Uli Jon Roth live in Athens December 2010

Up until 2010 I had seen Scorpions twice. The problem was that at both gigs they only played songs from their "recent" period (meaning from 1979 onwards). To be more precice, I can say that the carεer of Scorpions can be divided into 2 periods : The era before "Lovedrive" (until 1978) and the era after it (after 1979 when they changed both their record company and their guitarist). During their first period, their guitarist was Uli Jon Roth. He quit the band when he met (and fell in love with) Monika Dannemann, who, by the way, was Jimi Hendrix's last girlfriend (but that, as they say, is another story). Two songs from that period were extremely popular in Greece: "Pictured Life" and (mainly) "In Trance". And since Scorpions didn't play these songs neither in 2006 nor in 2010 at their "last ever" concert, Uli Roth himself came to Athens on Wednesday the 1st of December to play them himself.

 

 

The gig's flyer, which was given to me outside the Peace & Friendship stadium before the Scorpions concert, was advertising an acoustic set. But, as he told us himself on the night of the gig, he decided to get a band together and play an electric rock set.

 

He sang some of the songs himself, but he also had a singer in his band especially for the Scorpions tracks. 

And he played a lot of those as we can see from the setlist.
Support was provided by the Greek band "Leaving Tomorrow" who, among others performed a 12 minute song! 

 As for Scorpions... they would in fact return for an MTV Unplugged set in 2013. SETLIST: 

01. Pictured Life
02. Catch Your Train
03. The Sails Of Charon
04. Fire Wind
05. All Along The Watchtower
06. If 6 Was 9/Little Wing
07. I've Got To Be Free
08. Enola Gay - Hiroshima Today
09. Solo Keyboards
10. We'll Burn The Sky
11. In Trance
12. Fly To The Rainbow
13. Polar Nights
14. Dark Lady
Encore:
15. Kojo No Tsuki
16. Catch Your Train 

 

The Love Affair Between Scorpions And Greece

To be fair, Greece has a "love affair" with a few other groups as well. The most common example,(after Scorpions) is Puressence (now disbanded). Then it's James, followed by Placebo, even Depeche Mode. All these bands visit Greece on every one of their tours. And if, in the case of Depeche Mode, it can be said that they are popular all over the world, Puressence only have such a big fanbase in Greece (They even used a Greek model on the cover of their latest compilation album). And Scorpions of course. When they were asked to do an "MTV Unplugged" show they immediately asked to do it in Greece. They knew that in no other country would they sell so many tickets, even in the midst of a recession.

So how did this happen? I will try to explain it from my own point of view, they way I've experienced it through my teenage years at school. This was in the 80's (and please put your calculators away). Now school kids in those days would listen to different kinds of music, although Greek music wasn't as popular in those ages as it is now. Disco had been out of fashion several years before, so it wasn't a case of a "rock - disco" rivalry. Probably more of a "rock - pop" rivalry, or a "hard rock - pop" one. Scorpions were considered to be "hard rock" or even "heavy metal" by the Greek teenagers of that era. And there were those who would listen to music from both genres but only one was considered "serious music". So what was considered "serious music" back then? Well, definitely rock, not pop, and only certain groups. Number 1 on the "seriousness" category were The Doors. This was supposed to be because of "the messages" carried in their lyrics, but then again it could be because Jim Morrison was such a big hunk (Well, most of their fans were girls, so I rest my case). Scorpions did not have these big "messages" in their lyrics like The Doors but their lyrics (especially on their slow songs) were all about LOVE and that was enough to make teenage girls weak at the knees. And it was their slow songs that were most popular. Think : "Always somewhere...I'll be back to love you again..." (Everybody now : "Aaaahhhhh!"). Now, what about us boys? Well, those of us who were rock fans would rather listen to AC/DC, Motorhead and Iron Maiden, but Scorpions was the only chance for us to dance "the blues" at parties. So, what do The Scorpions have to do with the blues? Nothing. Neither did Bonnie Tyler or George Michael for that matter. But somewhere along the line something was lost in translation and slow songs of any kind came to be known as "the blues" among teenage Greeks. So, even if we didn't like the Scorpions, WE HAD TO LIKE THEM, because this was our only chance to dance close at parties with a girl ("close" meaning "touching").

Well, all those years later, those teenage boys and girls have grown up, most of them have their own families and responsibilities, many of them probably don't listen to music anymore (well, certainly not rock music) but when they hear that "Scorpions are coming to Greece" something seems to move inside them and they rush out to buy tickets.

