The next-to-last concert of the European tour, and at the same time, the last concert in Germany (unless they will play a festival in Germany after all …). I didn’t know the Gloria theater before, just from the outside, and I was pleasantly surprised – after I surpassed the first shock when coming in. The hall was great for Kaizers – an old theater, sloping down towards the stage, red velvet everywhere … just like in the opera, but with a standing audience! And it was packed (which was the reason for the shock when coming in); it was really hard to fight your way through the audience to get to the other side, were it was less crowded. But there it was easy to find a nice spot even just before the show started.

DJ Ralph Myerz warmed up for Kaizers – I haven’t mentioned him at all in my reports before. That’s because he wasn’t there before the concert in Berlin, because he was sick. In Berlin, Prague, and now Cologne I really wasn’t impressed by him, to be honest: They could have just played music without anyone on stage – that would have had the advantage that you could have conversations at the same time. The way it was, it was just loud, but not really interesting. Especially in Cologne the response to the DJ was really bad, and there was relieved and hopeful applause whenever a song ended. Not nice, of course – but I could understand it …

But then it was time for Kaizers – and they went full throttle right from the beginning. Totally awesome, I was overwhelmed! At the last concerts, they started out rather calmly and the atmosphere got better from song to song. This time, the Jackal talked and talked right from the beginning, and I could hardly keep up with taking notes. Very entertaining! But then there is a downside to everything – they couldn’t really keep that level throughout the whole concert. So this time, it started out totally amazing and then continued in a “normal” way. Which means that all in all, it was a very good concert, but if a concert deteriorates (even a little) instead of getting better and better, it feels a bit negative. Even though that’s not fair at all, because the concert was great.

All in all, I had the feeling that the concert was pretty short, and with just 17 songs on the setlist (for example, they did not play Svarte katter and Dieter Meyers, and these are extra long songs), the concert was definitely shorter than usual. I suspect that they had less time than usual because they had to leave as soon as possible – Copenhagen isn’t really that close.

The setlist:

• Aldri vodka, Violeta
• Det polaroide liv
• Tusen dråper regn
• Din kjole lukter bensin, mor
• En for orgelet, en for meg
• I ett med verden
• Støv og sand
• Sigøynerblod
• Ompa til du dør
• Bøn fra helvete
• Forloveren
• Philemon Arthur & the Dung
• Kontroll på kontinentet
• Min kvite russer
• Maestro
  ———–
• KGB
• Begravelsespolka

And since there was so much happening especially in the beginning, here’s just a list of my notes:

– In the part of Det polaroide liv where the Jackal sings all alone, the audience started clapping this time – also through his “breathing pause”. As a result, he started breathing on the beats, which didn’t sound healthy. *g*

– “We’ve played in Cologne before, and we know you can sing, clap, and dance – all at the same time!”

– Already after the third song they got questions from the audience. Even though they usually take questions later on in the set! The first question: “Why don’t you play in Hamburg this time?” First, the Jackal pointed out that he doesn’t really need to answer that question. But okay, so … uh … well, why don’t they, actually? Hellraizer saved him: “We thought this was Hamburg?” And the Jackal managed to get back to the concert in an elegant way: “That was a good question, but … now we are in Cologne!” Cheers from the audience – and all was well. *g*

– Next up was a duet – or, to be precise, the first duet of ten! Which made Hellraizer protest at first, but of course he did sing along in Din kjole lukter bensin, mor.

– After Støv og sand and before Sigøynerblod, the Jackal explained: “Not only can we play the blues, but also East-European gypsy music!” – and that was very well received, of course.

– At the end of that song, in the “for hans far” part, the Jackal somehow messed up the lyrics and saved himself by singing something about which father he was talking about – well, not his father, but his father’s father, and so on. Very funny. *g*

– After Ompa til du dør: “That was an old song – just like you!” And with that the Jackal pointed at someone in the audience, who he also addressed again later in the concert – not really that nice, uhem. *g* But it was true, all in all the audience was rather old at that concert.

– By the way: Bøn fra helvete contained duet number 6 of 10. *g*

– After the barrel part in Bøn fra helvete, the Jackal and Omen started arguing/fighting somehow. It ended in Omen using the crowbar as sword and waving it in the air – you just had to be reminded of Star Wars. *lol*

– Jackal before Forloveren: “I like the old songs and the old fans, but I love the new songs and the new fans!”

– In Forloveren, the Jackal stabbed Hellraizer with the mike again, and Hellraizer tumbled off stage (but a beer made him feel better quickly *g*), and in the middle of the song, the Jackal tested his golf skills (like he already did at some other concerts), shooting an imaginary golf ball into the audience. And he also did the “tsch-k-tsch-k” – “It sounds like jazz – I don’t like it” again.

– Before Philemon Arthur: “And now back to the old songs, back to the old songs” – my interpretation is that Kaizers consider everything that they did not play in the opera and that is thus fresh in their minds as an “old song”.

– After his solo in Kontroll på kontinentet, Killmaster complained that his guitar was broken – all show, of course.

– “The next song was written on the roof of the biggest Norwegian pop star, Morten Abel. I had my pump organ up on his roof for a while – long story, don’t ask – and composed two songs there. One I won’t tell you. The other one is the one which will follow now: Min kvite russer!”

– The singing part worked much better than in Prague, it was both louder and more confident. But it seems like more and more women refuse to squeak “kvit kvit” – maybe it is time to switch the roles? =;-) But the Jackal cheered us on: “Allez allez! Use your stomach!” And the entertaining improvisations by the Jackal didn’t cause any problem for the audience this time.

– When they came back for the encores, Hellraizer imitated Omen again and followed him in sync – until Omen suddenly turned around and faced him, catching him in the act, which caused Hellraizer to duck and wander off disappointedly.

– Not sure what the Jackal was thinking about during Begravelsespolka – definitely not about the lyrics. He actually sang one of the lines three times, and there wasn’t really that much that was correct of the rest of the lyrics either. But that didn’t matter, and I doubt anyone noticed – and of course the audience loved the song!

All in all, another great concert, even though it felt a bit hurried in the end.