Rockwave Festival 2023 - Robbie Williams, Mika & Leon Of Athens

I try to avoid Rockwave Festival if I can help it. The reason is of course Terra Vibe. The worst location for concerts in Greece. To the artists appearing it may seem beautiful, but for us who have to find a way to get there and most of all, a way to get out of there, it's horrible. But this year's proposition was really interesting. Now, Robbie Williams alone wouldn't have tempted me. It was the inclusion of Mika that made me take the plunge. And the appearance of Leon Of Athens just put the icing on the cake. We very rarely get to experience such a combination of pop acts live in this country.

It was with Leon Of Athens on my mind, that I took the first bus out to Terra Vibe to see him, the festival opening act. On paper, it looked as if it would work. However, the bus was late in departing and there was plenty of traffic on the way there. However, it left us close to the entrance for a change and I was able to get in quickly, run and catch at least what I believe was 50% of his set. I've seen him in so many different places in the past, so a festival appearance would be a different experience. And it was different, as far as the songs were concerned, although that was probably due to my being late. Plenty of new songs, so although there was no "Baby Asteroid" this time (at least not for me, I think he played it before I got there), I got to hear these new songs and my impression was that most of them were more upbeat and more danceable.

 

Next up was Jonathan Jeremiah. However, before that, I started wandering around Terra Vibe Park in order to get to the other stage, where no artists were appearing that night, however there was an exhibition there dedicated to the Rock In Athens 85 festival. were also shown on the main stage between artists appearances.

Having seen the exhibition I then went back to the VIP area (I usually get a VIP ticket when I go to Terra Vibe even if it means paying double the price, because as I had found out back in 2006, if you get stuck in the wrong area you may end up not being able to see anything at all), got one of the portable seats that were for the first time available for VIP ticket holders and then sat down to watch Jonathan Jeremiah. Hadn't heard of him before, but he seemed nice and most importantly, his set wasn't boring, something which can usually happen with artists one doesn't know and who are at the bottom of the bill of a festival date.

 

 

Then, finally it was time for Mika. He was third on the bill, not second, something which made me worry that his set would be cut short, but I needn't have worried. For most people Mika is "the guy who sang Relax, Take It Easy" (some of them also know "Grace Kelly"). I admit that I used to be just like them, until my ex showed me that there was more to him than that. (My favourite song of his is "Talk About You" from his 2015 album "No Place In Heaven", unfortunately not played at Terra Vibe). It's true that most of the songs he plays live are from his first album, but then again these are his biggest hits. And to his credit, his latest "My Name Is Michael Holbrook" is actually quite good. In short, even though his set, was shorter than it could have been and even though he was third on the bill, he managed to win the audience over and for the first time that day at Terra Vibe we felt as if we were at a big party!

Second on the bill, before Robbie Williams was James Bay. Well, not only is he more rock than pop, but the funniest thing was that I was going to see him again a few days later, not in Athens but in London, not supporting Robbie Williams but Bruce Springsteen at the BST Hyde Park festival! He wasn't bad and I'm certainly not the kind of person who detests it when there's a variety of music genres at festivals, but the marketing of music has lately become so homogenized and by that I mean that there are people who listen only to rock, others that listen only to pop maybe because that's what the industry and promoters think is what should happen.

And finally, it was time for Robbie. Everybody said that he fulfilled his promise to us at his last concert at the exact same place. However, dear organizers his exact words were: "Let's meet again in 18 months, shall we?" He said 18 months, not 8 years! What I what to point out by saying this is that Greek promoters will rarely invite artists on subsequent tours (unless they're called Scorpions or Depeche Mode). They think that if people have already seen them, they won't want to see them again. When Robbie Williams was speaking about "18 months" in 2015 he was referring to his  next tour. But as far as Greek promoters are concerned this was probably considered to be "too short a period"...

