The concert in Hamburg was actually planned at the CCH but has been mislaid to the "Gro?e Freiheit 36" shortly before, which made me pretty happy. After all I saw them before there at my first Travis gig :) My friend Ela and my new friend from the Travisboard Sanne (Chucky) ;) arrived the venue about 1pm...much too early of course so we decided to have a little walk over the Reeperbahn and eat something to kill time. SUDDENLY I saw Fran passing me by, but I was so perplexed I wasn?t able to speak, haha. I told it to the other both and we followed him, because we just wanted to say hello and ask him for an autograph but than I noticed that he was just phoning so we didn?t dare to interrupt him and we had neither a pen or a camera with us anyway so went another direction for have some lunch. *lol*
We came back to the venue about 3pm and listened to the soundcheck. I was so happy when I heard them practising "Somewhere else". I was hoping so much they would play it...and we waited for our friends (also boardies..jmorgain, Glasses 8-) and Micha) who arrived maybe two ours later. We had a nice chat and I think a never laughed that much before at one day, haha. We just had a great time outside the venue. We were so busy with chatting that we didn?t even notice when Dougie passed by *aaaah* and and Ela suddenly shouted "ey, are you all blind, or what??? Dougie just passed by!!!"...oops, *lol*...2nd chance missed on the same day ;-)
At the admission I?ve been checked like on an airport by the security but they didn?t find my camery anyway. *nasty* h?h?h?. I noticed once again how cool the crowd in Hamburg is ? nobody was pushing or jostling and we made it in the front row again...all of us, yay! :)
Athlete supported again, like in Freiburg before in the summer. It was cool, they heated up the crowd for Travis :-) We were so excited, because 12 Memories was just out and we knew they're gonna play a lot new songs from it tonight. Ela and I had a good laugh with one of the security guys who was really cool, not bossy at all or something and Sanne took a picture with him yet. *lol* Ela said "I will shout `Booh' when they come out" and I said "...you?ll never dare doing that!" so we made a little bet about it. Finally the time has come...the lights turned off and the crowd began to scream...and Ela really shouted "boooo!!!" Instead of cheering. *screeches* I begged her to stop and told her she?d won, haha. You could hear the intro-music of "Happy to hang around" and the band appeared on stage one after another. They took their instruments and started immediately with "Happy to hang around". First time we heard it life and it was soooo cool, the crowd was amazing and I just knew this gig is going to be GREAT again, no doubt! The second song was "Re-Offender" and those 6-feet-and-larger-photographs in front of the stage ruined the magic of this song a bit but luckily after the second song they disappeared and we enjoyed a great performance of "Writing to reach you".
I?m probably repeating myself but the "Gro?e Freiheit" was the best venue ever, it?s like this place is filled up with only the biggest Travisfans..everyone?s just singing along and stuff. And the sound is just perfect there. Fran welcomed everyone in German by saying something like "wie geht?s? alles gut? alles klar?" (..how are you? everything good? everything alright?) He said thanks to everyone who sent good vibes to Neil after his accident and the audience was cheering like mad and Neil had a big smile on his face :-) "Pipe dreams" followed and after that "Quicksand"...aah, it was so cool to hear this song live for the first time. Dougie sang the part, when you actually hear a cello on the album ? sounded so great. "Sing" was next and just everyone knew the words of it and sang along. "Love will come through" followed and it was the best performance of LWCT ever if I look back now. It sounded all so clear, the instruments, the voice. "The beautiful occupation" was next and it was brilliant again, I was surprised how cool this song is live in Freiburg already and that night it was even better. Ela leaned over to me and shouted into my ear "...that song?s so ace!!!" They played "Side" next and my throat was so dry afterwards but - me fool - spilled my drink shortly before. "How many hearts" was next and I must admit embarrassed that I only can remember blurred about that song at that night...my brain *shakes head* "The fear" and "As you are" followed and than the beautiful "Driftwood"...all those 3 songs were pretty well known by the crowd, since everyone was singing along to them :-)
Fran announced the next song, which made me just scream in joy loudly..."Somewhere else", yay. This song was (...and still is) my favourite of the new album. Dougie's dancing is so cool in it x-D "All I wanna do is rock" was next and Andy surprised everyone with his climbing action during this song. He climbed up to the the people on the balcony over the amps ? he?s crazy!! *lol*..This song was just Andy?s song and the crowd totally freaked out, although at the end of the song it looked like he had some trouble to get off the amps again *laughs* "Humpty Dumpty Love Song" was the following song and it was so cool...everyone was just clapping the rhythm of the song.
"Turn" was next and I recognized it already before it started, alone this song is ? as Ela once said yet ? worth already to attend a Travis show...brilliant!
Encore break. The crowd didn?t stop shouting for Travis and Fran came back on the stage alone. First place I thought he?d going to sing "20" now but he came right in front of the stage and shouted something like "Ok, I?m gonna sing the next song without a microphone, so you have to be very quiet"...I just though "Oh my God, how cool is that???" I turned to Ela and said "Geil!!!" Fran heard it and repeated it twice "geil, geil!" *lol* he?s cool x-)...it just sounds so great if he speaks German ? he should do it more often! ;-)
And then he started to sing it..."Flowers in the window". It was so great and definitely the highlight on that show. I just thought how can anyone sing in front of maybe 2000-3000 ppl without a microphone ?! It sounded so fantastic and we were standing right in front of him so it was the coolest thing ever!!! Everyone in the audience was so stunned, the applause didn?t seem to stop afterwards. The next song was a most welcomed surprise for us ? especially because just outside we talked about how cool it would be to hear some songs from the Good Feeling album...so "The line is fine" followed, wohoo! :-D
"Peace the fuck out" was another highlight of the show..well, at least for us, we were hoping they would play it, since we heard it in Freiburg and liked it immediately.
Fran said thanks to everyone for coming and then "You don?t realize about you are the future of music, because you get up of your backsides and you?re still going see music, live!!...and that?s important so thank you so much! YOU ROCK!"...the crowd was cheering and whistling and than he said he?s gonna do some classical music *pretends to play the cello on his guitar at the beginning of WDIAROM?* and the song began...EVERYONE was just jumping and singing like mad during this song and Nora made pictures and Fran went close to her at the front of the stage and encouraged her to sing along and she did. She made us laugh when she had to bend herself completely to the back to make a picture of Fran, because he was standing so close to her. This song was a fantastic end of a fantastic night. We were so happy and looked forward to the next show in Berlin less than 2 weeks later. Travis said good bye and went off the stage and I asked Nora if there?s sill a setlist on the stage but they were all gone already. She was very kind with the fans and I asked her to tell the band that this show was absolutely ACE!!! And she took a picure of Ela and me and another one with all of us. You could hear "Walking down the hill" playing and we went to the hotel...walked through the streets of St. Pauli singing all kinds of Travis songs, we also stopped at McDonalds where we even got an applause of some guests for our version of "The Beautiful Occupation", haha (...good to know that nobody knows us there ;-D) WHAT A NIGHT !!
I hope Travis will play the same venue again very soon. :-)