Vancouver, April 5th, 2013

Well, here we go yet again.  It’s time for another OMD tour and I’ll be blogging all the gigs I’m going to.  First up…NA  but  this time around, the tour is a bit different because it’s split in two parts due to them doing the Coachella Music Festival in CA so mostly west coast gigs for now.  And first stop…Vancouver Canada.

As it turned out, it was actually cheaper for me to fly into Seattle Washington (for those not familiar with American geography, it’s a state almost directly south of Vancouver), get a rental car, and drive into VC than it was to just fly into VC and rent a car so that’s what I did. This meant I had to drive thru Border Control….hahaha…yeah, so I’m in the car and I’ve got Green Day’s newest playing. I get up to  the first, er, check point where we are all having to merge into one lane that then opens up to about 5 lanes leading into booths which is where the officers will ask questions etc and ultimately stamp your passport and let you through. I purposely knew not to be headbanging when I got up there and put a more mellow song on but I guess me still singing along and slightly moving my head got the guards attention (or that I was a solo female driver coming into the country as my sister thinks since it happened to her too) but he stopped me.  The usual questions came, Where are you from? Where did you pick up the rental? And then the star question “what brings you to Vancouver?” I happily said “a concert :D”. Well he had sunglasses on so  couldn’t see his face but he tipped his head a bit and said “you came all this way for a CONCERT?”  YUP! 😀  But the guy at the booth went further…Who are you seeing? Where are they playing? Do you have a ticket? Why are you alone? Etc etc. When he finally got done and found out I was doing other gigs he looks at me and says “what are you a big fan or something?” 😆 😆 But tbh, he was professionally friendly and eventually gave me the ticket back (after thoroughly inspecting it) and stamped my passport so I was OK. I couldn’t help but think however, as I was driving away “thank God I at least got THIS ticket in the mail!” because I can only imagine trying to convince them I’m here for the show and not have a ticket to show. 🙁

Vancouver is a port city with lovely mountains behind it but also a lot of high rise apartment buildings and such for their skyline.  I had Thursday and Friday to see sights and though the weather turned rainy, I knew about it so came prepared with umbrella…and an appetite. My sis warned me about Granville Island Public Market. Any local Vancouvernites will know what I mean when I say WOW! 😯 LOTS of goodies to choose from and my hotel room actually had a micro and frig so I happily bought a bit extra to have for dinner and lunch the next day. 😀 The only bad thing about the market…their seagulls. OMG! I’ve traveled around so it’s not like I’ve never encountered aggressive birds so when I saw the sign to be careful when eating I thought “OK, I won’t leave my food”. But the birds I’ve  come in contact with prior hold nothing on the Vancouver seagulls! I came up to a bench and decided to put my plate down while I took my purse off from my shoulder and the bag of stuff I had bought from my wrist. Mind you, the plate was right in front of me, I never turned away but this darn gull by me just swooped in and before I knew it, was practically in my face snatching a bit of my quiche! 😯 Then his buddy decides “hey, good idea” and comes in for his share but I was able to snatch the plate up just as he was coming at it. UGH! Since I didn’t want seagull coodies I had to toss half of it out (darn bird got the center of the quiche) and as I ate the rest, the initial little brat had followed me to my new eating area and stood there staring at me with a look that said “you gonna eat that?” Um…YES, I am! Ah well 🙄 😆

Aside from those things, the two days were peacefully uneventful and I got a feel for the city while I walked around seeing sites. OH, one thing….I came across a place that was so me…Smile Diner! I almost fell over and though I wasn’t hungry, I LOVE smilies (collect them and am an emoticon/smiley fan… keep reading, you’ll see what I mean :oops:) I had to go in for a small bite. 😆 😉

So the day of the gig found me reuniting with a number of friends. To start, bouncing buddy Mark was with me, along with Kim who decided to come last minute, Kirsten, another friend who’s asked to remain nameless and Selina.  For anyone who read my Miami blog  from the last time OMD were here in NA, I dubbed Selina my ‘partner in crime’ because she was my extra pair of eyes and hands for getting the baskets in to the guys and crew without them knowing. Tonight, compared to that night, was quite boring for us LOL. It was great to visit as some of us had dinner first, then got in line in the rain for the sold out first gig of the tour. I wasn’t at the Vancouver gig last time but I remember Mr. M. saying it was one of their bests and knowing this one sold out again ventured  to say it was going to be great again.