Anyway, Robbie was here and it's true that this was a different Robbie from the one we had seen 8 years ago. He had probably suffered from the effects of COVID, he was older (but then again, aren't we all?) and of course his set was different. Not shorter, but different. There were in fact fewer songs, but not because the set was cut short, but because he talked a lot between songs. And when I say a lot, I mean A LOT! About how he became famous with Take That, how he left Take That, how he became once again famous and successful again on his own this time, how he rejoined Take That, but most importantly how difficult a time he had had through the pandemic and how he is finally happy having found love with his wife and having a family. I didn't mind. It was like having a conversation with a friend whom you haven't seen in... well... eight years, even if the conversation was one-sided. And, if you ask me which of the two concerts of his I have attended was better, I would definitely say the first one, eight years ago. Better songs, more songs, but most importantly, because as we all know it's "never as good as the first time" because that first time, no matter what we are talking about, a concert or a kiss, is the one by which all subsequent ones will be compared to (and found wanting as Stephen King has said). I've said all this because I've heard another opinion about his appearance which came from my ex and that was that he was a total and absolute mess. Although I don't agree with it, I can understand that some people might not have enjoyed someone who certainly looked that he had aged and probably suffered during the last 8 years and instead of singing preferred to engage in conversation with his audience. However, what I don't understand is another, a third opinion that was going around on social media and other Greek websites that he had insulted Greek people with one of his jokes. My answer to this is that if, after all these years, you still don't "get" British humour, you had better attend only concerts from Greek artists from now on.

OK, so what about the music? Well, once again, the highlight for me was the same as the one from 8 years ago: "Come Undone". It probably has to do with the lyric "Because I'm scum, and I'm your son, I come undone". Also, this time we didn't have Queen covers like in 2015, but oh boy, what a cover we did get : "Don't Look Back In Anger" by Oasis! He finished with "Angels" and then went on to perform an acapella medley of his best songs including one which he didn't perform that night: "Me And My Monkey" which apparently is only popular in Greece!

When it was finally over and "(I've Had) The Time Of My Life" was playing from the speakers, I was thinking that I had enjoyed every minute of it and I went home thinking that this was the best concert I had attended in Greece this year. With hindsight, I'd say it was one of the two best on Greek soil in 2023 (and that's because abroad, there was Bruce...)

SETLISTS:
JAMES BAY
01. Best Fake Smile
02. Just For Tonight
03. If You Ever Want To Be in Love
04. Wanderlust
05. Us
06. Let It Go
07. Goodbye Never Felt So Bad
08. All My Broken Pieces
09. When We Were On Fire
10. Get Out While You Can
11. Pink Lemonade
12. Craving
13. Hold Back The River

ROBBIE WILLIAMS
01. Hey Wow Yeah Yeah
02. Let Me Entertain You
03. Land Of 1000 Dances
04. Monsoon
05. Strong
06. Come Undone
07. Could It Be Magic
08. Don't Look Back In Anger
09. The Flood
10. Love My Life
11. Eternity
12. Candy
13. Feel
14. Kids
15. Rock DJ
Encore:
16. No Regrets
17. She's The One
18. Angels
19. Acapella Medley : Feel/Let Me Entertain You/Come Undone/Angels/Me And My Monkey

 

Rockwave Festival 2018 - Day 3 - Iron Maiden

Day 3 of Rockwave Festival 2018 came on the next day after Day 2 (and 14 days after Day 1 by the way). The problem was that it was also two days after my return from Rome where I had seen Little Steven And The Disciples Of Soul and Roger Waters. Would I be able to get through another festival, once again at Terra Vibe? It seemed that I could. 

This time I wasn't planning on seeing any of the other bands so I left for Terra Vibe at a reasonable hour (not too late though since a lot more people were expected to see Iron Maiden than Judas Priest. (Indeed by the end of the night it was filled to capacity.) I arrived there on time and I went to my usual spot (the same one as the day before, which I know that it has good visibility since it has been used as a VIP area on other concerts) and lied down to relax with a beer.

