Where ya been, where ya going ?: 08/17/13

Didn't have a lot planned today, we arranged to meet up with Ray and his wife at 1pm at the central train station, they were doing a guided tour of the Opera house.

Ole, Stuart and i found an outdoor cafe near the station and saw Ray and his wife just as we sat down. We followed them over to the Opera house but didn't do the guided tour, the three of us just walked around the building and up onto the roof.

Its an amazing building that you can actually walk all “over” you can walk up on the roof, on the sides of the walls, everywhere, very strange but very cool. You got some great views over the water too.

After wandering around the waterfront for couple of hours, we walked for 25 minutes to the re show meet up bar. Had a couple of drinks and shared a pizza before taking the local bus out to the venue around 5pm.

From one extreme…. to the other! Embassy row in Oslo

Unlike last night, we got to the venue in good time, the bus used the bus lanes to avoid all the traffic and 25 minutes later we arrived at the venue. I have VERY funny story as to what happened on the bus ride but i think I'll save it for book, if there ever is a book version of this blog:)

Stuart and Ole went to pick up there tickets, they were front row dead centre tonight, i sat down on the walkway to the venue in the sun and people watched for half an hour. 10 minutes went by when a guy *Stien) walked up to me and spoke in Norwegian, i told him i was English and he looked at me and said, “ ahhh, have you seen the show before” jeez, did he pick the wrong person to ask tat to!! did he really want to start this conversation ? lol i told him a few times and we started chatting about the show. he was a big collector of Vinyl bootlegs and had seen Rogers In The Flesh show in 2002, Rogers dark side show and the wall in 2011 along with Dave’s Floyd show in 1994. I told him how special that show had been as it was the only place on the tour that they had played Marooned, he actually wasn't aware of this! As we chatted more and more i gave him a blog card and explained just how many shows i had seen! his face like most people when they hear this was astonishment.

Stien, outside the venue with a blog card.

It now now around 6:15, the doors had opened at 6 and i walked toward the entrance with Stien. We said goodbye and i headed in and found Stuart and Ole wandering around. We were stood chatting and drinking when Pat Lennon came over and chatted to us all for 20 minutes before heading back to get ready. All the Lennon's are such nice people but Pat especially takes time to come out onto the floor of the venue and chat to people before the show.

Ole and Stuart headed off to buy some beer, Kevin wasn't at tonight's show, he was at the Leonard Cohen show and had taken the train over to Stockholm earlier in the day. I was sat on my own tonight, 18th row on the isle, my regular seat. As i was walking the isles, a guy (Ronny) stopped me and asked if i was the person who did the blog, he had seen the blog on Matts site (Brain Damage) and stopped to tell me how much he enjoyed it :) was nice to meet you Ronny and hope you enjoyed the show

The back The front Ronny and I

Pat had been telling us earlier how difficult it was last night to feel if the crowd were enjoying the show. He said its very hard for them to feel any energy and get any feedback when the crowd are not only seated, but act very quiet most of the night. Even the band had noticed how quiet the crowd were when Roger came out as the pyros were going up, he said.

Tonight was a lot different from last night, even though it wasn't the same as “normal” The venue was certainly a lot fuller than it was last night, maybe as it was a Friday night, I'm not sure, but both the Oslo shows were announced together and it wasn't like one was announced and then they added another! Maybe the people of Norway had read the three main daily newspapers today and seen the show got top marks from each of them!

As the pyros went up tonight there was a huge cheer and even a couple of people stood up, but this was short lived when the pyros had died down and Roger had made his entrance.

As i said yesterday, there were very few people taking pictures last night and tonight was the same, i turned around during “Flesh” and there wasn't a single visible flash or iphone light around!

Gig went same as usual with the exception of again, Roger changing his Mother speech ever so slightly, adding, “you've know idea how bad he was” after him telling the audience of that Miserable Fucked up little Roger from years ago. He also changed the ending of “Mother” slightly making the end arrangement a little different as can be heard here:

Couple of shots of the audience at the height of their excitement!

The three of us met up at Intermission and all agreed it was far better than last night. Stuart going as far to say as it was his favourite gig out of the dozen or so he has seen. We met up with Ray and his wife whom also both agreed it was a better atmosphere than last night and had enjoyed not only the two shows they had seen but their 2 weeks vacation they had had, they were flying to Paris tomorrow and then home to the US on Monday morning, was great to meet you both and hope you had a safe journey home

Second half came and went even quicker than it seems to have done in the past! Once Hey You has finished and The hotels rooms gone back up into the wall after Nobody Home it really feels like the shows on the homeward straight. Roger gestured to get the crowd on their feet again during Comfy but a couple of them were already there! Dave K had messaged me earlier in the day to say it had kinda hit him now that these were probably the last few shows that he would play The Wall with Roger and he was determined to give every solo 150%, he didn't disappoint and brought rapturous cheers that the venue has probably never heard before at the end of his comfy Nub solo.

I did have to laugh at the couple who sat in front of me all night, they had obviously had a skin full of alcohol and had their cigarette lighters out for 80% of the show and were constantly waving them in the air. I watched them a few times as they had no idea which way to look during the show and totally missed the whole of the hotel room scene during Nobody Home while struggling to fill up their lighters with gas! didn't see the pig come out and didn't even see Robbie and Dave on top of the wall until 15 seconds before the end of Dave's 2nd solo!

Lighter em all up!