Well, I’ve gotta say, I was really excited to see Diamond Rings and they did NOT  disappoint!  Coming out about 15 minutes early (which was great because otherwise we would have had 1.5 hours to kill from doors to gig) he immediately pounced out to the front of the stage and proceeded to churn out infectiously poppy tunes.  He was wearing sunglasses, a black leather jacket that had what looked like little spikes on the top of his shoulders and black pants, white shirt and his hair had a bleached blond top to it plus he appeared quite young. In fact, the entire band was young with the keyboardist who happened to be standing in front of Selina looking like he could still be in school. We joked about how old they were making us feel. 🙄 😳  At times he (real name John O’Regan so I’m just gonna call him John) would strap on an electric guitar and I had to laugh the first time because his strap was a rainbow…that reminded me of the old 80s waist belts…I’ll stop there before I totally date myself! 😳 Well, he was charismatic and spunky and definitely got the crowd going with hand claps, fun beats and calls to dance. I won’t mind seeing him a bunch of times for sure!

When he was done, the usual switching of stage set ups occured so I began my routine trek to the girls bathroom and back…fairly easy tonight even though the floor had filled up. I was sad to find that the crew OMD had had for the last two NA tours wasn’t the same as tonight. The only member I recognized was Merv…no Roger, no Ryan and I don’t know if Andrew is with them either (he’s usually in the back of the venue doing lights so I don’t always see him but I had to wonder). This made things seem…well…strangely foreign and unlike the second NA tour which really just felt like we were all picking up where we left off, this one felt like starting over from scratch. I’ll miss those guys! 🙁 (though glad to see Merv!)

Mark and I speculated that they’d open with Please Remain Seated but when the DJ music stopped and we knew things were about to start, the lights were still on. I thought that strange, especially since they started Decimal. 😯 But THEN they led it into Please Remain Seated and the lights went down…one by one the guys coming out like usual. First Mr. H.#2 and Mr. C. (well lit by Mervs bright flashlight) and then Mr. H. and by the time he got settled, they started Metroland. But not the radio single version, the FULL version! It was sounding awesome, a great first ‘song’!  Mr. M. came in during the intro, his back to us at first but he eventually turned and the cheers really erupted. This was going to be a good gig! 😀

Well, I thought Metroland went down fine but when Mr. M. got his bass in hand and they started into Messages, THAT went down even better LOL.  But then it was another new song. Mark and I hadn’t listened to spoilers so we were trying to figure out which it was…I had snapped a pic of Mr. M.s setlist upside down and figured I’d correct it and blow it up for later references so…says Dresden….Dresden it is. 😀 NICE! Another smooth transition from old to new.

Radio Waves was next and Mr. M. made mention that it’s from Dazzle Ships which turned 30 this year, yay!  The guys all looked really happy by the crowd response and it was great to see their huge smiles. 😀

Well, after that it was a must bounce song…HoM Part 1 and I was happy to see a bunch of others bouncing too including Selina, Kim and Kirsten. How can you not LOL (though I saw Mr. M. make the yawning sign to the crowd on our left so…)   So after that came the first of 3 Mr. H. songs and the screams from the girls (especially Kim and Kirsten) were definitely making a statement, welcome back! Oh, forgot to mention, when Mr. H. walked out on stage, he was looking extra sharp as he had not his usual  black tie with suit but a red (with what seemed like a sort of small black pattern) on. But anyways, FLaD was our treat and it was, as always, great to see him come front and center.  When Mr. M. came back in front he made a joke about IYL being a song you hate to love but in this crowd, there was no hating it, just loving it! Great sing along and when Mr. M. said “louder!” we obliged. 😀

Well, Souvenir started next and I got ready for the 1, 2, 3, hit A&M section….except it didn’t go down that way. After Souvenir a different song started 😯 and Mr. M. said “don’t worry about this one, just sway”.  Um…OK, sure. 😀 Night Cafe…yeah, definitely a swayer LOL.  I couldn’t help but wonder though “does this mean they’ll knock out JoA?”….NOPE! It was next followed by MoO…phew. 😆  By the time those two were done, the crowd was just in a massive roar that kept going on and on as all four guys beamed from ear to ear. Mr. M. looked at Mr. H. with a “eh…eh…” look while he pointed to us and Mr. H. just happily shrugged like “I know, right?! Brilliant!”. Mr. H.#2 was giddy and huge smile of surprise on Mr. C.s face too…yeah, OMD are back!

