Poets of the Fall – MS Baltic Princess; November 25th 2016
The gig at MS Baltic Princess cruising between Turku and Stockholm was another one of those concerts I had not originally planned, booked on a whim and then loved so much more than I had expected. It was announced rather late and I didn’t feel like spending two vacation days on a cruise until S. told me she was going. I spontaneously booked and never regretted it. They played the full tour setlist and the concert was so much fun I would not have wanted to miss it.
Since the noon flight was just a little too late to make it to Turku with time to spare I decided to save me the stress and go early. That meant being at the airport at 4:30 am, but I could luckily sleep on the plane. Got to Turku with no trouble, had some food and met my friends at the harbor. In the past three years I have learned to live healthier than I used to, especially on tour. Thus, when I had a falafel burger for dinner I didn’t enjoy it at all. Seems I lost the taste for that type of fast food. Nice. 😀 Anyway, at the harbor we chatted, waited, joked, watched people.
We finally got in and agreed to be back at the venue a little after 9 pm. All of us went to our respective cabins, I rested a bit and was back at the club before time. The guys were soundchecking still so I stayed at the back, not wanting to bother them. It was nice hearing them and when they were done half of them walked past me, saying hello with Ollie giving me a big hug. <3 Since this was my 150th concert I had a sign prepared to let them know. First though, we sat down and waited, expecting a house band to play like they usually do before the main gig of the evening. At 22:30 we realized that was not going to happen ad took our spots in front row – that was easy. 🙂 I remembered I had tape in my bag so I taped my “This is my 150th Poets of the Fall concert” sign to the railing. Hands free 😀
There were not all that many people and none of the huge number of partying students we had seen enter the ship earlier. I had feared lots of drunk people, but this was a good crowd. Not that many familiar faces, but S., Z., S., H. by my side and some more around. M. and S. were on the left, having brought pom poms. Nice! 😀 I had my camera with me, but did not lift it up even once, just enjoyed the show. It is nice to alternate between picture taking nights and off nights. 🙂 Feeling considerably better and more balanced than the previous week I enjoyed the show to the fullest from the moment the intro started until the last note of ‘Children of the Sun’ rang out, feeling nothing but love and having no distracting thoughts in my head this time. There was only happiness and positive energy. 😀
Ollie and Jani spotted my sign right away (largely thanks to S. and Z. pointing to it) and smiled when they read it. Towards the end of the show Ollie came over to give me a hug and handed me a guitar pick. <3 The guys did not have all that much room to move, but made the most of it, even visiting Jari, who was behind a plastic wall as usual. Jaska and Ollie were both checking on him at one point. They also exchanged lots of gestures, like Jani and Captain patting Ollie on the shoulders as they walked back on stage after the acoustic part or Ollie waving at Captain in passing. I think it was Jaska who walked over to Captain with a towel and wiped his brow after a solo. 🙂
Marko was wearing a jeans jacket with lots of patches and buttons this time around. One of the buttons showed a hand that was crossed out which Z. and I read as “Don’t touch!”. Neither of us did, but we had a lot of fun joking about it, when he stood with his foot on the railing between her and me, crouching down. I was very tempted to give him a slap on the butt, but didn’t of course and Z. joked about pinching his butt. Captain saw it, though it funny and dared here to do it, but she didn’t. 😀 We later agreed that making fun about it is perfectly fine, but actually doing it not so much.
For ‘Stay’, Marko asked us to use the white lights on our phones, but I got out my lighter instead. Held it up until some security guy came to my all panicky and gestured for me to take it down. Seriously? I guess bing old school is not allowed any more. *eyeroll* Of course I might have set the world on fire or something. 😉 I think it was during ‘Someone Special’ that Marko went off stage and stayed there for the rest of the song. The audience loved it and I had fun watching the other guys. 🙂
When ‘Carnival of Rust’ was over and Ollie sat down on a bar chair I realized they were going to play the full tour set and not a shorter one as they usually do on the cruises. 😀 Everyone was cheering for Ollie so much that he shushed us before he started playing. It was beautiful, leading to a gorgeous version of ‘War’. Without any break the band exploded into Lift, moving all over the place again. Jaska, Jani and Marko tried to stand on the boxes in front which was a bit of the balancing act. Jani had the best footing, standing on two of them. but they all had a bit of a hard time and jumped off pretty soon. During Ollie’s solo, Marko was fanning air towards him with a towel. He might have needed it too.
It was such a fun gig, the audience brought great energy and of course it went by too quickly. Suddenly we had arrived at ‘Children of the Sun’ and I wondered where time had gone. What a powerful show! In the end, Captain even took an extra bow for me before he walked off. <3 It was a feel good gig, exactly what I had hoped for. Happily I hugged the others, everyone agreeing how great it had been.
We hung out for a little while, just to see if we’d spot the guys, but finally gave up and went our separate ways. S. and I spent the night with some great conversations, getting to bed way too late and we all met again for lunch the following day. This trip could not have been any better. 🙂
Setlist:
Intro: Shadow Play
Drama for Life
Daze
The Child in Me
Dreaming Wide Awake
Diamonds for Tears
The Game
Stay
Someone Special
Sleep
Running Out of Time
Once Upon a Playground Rainy
Locking Up the Sun
Carnival of Rust
Encore
War
Lift
Children of the Sun
Clearview tour 2016/17: 6 gigs down, 18 to go, next stop: Hamburg