at last

i've been waiting five days to be
able to post something, being a new member.

so although this is a little overdue, here are
some personal thoughts on the first melbourne concert.

P and NPG took the stage at about 9pm
I was sitting in the stands, fifth row in, eight
seats along from the stage.

the show began, of course, as I knew it would, with
the words: DEARLY BELOVED ...
uproar from the full house, and I thought: this is
like the Beatles in 1964 (not that i was there for that)
somewhere in the midst of this opening monologue, P
included the word "Australia"

he didn't talk about the afterlife, though: the 'something
else' was changed to 'the truth'

other lyric changes later on:
I thought i heard him say: open your Bibles and discover
the secret

in a song that had him singing about selling his soul,
he said as an aside: 'never'

I stood up along with everyone else, and my legs were
trembling for the first ten minutes; I could hardly stand with the excitement,
which I wouldn't have believed would happen to me

the first three or so songs were fused into a single
musical work, as far as I could tell
in the midst of all this, there was an explosion, and
a huge cloud of tinsel/glitter was shot into the
auditorium over the heads of the main arena

at this early stage of the concert, P came over on to
the right hand side (where I was sitting), and you could
see him smiling; or perhaps trying not to: he looked
like he knew how good he was, and he knew what an
effect he was having on us!

early on, he also descended into the main audience,
teasing them a bit as to will I? won't I? -- but he
did; someone gave him a bouquet of yellow flowers
(i'm not talking about the big yellow flower that an
org-er threw on to the stage at the end), which he
took, and up on stage put it down on rad's keyboards

at the 35 minute mark, P took a breather: he wasn't
on stage; and (from memory) Renato Neto carried the
show for about five or so minutes, on solo keyboards

other memories: at one point, P had the stage lights
turned out, 'because it's sexier in the dark'
so we saw nothing! i hope this is one idea he shelves,
because it didn't work

at about the 2/3 mark, P was patting his face with a
white cloth, and went over to Rhonda on bass, and patted
her face with it too, which had her smiling; he eventually
gave this cloth to one of the ticket-holders sitting on stage

a lot of the time, P asked us to sing, holding the mike
towards the audience
and everyone did!
it was quite something to hear 10,000 people singing
"nothing compares, nothing compares ... to you"

after one of these singalongs, when the song ended and
we applauded, P said: no, it was U!

Soul Man was a highlight

above all, i was impressed by how much P was evidently
enjoying what he was doing

also impressed by his generosity to the other performers,
letting them take the limelight here & there

although one point that puzzles me, is that when he
went through the band, naming them all (and finishing
up with the words: 'we are new power generation'), i
didn't hear him name JOHN BLACKWELL, which i was waiting
for; but to be honest, i didn't hear everything he
said

at the encore, he spoke about two people he'd met
backstage, a woman who had been listening to him for
20 years, and was raising her daughter to his music
he dedicated purple rain to them, saying 'they know
who they are'

he also said:
'contrary to rumor, this is one song I don't never
get tired of singing'

including the encore of purple rain (many people held
up cigarette lighters for this), the show finished at
about 10.30pm

it was a little short, then, but i can easily say this was the best concert i have ever attended

Thanks for this report.
It is sweet.

Melody

thanks for the review and


welcome 2 the org !