Iron Maiden, Ullevi Stadium, Gothenburg. - Best. Show. Ever.

[Azvareth]

[disclaimer: if you don't like long posts with poor grammar, you should probably stop reading now.]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Okay. Now you're probably thinking "umm dude, get a journal!"... well, the thing is, nobody reads those journals. And I'm thinking that this was a pretty interesting event, and I'm sure we have at least a few Maiden fans here, thus I don't see any reason why I shouldn't type and submit this. If anybody disagrees, feel free to do so via PM. :)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Right, now that we've got that out of the way, I just got home from the show (it was yesterday, the 9th of July), so, for you who are interested, I'll give you some background info, some "station" info (i.e how Gothenburg was), and concert info (how the concert was, the setlist, supportband, blah blah). So if you're lazy and only interested in the concert, skip to the part labelled "Concert" in big, bolded letters.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Background info: My mate's dad knows a guy who had some spare Iron Maiden concert tickets, so he offered him them; they obviously had to pay him however much they cost (which was 450 SEK, but my mate's dad made it 500 SEK as a sign of gratitute). They bought three tickets: one for the dad, one for my mate, and an extra one for my mate in case he wanted to bring a friend, which he did. Well, to cut a long story short, he picked me to follow with, since we've gone to a lot of concerts together, and always had a great time.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

However, the concert was in Gothenburg which is about 500-600 miles from Stockholm (~6 hours by car), so we had to book a hotel and stuff beforehand. Which wasn't the easiest thing to do, almost every hotel were fully booked, but fortunately we managed to find three single rooms in a four-star hotel, for the timid price of 700 SEK (and no, I won't bother estimating the american, euro or brittish value -.- -- but last time I checked, 7 SEK were worth 1 american dollar, 9 SEK worth 1 EUR, and 13 SEK worth 1 pound) for one night. But it was worth it, the rooms were great and we didn't have to bother with fixing breakfast the next morning, since they had a breakfast-buffet. So yeah, definitely worth it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Anyway, the six-hour drive felt like nothing, thanks to the car having a great AC system, it was literally boiling outside. They had also brought a bunch of Maiden albums, both live and studio ones, which we listened to the entire drive to (and from) Gothenburg, full blast. ;P

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

"Station" info (excuse my vocabulary, I've barely slept anything): When we arrived at Gothenburg the first thing we saw was Ullevi Stadium, and outside around 200+ fans waiting, some 6 hours before the show started.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It was a serious Maiden-craze in the town. Just about every person you saw walking down the street wore a Maiden shirt, every pub, caf̮̩̉̉, restaurang, CD-store and whatnot played their CDs, there were posters everywhere, they were selling Iron Maiden tour t-shirts here and there (they cost 200 SEK less, so we bought ours there). And most/all of the CD-stores had reduced the prize on all Maiden CDs + special offers, "Buy an Iron Maiden CD, get a poster, sticker or plectrum". I bought one and picked the Iron Maiden tour-plectrum. :P

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We walked around the town for an hour or to, buying a new can of soda or water each time we walked past a candy store or whatever. It was really, really hot!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After that, we headed back to the hotel to fresh up, and get ready to go out eating and later head to the stadium, where the concert would take place.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

However, on our way to the hotel, we passed this other hotel, and what do you know, one of the guitarists stood outside, Janick Gers. It took a while for me to make the connection: "blonde long curly-haired guy signing stuff... hmmm...". Anyway, by the time I had made that connection, and was about to fetch something for him to write on, he hurried inside the hotel. Everything happened very fast... maybe 10 seconds or something, and he was gone. And he seemed eager to get inside the hotel though, probably not wanting to cause mass crowd of people wanting to speak with him, getting stuffs signed or whatever, so I didn't want to run after and bother him.

 

 

 

Still... it would've been cool to have an Iron Maiden tour t-shirts signed by one of the Three Amigos.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The concert

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A 360-degree picture of Ullevi Stadium (requires Java plug-in).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We headed to it about 2 hours after they had opened the doors, since we had seats it didn't really matter (nobody used them though :P ). There was probably a 2 km long line of Maiden fans paving the way to the stadium, pretty sweet.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Right, so after taking our seats on the - if you would stand on the stage, and face the crowd - right grandstand. If you've clicked on the above link, slant the camera to the left, and a bit up, and in the middle somewhere - that's our seats. So we saw everything pretty well from up there.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After waiting there for about an hour, and the Stadium being half-filled with people, the supportband, In Flames, entered the stage. They put on a pretty great show, and it's definitely a really good live band. I can't really tell you their setlist, because I'm not really a big fan of the band, but two of the songs I know they did was "Clouds Connected" and "Trigger", both very good songs.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

