Roxette and her musical journey of XXX years keep London singing all night
I’ve been waiting for more than 15 years to see Roxette live, and last night I finally lived my dream. And what a night it was. I bought my tickets starting in November, paid a small fortune as they were front seats, but it was worth every penny spent. Needless to say, I got there early (annoying my dear wife a bit), but I didn’t want to miss a thing. Ok, enough about me, let’s move on to the real story and the actor of the night.
The show started with the Swedish group Eskobar, I was a bit bummed out as at the beginning as the O2 Arena was almost half empty. They did their best to get the attention of the public for more than half an hour. The only Eskobar tune that caught my eye was “It’s a good day to die,” but for me and everyone else it was a night to live. So after 30 minutes of Eskobar, the O2 was finally full and a magical evening was about to begin.
The concert started with ‘Sleeping in my Car’, the audience was already on their feet, I never really liked that song, but it’s just a personal opinion. ‘The Big L’ followed and the clapping and singing got better and better. “Stars” was next, in this not all the public seemed to know the lyrics, but they continued with the band. Then on ‘Spending my time’ I felt like I was going to knock the roof off the O2 Arena when Marie let the audience drift into the song. ‘Shock! Boom! Pop!’ it was a bit surprising as it was introduced by Per, and Marie joined later, to me that will always be a Marie song, no offense to Per. ‘Crush on you’ also had a better reception than expected. I like the song, don’t get me wrong, but I always thought I could have done better on the charts. The newest song performed, ‘She She She’s Got Nothing On (But The Radio)’, was another concert success story.
Per introduced “The Sea in the Shape of a Heart” while joking with Magnus about Roxette’s favorite album. Per said that Magnus’s favorite album was ‘Have a nice day’, Magnuss denied saying that his favorite is ‘Balladas en Español’. Special mention to Dea, the youngest member who did a great job helping Marie when she needed it, and she also did a good piano performance on ‘Water Colors in the Rain’. He was busy clapping, singing, taking photos, and making me anxious while I waited for ‘Joyride’.
I haven’t read the program before the show, so I had no idea of the schedule. As I wait for Joyride, I start to wonder why “The Look” was missing. It is not necessary to mention that in all these times there was not a single soul sitting. Sorry, let me go back to the show, since it was time for ‘Fading like a flower’, the singing from both sides was getting better and better. The one that was going to get the best reception was “How do you do”, it felt like it was a clapping contest throughout the song. The title track of ‘Pretty Woman’, “It Must Have Been Love”, was introduced by Per, but needs no introduction. ‘Dressed for Success’ made me wonder about Per’s real age as he ran around the stage, while you could see on his face that he was enjoying the audience’s contribution to the show. Marie also seemed very happy and rewarded us with an amazing performance. By the time ‘Dangerous’ came on I was starting to wish the night would never end. Suddenly it was time for the big ‘Joyride’, but then I was already giving up my camera and tried to use the best of my phone to record. And that seemed to be the end, but I knew I wanted to see some more, so I joined everyone and started yelling “ROXETTE” as loud as I could after an hour of singing. After a few minutes, my favorite band came back on stage.
‘Listen to Your Heart’ with a very long goodbye from Marie, (who by the way looked beautiful in white) seemed to be the end, but no, once again it was proven wrong, since ‘The Look’, was the one that would finish end the show and the night, as sung on the tube stairs by one of London’s amateur singers. A London evening that will always remain in my heart.
