticks, and the fans who'd organized it threw star-shaped confetti at Mark from the front row. It was a genius moment, and Mark really seemed to groove on it. (Mark encouraged fans to throw the confetti again near the end of the concert, and he ended up with some of it stuck to him, he was that sweaty.)
This is my star glow stick, still with a little juice left hours after the concert.
Mark played guitar and keyboard for various songs during the show. They keyboard was dead in front of where we were, so we had an especially good view any time he was there.
He lost the jacket fairly early on in the show--it was incredibly hot in the venue where I was, and I'm sure way worse under the stage lights--and looked fab in his white t and black waistcoat. And OMG, did he put on an amazing show. He just seemed to be having such a wonderful time, the whole night, which made it even better for us. My personal favourite little moment was when he'd got an especially good reaction from the crowd and he turned back to his band and did this little wriggly dance of delight. It was such a Markie moment.
Musically there were so many highlights. Of the new songs, The One and Heaven's Falling were standouts for me. And during Heaven's Falling it was great to hear guitarist Ben Mark rock out on the supporting vocal.
It was also great to see Jamie Norton live. (We saw him outside the venue as we were waiting in line. He was heading towards us, carrying a keyboard case, but stopped before he got to us when he realized he was not heading towards the stage door.)
It was wonderful to hear Mark's older solo songs, Four Minute Warning, and Makin' Out and Believe in the Boogie live, especially with the crowd all enthusiastically singing along. Of the TT songs, Mark's version of The Flood was really lovely. I've never quite had the love for Hold Up a Light, but live it was quite transcendant. But not as transcendant as Shine. It's one of my favourite TT songs, and probably just one of my favourite songs ever, and this version live was everything I could have wanted. (Well, except for Howard and Jason lifting Mark up over a piano. *g*)
After the final song of the regular encore, a killer version of End of Everything, Mark stayed out on the stage and did a capella versions of both Babe and Up All Night, which was just a lovely way to end the concert.
Here's a last picture of Mark at his keyboard, with one of his merch mugs full of his honey and ginger tea. You can see his little good luck cat to the right of the keyboard. (He introduced the cat as his version of the TT giant elephant and robot.)
And here's my Mark mug, now firmly ensconced on my desk.
After the concert, we said goodbye torangerke as she headed off to her hotel, then soundofthesurf and I headed off to Villa Orange. We stayed up until sunrise, talking about the concert and Take That and having a wonderful time, then got a couple of hours sleep before I had to head off to the airport and the return trip home.
It was an entirely brilliant trip, brilliant concert, and worth all the time, expense, and travel drama I went through. A week later, I'm still basking in the glow. (I was in a downtown bookstore on Friday getting some birthday books for my mom when I realized they were playing Shine on the sound system--and I've never heard TT before in a Canadian store--and it just put me in such a good mood for the rest of the day.)
This is the ticket for the show. I've got to say, European concert tickets are very pretty objects. Though it's also lucky I could get the tix mailed to
soundofthesurf, since the courier fees to Canada were more than the price of the ticket.My flight landed Saturday morning, and I was lucky enough to spend all day Saturday with
soundofthesurf. We checked out the concert venue, then went to the Römer, the old city hall, and had a lovely lunch in the neighbouring square.Then we checked out the Palmengarten, the botanical garden in the city.
We checked into the hotel, and the Villa Orange was a really great little hotel. The staff recommended a nifty little restaurant in the neighbourhood for good German food--my request, since you can't get good wiener schnitzel in Toronto anymore--and we spent the rest of the evening there in their open air courtyard. Mostly we talked, about Mark and Take That and all sorts of other things. It was a fantastic day.
Sunday morning, we hooked up with
rangerke in front of the venue. rangerke was planning on lining up all day, and I figured since I was already mad enough to fly over from Canada for the show, I might as well go all the way and do the all-day lineup. (soundofthesurf went off to visit a friend in the outskirts of the city.) This is the front of the line. The people at the front got there just after 4 a.m. They were really well-organized, and were giving everyone who arrived numbers so the line stayed reasonably organized.I was number 32.