They played for about an hour or so.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Now more and more people began entering the stadium.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

25 minutes later, at 9.15 PM, the fences on both sides of the stadium, closest to the stage opened, and the people with the "special tickets" were let in (they were allowed to the area closest to the stage, with a small fence behind them). They all ran as fast as they could to get as close to the stage as possible. A few even fell over while running. It was really cool to see. That was when the swedish TV channel SVT started broadcasting (my parents were taping it), and a few moments later, the band entered the stage. With 57,000 people in the audience.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here's the setlist:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

- Murders In The Rue Morgue

 

 

 

- Another Life

 

 

 

- Prowler

 

 

 

- The Trooper

 

 

 

- Remember Tomorrow

 

 

 

- Run To The Hills

 

 

 

- Wrathchild

 

 

 

- Revelations

 

 

 

- Where Eagles Dare

 

 

 

- Die With Your Boots On

 

 

 

- Phantom Of The Opera

 

 

 

- The Number Of The Beast

 

 

 

- Hallowed Be Thy Name

 

 

 

- Iron Maiden

 

 

 

 

 

 

BONUS:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

- Running Free (<-- if anybody here was there, or if you watched it on the telly - this was without a doubt the best song that evening. The entire audience sang along as loud as they could)

 

 

 

- Drifter

 

 

 

- Sanctuary

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As you might've noticed, they only did old Maiden songs. After the first song, Bruce announced that they were only going to do songs from the first four albums, and this will be the last time the play most of them. So it was, on one hand, kinda' sad, because the majority of the songs are classics, songs that made Iron Maiden to the legends they are, but on one hand it felt kinda' sweet to be picked as the select few who had the opportunity to experience some of them live for the last time.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

They also informed us that they will enter the studio next winter and start recording a new studio album! :)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I still am amazed how having three guitarists in a band, yet they sound freaking awesome, even live. One would think that it would make the riffs sound "clumsy" or whatever. And it's all true what they say, Iron Maiden is definitely a live band. Bruce [bleep]inson was running back and forth, jumping over speakers, trying to steal one of the cameras -- heck, even the drummer, Nicko McBrain, was crazy; sitting there laughing and doing weird funny faces, not looking where he's drumming half of the time. Cool character, that one.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

All in all, it was a freaking awesome concert. I naturally had a freaking blast, and I could tell the band was too.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

So, if I wasn't before, I am now definitely a real Maiden fan.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After the show ended, we all exited the stadium singing along to "Always look on the bright side of life".

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

// Azvi.

[knives669]

Awesome. :D I've always wanted to go to Gothenburg, and I've wanted to see Maiden live.

[Sir_Alex85]

Nice dude. Iron Maiden rocks!

 

 

 

I've also wanted to see Maiden live... They came to a city by me, but my parents are strict... and think I'm to young. Meh. :D

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

(Man. And Motley Crue's coming here in August.. and my big brother's going. Raaaaaarrrrgh)

[Rizla]

Glad you enjoyed them, i saw Maiden in December of 2003 and they were awesome. I'm not a huge fan or anything but they put on one hell of a live show.

[Azvareth]

Cheers!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yeah, it was insane. You could hear the people at the stadium making noise several kilometers away.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And man, 56,022 people can be loud -- inbetween some songs, when we were shouting, clapping, whistling, generally causing mayhem, I took out my earplugs for a second, but I immediately had to put them back in, in order to keep my hearing intact. :P

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

But after seeing the concert on tape, it's obvious that they didn't have any microphones placed out among the audience (which is also true, so it was some 100x louder), and the git to director managed to miss capturing several guitar solos, as well as the stuff Bruce did to pep up the audience; mostly filming the back of the peoples' heads or other stupid things. :sigh:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Ah well, proves to show that you should really see Maiden live, not on radio or TV. :P

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

// Azvi.

[How2PK]

Sounds like got an amazing time Azvy! Once in a lifetime experience this is, if they really don't play the older songs anymore!

[Pyro]

I watched it on TV, and it was cool indeed. I wasn't that much of a fan of the setlist though, but the performance was awesome.

[Tynnhammar]

I watched it on TV, and it was cool indeed. I wasn't that much of a fan of the setlist though, but the performance was awesome.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Oh, and I thought it was almost the best of the best :).

[council_tax]

Sounds like you had an ausome time there man, im going to see them in august at Reading festival. looking forward to it already and after reading that makes me even more excited.