Munich: Glitter and Shimmer - Thu 28th Jun
Munich: Glitter and Shimmer
28 June 2001
Gunter sent this translation of an article from 28th of June, from "Süddeutsche Zeitung" by Jörg Schaller. The original version in german can be found at:
http://szonnet.diz-muenchen.de/REGIS_A12537550
It took a long time until the ice broke. Rather long. But this was understandable, since it was more than 18 years ago that Roxy Music performed on a German stage, and therefore apparantly the band and its audience had to get used to each other again. The quickly fired " Street Life " at the beginning did not do the trick and for about an hour Roxy Music played through all these well known, brilliant tunes like " Out Of The Blue " or "Oh Yeah " which had made them trend setters between 1971 and 1983 in the departments of Rock, Disco and New Wave - and then of all things it was the composition of somebody else, that moved the audience in the Olympic Dome -filled to only two thirds of its capacity at the most- to a storm of enthusiasm. When Bryan Ferry sang the first lines of " Jealous Guy ", of this song of John Lennon that Roxy Music recorded after his murder in 1980, the distance between stage and audience was gone.
What followed was a furious finale with " Virginia Plain " and the encores " Love Is The Drug " and " Do The Strand ", the crowd roaring departure of Bryan Ferry, guitarist Phil Manzanera and saxophonist Andy Mackay -remaining members of the original lineup-and a curtain shutting again. When it had opened well over one and a half hours before, the high expectations as well as the big doubts were noticeable. What sort of a comeback would it be for a band which once had moved with the spot on stylistic sense of dream walkers between Kitsch, Art, Pop, Rock , Glamour and Avant-garde and moreover had accomplished the art of splitting up at the right moment - that is at the moment which brought the biggest commercial success, but at which Roxy Music was increasingly reduced to the backing band of Bryan Ferry.
They solved the problem by initially presenting themselves compact and rocky like a normal band, leaving a lot of space for solos by Manzanera and Mackay and moving Bryan Ferry in his anthracite coloured glitter dress jacket - which he later exchanged for a white dinner-jacket and, finally, a silvery gleaming dress jacket-only gradually into centerstage. Of course they had booked excellent backup musicians -from keyboard to percussions. And when all that did not quite do the trick yet, they played the right song at the right time . Even if that was a reminder that even at their peak period there were indead bigger ones around then themselves. But of course those ones were not dressed as well.
Article from 28th of June, "Süddeutsche Zeitung" by Jörg Schaller