When I was in my teen years, Iron Maiden, were, for me the third part of the Heavy Metal Trinity (the other two were AC/DC and Motorhead). I guess it's a matter of personal taste. I remember that back in 1983 I had bought "Flick Of The Switch", "Another Perfect Day" and "Piece Of Mind" on the same day. I had seen AC/DC twice, in 1988 in Lausanne and in 2009 in Athens. Iron Maiden I had also seen in Athens, again in 1988 in what is now considered a legendary concert. It was only Motorhead that I hadn't managed to see until 2014 in Milano, a bit more than a year before Lemmy left us. But I really wanted to see Maiden again, almost 30 years after my first time. In fact it was going to be 29 years, 10 months and 1 week, my biggest gap between seeing two concerts from the same band).

Back to the present and Terra Vibe, while comfortably relaxing at my spot, I also managed to see two other bands. Tremonti were first.

Then it was time for Volbeat, who I must admit that I liked quite a lot in fact. By that time I had already met again some of my friends that were with me on the previous day and quite a few more.

Then, a couple of hours (and almost 30 years later), Iron Maiden were on stage! Much more material to draw from plus a great stage show, with Eddie making several appearances.

I have to state that although Iron Maiden have a long history, their ideal singer, in my opinion is (and always was) Bruce Dickinson. Respect to Paul Di' Anno, they produced quite a few great tracks in his time but the best ones were from the Dickinson era. Not much to remember from Blaze Bailey. As far as a connection with the previous concert goes, it was great to hear "The Evil That Men Do" once again. Back then it was one of the new songs, now it was one of the golden oldies from one of their greatest albums "Seventh Son Of A Seventh Son". And from the songs that were not yet written in 1988, the best one has to be "Fear Of The Dark" a track that always sounds better live. In fact, I remember buying the live version on CD single back in the 90's.

The night came to an end with Bruce Dickinson singing, acapella, a verse from "Alexander The Great", a song the crowd wanted to hear, but the band had not planned it in their setlist. And so, with Monty Python's "Always Look On The Bright Side Of Life" playing over the speakers the last of my summer concerts came to an end. 

Thankfully, it looks like that was the end of Terra Vibe. The company that organizes Rockwave Festival has decided "to rest" and the new company that was formed by several of its former members has announced its first concert in the center of Athens. If this is indeed true, this is great news for Athens concert goers, since there has never been a more inconvenient place for concerts than Terra Vibe which is also a huge safety hazard. We will hopefully now spend our summers enjoying concerts instead of wasting time going to and coming back from Terra Vibe.
I now had 10 more days in July and the whole of August to rest. My next gig would be in September!

SETLISTS

Tremonti

01. Another Heart

02. You Waste Your Time

03. My Last Mistake

04. So You're Afraid

05. Catching Fire

06. Flying Monkeys

07. Radical Change

08. The Things I've Seen

09. Throw Them To The Lions

10. A Dying Machine

11. Cauterize

12. Wish You Well

Volbeat

01. The Devil's Bleeding Crown

02. Heaven Nor Hell / A Warrior's Call / I Only Want To Be With You

03. Lola Montez

04. The Lonesome Rider

05. Sad Man's Tongue

06. Slaytan

07. Dead But Rising

08. For Evigt

09. 16 Dollars

10. Seal The Deal

11. Let It Burn

12. Black Rose

13. Fallen

14. Doc Holliday

15. Still Counting

Iron Maiden

01. Aces High

02. Where Eagles Dare

03. 2 Minutes To Midnight

04. The Clansman

05. The Trooper

06. Revelations

07. For The Greater Good Of God

08. The Wicker Man

09. Sign Of The Cross

10. Flight Of Icarus

11. Fear Of The Dark

12. The Number Of The Beast

13. Iron Maiden

Encore:

14. The Evil That Men Do

15. Hallowed Be Thy Name

16. Run To The Hills

Rockwave Festival 2018 - Day 2 - Judas Priest, Saxon, Accept, Foray Between Ocean