So the Scorpions keep on coming to Greece. Somehow though, I always missed them. Even in the 90's when I was studying in Britain, they came for a UK tour and my Greek fellow students asked me to go with them but I couldn't for some reason (Probably I didn't have enough money). Finally in 2006 I decided to go when they came to Athens to play together with Whitesnake (and I must admit I enjoyed Whitesnake more). Well, I thought I was done with them.

The only thing bugging me was that they did not play any songs from their early years with Uli Jon Roth (eg songs like "Pictured Life" and "In Trance"). The next year, 2007, they came again, and they did play songs from that era, but I was abroad to see The Rolling Stones.

Finally, 4 years ago they announced that they were finally disbanding and that they would come to Athens for one final concert. Some friends wanted to go, so I went with them, but once again they did not play anything from their early years.

While waiting in line to get in the venue, I was handed a flyer announcing that Uli Jon Roth was coming with his own band, so I went to that one as well and finally got to hear those songs.

We all know what happened next. They decided not to disband and they came for 3(!) MTV Unplugged dates (And all 3 were sold out). So why did I go? Well, probably because I thought it would be something different playing with acoustic instruments and several guests (one of them was Morten Harket, the singer from A-Ha singing on "Wind Of Change" but I did not recognize him after all these years), probably because the show would be later released on DVD and I would have a souvenir, probably it was just a "WTF?" factor.

MVI_1642 από papdx

But I did go in the end and in a way I was glad because they finally played "Pictured Life" and "In Trance" in my presence...

Τζάμπα πήγαινα στους Scorpions τόσα χρόνια...

Εντάξει, όχι και τόσα χρόνια. 2 φορές στα 4 τελευταία χρόνια μόνο. Αλλά και τις 2 φορές παίξανε κομμάτια από την "πρόσφατη" περίοδο, που θα λεγε και η κουμπάρα μου (δηλαδή από το 1979 και μετά). Η πορεία των Scorpions, για να διευκρινίσω, μπορεί να χωριστεί σε 2 περιόδους : Την εποχή πριν το Lovedrive (μέχρι το 1978) και την μετά (από το 1979 και μετά, όταν αλλάξανε εταιρία και κιθαρίστα). Στη πρώτη περίοδο κιθαρίστας ήταν ο Uli Jon Roth. Εγκατέλειψε το συγκρότημα όταν γνώρισε (και ερωτεύτηκε) την Monika Dannemann, η οποία παρεπιπτόντως ήταν και η τελευταία κοπέλα του Jimi Hendrix.

Δύο κομμάτια αυτής της πρώτης περιόδου ήταν πασίγνωστα στην Ελλά δα: Το Pictured Life και (κυρίως) το In Trance. Αφού λοιπόν δεν μας τα παίξανε αυτά τα κομμάτια οι Scorpions ούτε το 2006 ούτε τώρα το 2010 στην "τελευταία" συναυλία, ήρθε ο Uli Roth αυτοπροσώπως στον Ζυγό την Τετάρτη 1 Δεκεμβρίου και μας τα'παιξε αυτός.

Το flyer της συναυλίας, το οποίο μου το δώσανε έξω από το ΣΕΦ πριν από την συναυλία των -αχέμ- Scorpions, έλεγε ότι θα έπαιζε ένα ακουστικό σετ.

Όπως όμως μας είπε ο ίδιος το βράδυ της συναυλίας, αποφάσισε τελικά να μαζέψει μια μπάντα και να παίξει ένα ηλεκτρικό ροκ σετ.

Σε κάποια κομμάτια τραγουδούσε ο ίδιος, είχε όμως μαζί του και έναν τραγουδιστή ειδικά για τα κομμάτια των Scorpions.

Από τα οποία, όπως βλέπουμε, έπαιξε αρκετά

Setlist:
Pictured Life
Catch Your Train
The Sails Of Charon
Fire Wind
All Along The Watchtower
If 6 Was 9/Little Wing
I've Got To Be Free
Enola Gay - HIroshima Today
Solo Keyboards
We'll Burn The Sky
In Trance
Fly To The Rainbow
Polar Nights
Dark Lady

Encore:
Kojo No Tsuki
Catch Your Train

Support έπαιξαν οι Έλληνες Leaving Tomorrow που μεταξύ άλλων μας έπαιξαν και ένα κομμάτι 12 λεπτών!