I actually wanted to write about summer students and voodoo, but I first have to report on an absolutely great concert I saw last night.
Pear Jam on stage August 15th 2009 in Berlin, Germany.
Pearl Jam played in the Wuhlheide in Berlin last night. The Wuhlheide is an Open Air stage in the middle of a forest with a capacity for 17000 people. It is a beautiful location I love to go to for concerts. Going to concerts there means, taking the local train to a station close to the place and then walking through the forest to get to the entrance. Left and right from the way are people selling drinks and Bratwurst, or trying to buy or sell the last tickets. It is a nice walk for about 15 minutes and somehow is part of the whole event as one walks with thousands of people going to the same nice event. To get in to the arena itself we had to wait quite a while, but we could enjoy it by standing in the sun and listening to what the people around were talking about. As this was one out of only 4 concerts in Europe on this tour, the crowd around us was very international. I heard many different languages, from Italian, Spanish to Polish and Swedish. Finally inside, we, a group of six, found a nice spot in front of the sound mixing guy (usually the spot with the best sound). Already the first band, Gomez, was amazing! I didn’t know them before, but I guess I have to add them to my collection.
At about 9pm, Pearl Jam came on stage, and the atmosphere exploded! 17000 people were singing along from the first tune on. It seems that Eddie Vedder, the singer, had a good monitor system, otherwise he wouldn’t have heard himself anymore. The play list of the evening was a nice mix of songs from many of their 9 albums. It was really really nice. Here an example song, some people are really quick to upload material.
One of the encore songs was “Keep on rockin’ in the free world”, written by Neil Young. Pearl Jam said, that the played this song often before, but never in Berlin. Due to the history of Berlin this song gets a very special meaning! All in all it was one of the best concerts I ever went to and I enjoyed a lot.
The next concert I am planning to go to is Billy Talent in Hamburg!