Two days after attending the Little Steven And The Disciples Of Soul gig in Rome and one day after my return flight from Rome to Athens I was on my way to Terra Vibe for the second day of Rockwave Festival. What I was really interested in was the festival's 3rd day because I wanted to see Iron Maiden. The band I initially wanted to see on the second day was Foray Between Ocean, a Greek band, because their bass player (who used to be a member of Sorrowful Angels) was a Facebook friend of mine. The headliners on this day were Judas Priest and the last time they played in Athens was on the only date of the 2015 Rockwave Festival that I didn't go to. And the other bands were practically a who's who of 1980's heavy metal. Saxon and Accept. From the third day of the line up, I only wanted to see Iron Maiden. Taking into account the fact that tickets for both these dates were sold at a lower price, I finally made up my mind: I would go to both!
So I took an early bus to Terra Vibe on the 19th of July in order to catch the full Foray Between Ocean set. I secured a place at the very front of the stage under a scorching sun which turned out not to be a problem since they only played for about 30 minutes. And although I'm not a fan of this type of heavy metal, I enjoyed them so much that I even bought their album, copies of which the band threw at the audience at the end of the gig!

Next, I made my way to the other stage and to an area of Terra Vibe that I had already earmarked (and on other concerts is normally used for VIP ticket holders) where I could sit down between bands. And although I had arranged to go to Terra Vibe alone, it was there that I met several friends and colleagues (and even a fellow Springsteen fan from Cyprus) who had all chosen the same spot.
The first band I watched from that spot were Accept. And what caught my attention was one of their new songs "Koolaid", proof that they can write great stuff more than 30 years later.

Next up were Saxon. Now this is where I wondered how time flies. I remembered them as one of the bands of the New Wave Of British Heavy Metal when they were in their twenties. It was great to see them after all these years and people really enjoyed their cover of "Ride Like The Wind".

The next band to play were Sabaton on the other stage. I must admit I didn't know them, but my friends went up there to see them while I stayed behind on my spot watching them using the powerful zoom of my camera. Although the most impressive thing about them seemed to be their stage effects (all these fires), I quite liked some of their songs as well.

Finally it was time for Judas Priest. I get dizzy whenever I try to calculate how old Rob Halford must be (who, by the way, I had met at Tower Records in Sunset Boulevard when I was in LA in 2000), but he's still got it! And he managed to bring back memories of the 80's in great style!

What most of us were waiting for however, came towards the end: "Breaking The Law". I could even imagine Beavis in the audience headbanging along to it.

Considering I had just come back from a five day trip to Rome I reserved my strength for day 3: Iron Maiden...

SETLISTS

Foray Between Ocean
01. Lost Sky
02. Smiling Faces Of Vanity
03. Depression Never Ends
04. My Orient
05. Piece Of Life

Accept

01. Die By The Sword
02. Restless And Wild
03. Pandemic
04. Koolaid
05. Princess Of The Dawn
06. Up To The Limit
07. Analog Man
08. Metal Heart
09. Teutonic Terror
10. Fast As A Shark
11. Balls To The Wall
12. I'm A Rebel
13. Burning

Saxon
01. Thunderbolt
02. Sacrifice
03. Motorcycle Man
04. Strong Arm Of The Law
05. Battering Ram
06. Power And The Glory
07. The Secret Of Flight
08. Ride Like The Wind
09. They Played Rock And Roll
10. Crusader
11. Princess Of The Night
12. Heavy Metal Thunder
13. Wheels Of Steel
14. Denim And Leather

Sabaton

01. Ghost Division
02. Winged Hussars
03. Blood Of Bannockburn
04. Swedish Pagans
05. Carolus Rex
06. The Last Stand
07. Into The Fire
08. Sparta
09. Resist And Bite
10. Night Witches
11. Primo Victoria
12. Coat Of Arms
13. Shiroyama
14. To Hell And Back

