The next concert, this time in Cologne. And the Cologne concerts have always been special – just like this time! The concert was amazing, the place was sold out, the audience wanted to have a lot of fun, the band had a lot of fun playing and the frontman had problems with his voice… But this didn’t matter much. Okay, sometimes he was croaking more than singing, but so what – if I want to hear it sung perfectly, I just listen to the record, I don’t need a concert for that! And I go to a concert if I want to see a few hundred people screaming, clapping, dancing, jumping and having a lot of fun – just like yesterday in Cologne.

I could actually see Micke from Sweden yesterday. Not good though, and only for a few moments, but better than nothing. I still think that the idea to hide behind the piano is completely stupid… His concert was basically the same as yesterday, except that he didn’t shoot any bananas down from stage this time but a rat. And the tap dancing and the snow were back, and Jonathan as well. =;-)

Then Kaizers came on, with a fairly different setlist containting some old and rarely played songs – that’s always cool, of course: KGB, Container, Bøn fra helvete, Veterans klage, Senor Flamingos adieu, Blitzregn baby, Kontroll på kontinentet, De involverte, Jævel av en tango, Dr. Mowinckel, Katastrofen, Di grind, On the road again, Dieter Meyers Inst., first encore Evig pint, Ompa til du dør and Maestro, second encore the Gypsy Finale.

Actually, I had the feeling they were going rather straight through their set, without much talking, but there was so much happening on stage anyway that I think this report will be rather longish… =;-) Don’t know why. Just a great concert! *g*

Between Veterans klage and Senor Flamingo, the Jackal remarked that those two were the two shortest songs they had ever made. And to not make it seem too short, Killmaster improvised some parte around Senor Flamingo, but it seems this rather irritated the others… =;-)

The introduction in Kontroll was cool as always, no remarks for that one this time though. Weird. *g* After that a song that the Jackal wrote when he was 23. (“And last week, I turned 24!” – and the audience was so kind to sing him a Happy Birthday then, of course *lol*) Then they played De involverte – veeeeeerrrry nice. At least if you don’t hear it every night on tour, that is. =;-)

After that the Jackal wanted to know again who comes from where. This time he believed the Finnish guy: “Yeah, you have that big Finnish nose!” Uh… okay. *lol* There was exactly one Norwegian at the concert (well, plus the one the Jackal didn’t see *g*), and the Jackal explained why he always asks that. “My mum always says: Boy” – talking in a very high and creaky voice, because “my mum talks like this, she’s already 89 years old!” – “Boy, when you play in other countries, are there people there from your homeland?” So the next song was the lovestory from Dieter Meyer’s institution, sung by Clementine (“so, I am Clementine now”). Like yesterday, the song ended in the whole band screaming “Jævel” at very weird and unpredictable intervals… *lol*

Then Hellraizer was welcomed to the center of the stage again. The Jackal started hitting the barrel, just to stop again at once – he had forgotten to put on his gloves. Hellraizer: “No gloves, no fun!” Jackal: “No gloves, no fun, no song!” Then Hellraizer suddenly saw that there were people up on the galerie as well, and of course he had to greet them before the song could finally start.

For Katastrofen, the Jackal got his guitar (“Oh, I guess they want me to play the guitar now?!?”), and we learned that this guitar had belonged to Bob Dylan before. OK, I thought it had belonged to Killmaster just a moment before, but well… =;-)

For Dieter Meyers, the Jackal then got his acoustic guitar, and this one actually belonged to – you won’t believe it – Johnny Cash! And to celebrate that, the Jackal had to play a little country of course – and suddenly the whole band was playing “On the road again” by Willie Nelson. Cool! *g* And no, if they play it, they’re not just gonna play the first few seconds, no, they played it completely, including all guitar solos (number two was incredibly mean, by the way…). According to the Jackal they had always played that in the bus just after waking up. OK, what I always wanted to know… *lol* But that was definitely really really cool!

After that, they played Dieter Meyers. It wasn’t sung very well, but that didn’t matter at all. At least they played it! And I realized again that the Jackal always has a big broad smile on his face when he is hitting the barrels. Amazing… *g*

During the encores, the Jackal was all artist again. Even though he forgot the first line of Ompa til du dør. Well, things like that happen. And it’s not like Ompa was played so often that you could remember every single line of it… *fg* During resistansen, he pointed out once more that he is an artist and is doing his art here, screaming and whispering and whatever. Just awesome… *gg*

And while they all left stage voluntarily after the first encore (well, at least after we promised to be there again next time), Hellraizer and Killmaster had to force the Jackal off stage at the very end. Why did they do that, by the way? *g*

So, to conclude some small details: During Sigøynerblodd, Killmaster suddenly stood up on his barrel on one leg, because some musician (forgot who) had done the same in some Late Night Show. Uh… well. *lol* Hellraizer was doing a lot of crazy things again, but as he was standing on my opposite side, I didn’t catch most of it… but at some point in time, the stick he used for conducting the audience was “broken” and showing the wrong melody, and the poor barrel got some attention and caressing. Killmaster on the other hand didn’t have any difficulty in deciding if he wanted to use the oil barrel stick or an ordinary drum stick. At some point in time we were asked if we didn’t have to go home now, ’cause we would have to work romorrow. And they themselves also had to work tomorrow! “It’s hard work being a superstar, right Hellraizer?” – “Yeah, really tough!” Hmm… is it a part of being a superstar that make you stand in the middle of the stage and play around with an organ-players eyebrows? *lol*

The part that is somehow missing in this report now is the amazing atmosphere in the audience. People were constantly dancing and jumping, singing along and screaming, and there was a lot of audience interaction. This is something that will only happen in big and sold out venues. That’s also why it seemed a lot more quiet in Nijmegen, for example. But well, instead you could survive the concert in front of the stage in Nijmegen… so there’s advantages and disadvantages in everything. But yesterday, the advantages were a LOT bigger, I think.

After the concert there was a very fun moment when Micke from Sweden and Helge Kaizer decided they hadn’t sold enough merchandise yet. So they just did a short tap dance on the merchstand. *rofl* With the rest of the band standing around and clapping. Except for Mr. Rockstar of course who obviously had something else to do…
Accidentally, I recorded a short video of that. It was supposed to be a photo, so don’t complain about the quality… =;-)

And now I’m really curious if my car and Brussels will get along well, wish me luck…