Alphaville Forum - The Dreamroom - Concert in Esbjerg (Denmark), Jun 2010

Esbjerg (Denmark), June 5 2010 - Vognsbølparken - Esbjerg Rock Festival

My first Esbjerg Rock Festival was in 2007 when Alphaville were also on the programme. Since then I have been to the festival every year. This year the festival celebrated it's 20 year anniversary. The first festivals were more glamrock with bands like Sweet and Slade but 5 years ago they changed the concept to an 80s festival but kept the name "rock".

The lineup this year was Heaven 17, Johnny Hates Jazz, Hit med firserne with guests, Alphaville, Boy George and Simple Minds. I saw most of the Heaven 17 performance from a distance and they made a pretty solid performance playing all their hits and a cover or two. Hit med firserne (Give me the 80's) and Boy George didn't exactly attract us so I won't comment on their performances as we roamed the festival area when they were on stage. During Johnny Hates Jazz we stood at the front right and witnessed a great performance. Clark Datchler still has a great voice and they played their biggest hits but left out my favourite JHJ song "Foolish heart" so that was a dissapointment for me. Simple Minds was not as good as I had hoped for....the songs they chose to play sounded too much the same. They left out one of my absolute favourites "Belfast child" which in my opinion was a huge mistake. They did however play great versions of "Sanctify yourself", "Don't you forget about me" and "Alive and kicking". Jim Kerr was too passive though and to me their performance was a dissapointment. I also think the microphone for Jim was set too low as it was really hard to hear him during the low passages....and sadly that was also the case when Alphaville were on stage.

We occupied some great spots at the front just left of the center when Alphaville came on stage. We put the new banner I made the week before on the board in front of us and we were ready for the show! After the usual "Martin Lister chant" we rather quickly noticed that Marian was in great mood and he was hitting all the high notes! The setlist was close to the one in Växjö and with no real surprises. I must say that I really liked the new live version of "Wishful thinking" which really rocked!!! It was also great to hear "Golden feeling" live.... a fantastic song!!! The audience was really singing along during "Forever young" and Marian looked pleased. Sadly it was only a 75 minutes concert.

After the concert we went to wait at the fence as Peter had made an arrangement with AV manager Christian Mielke to come backstage 10 minutes after AV had left the stage. Like promised he arrived and asked how many we were so he could make the nescessary arrangements. There were only 6 of us there....Michael (zipler), Michael (frenzy), Willy (wii), Peter (Krapplund), my daughter Sarah (11) and myself. After having fun with some securitypeople Marian arrived, shook our hands and was ready to answer our questions! Most of our questions were naturally about the upcoming album. Marian said that the album was almost ready, but that they might add more songs before it's released. The record company wants to release "I'd die for you today" as the first single but Marian wasn't sure about that. Marian answered all our questions and he even found the time to speak with my daughter. Before he left he signed the new New Horizons banner with a golden pen....

We all had a great day at the festival, some of us perhaps got a beer too much, but that didn't make it any less fun. Peter was his usual self chatting up people, taking lots of pictures and of course almost always with a beer in his hands.

As long as they keep the concept of 80s bands at Esbjerg Rock Festival I will probably come back every year....

Review by Poul E.

Photo gallery:

http://www.alphaville.org/gallery/browseimages.php?c=71