Well, the next song was probably my favorite of the new songs…Our System. Mr. M. introduced it by having us stop and listen to the intro which was sounds from a satellite probe that he then joked “THIS is what me make music out of”…yes we know, it’s why we love you guy’s music so much LOL.  It was gorgeous!!! After that, we heard, well to my ears it was a bit hard to distinguish but once the song started, I realized it had to have been Claudia and her ‘robot’ part. Mr. M. started speaking it “is your robot your wife or your wife a robot?” hahahaha. Kissing the Machine..OMG! I’m sure a few of you reading this have just fallen off your chairs…YUP, we are finally getting to hear that awesome song and though I was nervous to hear the new version (because the original is so wonderful, why change it?) I am happy to report it’s not much different…mostly the ‘robot’ part so..yay! 😀

Well, that was our ‘break’ and Mr. M., when looking down at the set list, proclaimed “oh shit, it’s all fast ones now”, tee hee. SiL took off and Mr. C. did his thing on the sax, then SMS. We had told Kirstin, Kim and Selina about the ‘congregational pose’ and as the song started there was a nice little line of members LOL.  Also a nice little hand shake between Mr. M. and Mr. H. in the middle.  Locomotion and SotSS were great fun, Mr. C. doing a fine job on his solo in the later (“Mister Cooooper”) and then it was the final hey ho…Enola Gay. Well, by this time it was apparent that the crowd had eaten everything up and the guys just didn’t know what else to say but continued thank yous for “being such a great crowd tonight”.  When it was over and the guys walked off, the cheering was continuous and I could hear some people saying something but Mark and I couldn’t make it out so I asked Selina if it was something in french. She couldn’t make it out either but said it could be. I also heard the start of the OMD chant so we joined in but sadly it never fully took off. Ah well, we tried 😆

When the guys came back out, Mr. M. again thanked everyone and said “this is why we wanted to start our tour in Vancouver!” Massive roar in response LOL.  There was the usual request for ‘audience participation in the clapping department’ and Mark got the mic for his “hey hey” moment..yay! 😀  Secret was next (hahaha, we knew that couldn’t have been one taken out…at least not here :wink:) and then it was truly the last song. Mr. M. had mentioned earlier that we had been listening to songs  from 1976 to 2013 but at this point said “no, I lied, THIS song is from 1976”.  There’s something so sweet about them ending on their very first song ever written together and as the song finished and the crowd went crazy, the guys came out and took their bows, clapped to us, to each other, and then as they walked off, Mr. M. and Mr. H. came together arms around shoulders and gave a little hug…so precious! They all were truly just thrilled and what a night to kick off the tour with!

Afterwards, it was time for post gig picture which is a Mark tradition, then hugs and ‘see you soon’s for us all except Selina as she lives in VC so this was her only gig. 🙁 It was great to see her again and Mr. M. had mentioned they’d hope to be back “maybe just more than 18 months this time” so…

So, my highlight of the night…this one is easy! The new songs!!! As I mentioned earlier, I’ve stayed away from anything on the new album as I wanted to hear it first when it came out ‘officially.’ I knew PRS as they did it in Brussels and Decimal heard once (by accident) plus Metroland cause…well, it’s their single so I knew they’d be doing it live. But all the rest were new to me (OK, not fully KtM but still). To me, that was something special! I’ve only been able to see OMD live since 2008 so I’ve never been to one of their gigs where I didn’t know every song.  Going in tonight…it was just such a thrill because I knew this could be the only time ever I have this kind of experience…to see and hear songs that  I didn’t know AT ALL! 😀  It was unique and special to say the least, especially Our System, that song is so lovely, I had to just close my eyes and soak it up for a bit (hahahaha, actually did that a few times during the new ones). I wish I could have that feeling again tonight but nope, it’s a one time thing but that’s why it’s so special…and definitely the highlight! 😀

So, it’s off to Seattle. There’ll be 3 of us in the car now and I’m hoping to get thru Border Control a bit easier this time. Mark and I don’t have real tickets for the gig, they never arrived but I’ll try to not get us stopped (maybe I’ll turn all music off when we pull up LOL :wink:) and hopefully we’ll be in Seattle in no time. 😀