Judas Priest

01. Firepower
02. Grinder
03. Sinner
04. The Ripper
05. Lightning Strike
06. Bloodstone
07. Saints In Hell
08. Turbo Lover
09. Tyrant
10. Night Comes Down
11. Freewheel Burning
12. Rising From Ruins
13. You've Got Another Thing Comin'
14. Hell Bent For Leather
15. Painkiller
Encore:
16. Metal Gods
17. Breaking The Law
18. Living After Midnight

Rockwave Festival 2018 - Day 1 - Arctic Monkeys

People say that we don't often get the chance to see new bands (well, newer than the usual) in Greece which are at the peak of their career. I had seen Arcade Fire in Italy in 2014, something I'd been longing for for quite a long time, so after that I wanted to see The Arctic Monkeys. I never thought that would be possible in Greece but when Alex Turner's side project The Last Shadow Puppets played at Rockwave Festival two years ago, I thought, "well, Alex can't you come back with The Arctic Monkeys next year?" Two years later my wish came true. And not only did I see Alex Turner again, but also his partner in The Last Shadow Puppets, Miles Kane.

I arrived at Terra Vibe in time for Miles' set, grabbed what I judged to be a good place right in front of the second barrier (so that I wouldn't be squeezed -much -) and then Miles proceeded to give us a good head start which climaxed with the cover of Donna Summer's “Hot Stuff”

Next up were Alt-J and all I can say for them is that they were interesting but what really caught my attention was their stage set-up and their light show.

But the anticipation was high for the main act and it was during this anticipation that one Arctic Monkeys fan complimented me on my Arcade Fire t-shirt (after all, both bands begin with the same three letters!)

What can I say about their set? Wonderful. A lot of people did not appreciate their latest album with its laid-back, lounge-y sound, but when playing live they don't disappoint; mixing the new songs with the older, more energetic ones with good measure. Not to mention that they teased us in the beginning with a false start!

The only drawback was the price of the tickets. However, I have seen even British fans complain about them, so we're all in the same boat here, not just in Greece, but in other countries as well. It seems that a Monkeys gig costs a little bit more. But then again, it refreshes the parts other gigs cannot reach. And overall, it is worth it.

As for Rockwave Festival, it turned out that in 2018, for the first time ever, I attended all of its three dates. My next appointment with it would be for something a bit heavier...

SETLISTS

Miles Kane
01. Counting Down The Days
02. Inhaler
03. Better Than That
04. Loaded
05. Give Up
06. Taking Over
07. Cry On My Guitar
08. Rearrange
09. Too Little Too Late
10. Shavambacu
11. Colour Of the Trap
12. Don't Forget Who You Are
13. Hot Stuff
14. Coup De Grace
15. Come Closer

Alt-J
01. Deadcrush
02. Fitzpleasure
03. Something Good
04. The Gospel Of John Hurt
05. In Cold Blood
06. Ripe & Ruin
07. Tessellate
08. Every Other Freckle
09. Bloodflood
10. Matilda
11. Dissolve Me
12. Pleader
13. Taro
14. Left Hand Free
15. Intro (An Awesome Wave)
16. 3WW
17. Breezeblocks

Arctic Monkeys
01. Four Out Of Five (with Brianstorm false start)
02. Do I Wanna Know
03. Brianstorm
04. Don't Sit Down 'Cause I've Moved Your Chair
05. Crying Lightning
06. The View From The Afternoon
07. Teddy Picker
08. She Looks Like Fun
09. Tranquility Base Hotel + Casino
10. Do Me A Favour
11. Cornerstone
12. Why'd You Only Call Me When You're High?
13. Knee Socks
14. One Point Perspective
15. Pretty Visitors
16. I Bet You Look Good On The Dance Floor
17. R U Mine
Encore:
18. Star Treatment
19. Arabella
20. 505 (with Miles Kane)