I have to say, that waiting in line was anything but a hardship. It was a lovely day--not too hot, not too cold--and I got to talk more Mark and TT and concerts in general with
rangerke. In fact, the whole weekend was sort of like a TT convention in miniature, and it was great to be able to talk about Mark and the band with people who really got it and who shared the same level of knowledge/passion/obsession.The hardcore fans who'd been there all day were entirely civilized, but an hour before the doors were due to open a whole bunch of people arrived who decided that they were going to jump the queue, and then it turned into complete chaos. The venue security were less than useless, and
rangerke and I got swept up in the crowd. I have to say that there were a few minutes where I was honestly afraid that we were going to get crushed. But they finally started letting people in, and the crush eased.If the queue hadn't got screwed up, we would have been first or second row, but by the time we got to the floor we would have been fifth row, and behind a bunch of tall people. That would have been impossible for 5-feet-nothing me, but then I noticed a riser right behind the last row. We got right at the front of it, and it gave us a completely unobstructed view at close to the same level as the stage. It was a brilliant place to watch from, and possibly even better than front row. Here's a screen cap of an interview Mark did inside the venue with were we were stood.
The opening act was a guitar-based German duo, Kids of Adelaide, and they were absolutely killer, and a great warm up for Mark.
By the time Mark hit the stage, the crowd was ready, and we all went totally berserk. Mark was wearing this really awesome white jacket. He looked happy and confident and really seemed to bask in the attention when he came out. (
rangerke is convinced he's looking at me in this shot, and I'm going to go with that.)One of the many highlights was when Mark did his new single, Stars. Some of the fans had bought a ton of star glow sticks, and they were selling them at cost to everyone in line. When Mark hit the chorus of the song, we all pulled out our glow sticks, and the fans who'd organized it threw star-shaped confetti at Mark from the front row. It was a genius moment, and Mark really seemed to groove on it. (Mark encouraged fans to throw the confetti again near the end of the concert, and he ended up with some of it stuck to him, he was that sweaty.)
This is my star glow stick, still with a little juice left hours after the concert.
Mark played guitar and keyboard for various songs during the show. They keyboard was dead in front of where we were, so we had an especially good view any time he was there.
He lost the jacket fairly early on in the show--it was incredibly hot in the venue where I was, and I'm sure way worse under the stage lights--and looked fab in his white t and black waistcoat. And OMG, did he put on an amazing show. He just seemed to be having such a wonderful time, the whole night, which made it even better for us. My personal favourite little moment was when he'd got an especially good reaction from the crowd and he turned back to his band and did this little wriggly dance of delight. It was such a Markie moment.
Musically there were so many highlights. Of the new songs, The One and Heaven's Falling were standouts for me. And during Heaven's Falling it was great to hear guitarist Ben Mark rock out on the supporting vocal.
It was also great to see Jamie Norton live. (We saw him outside the venue as we were waiting in line. He was heading towards us, carrying a keyboard case, but stopped before he got to us when he realized he was not heading towards the stage door.)
It was wonderful to hear Mark's older solo songs, Four Minute Warning, and Makin' Out and Believe in the Boogie live, especially with the crowd all enthusiastically singing along. Of the TT songs, Mark's version of The Flood was really lovely. I've never quite had the love for Hold Up a Light, but live it was quite transcendant. But not as transcendant as Shine. It's one of my favourite TT songs, and probably just one of my favourite songs ever, and this version live was everything I could have wanted. (Well, except for Howard and Jason lifting Mark up over a piano. *g*)
After the final song of the regular encore, a killer version of End of Everything, Mark stayed out on the stage and did a capella versions of both Babe and Up All Night, which was just a lovely way to end the concert.
Here's a last picture of Mark at his keyboard, with one of his merch mugs full of his honey and ginger tea. You can see his little good luck cat to the right of the keyboard. (He introduced the cat as his version of the TT giant elephant and robot.)
And here's my Mark mug, now firmly ensconced on my desk.
After the concert, we said goodbye to
rangerke as she headed off to her hotel, then soundofthesurf and I headed off to Villa Orange. We stayed up until sunrise, talking about the concert and Take That and having a wonderful time, then got a couple of hours sleep before I had to head off to the airport and the return trip home.It was an entirely brilliant trip, brilliant concert, and worth all the time, expense, and travel drama I went through. A week later, I'm still basking in the glow. (I was in a downtown bookstore on Friday getting some birthday books for my mom when I realized they were playing Shine on the sound system--and I've never heard TT before in a Canadian store--and it just put me in such a good mood for the rest of the day.)
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Date: 2013-07-09 07:15 pm (UTC)Isn't it awesome! And I think it's the perfect song for Jason, he looks so happy and confident performing How Did It Come to This. Wooden Boat is beautiful because of its vulnerability, but I really started appreciating Jason's voice because of How Did It Come to This. Hold Up a light definitely is genius, always nice when you truly start appreciating a song! I agree with Howard, it's a real rock and roll song of Take That ;)