Image: EVA MANHART (APA)
The 49-year-old, who is currently on tour with his orchestral best-of album “XXV” to mark the 25th anniversary of his solo career, was in top form. Excellent mood, talkative and vocally convincing.
“Austria, are you louder than Germany?” Williams cheered on his fans, who were also getting on in years, after the opener “Hey Wow Yeah Yeah”. It should not remain the only comparison with the neighboring country. After a quick swim in the front row, he realized: “What kind of people are you? I just had a mother! One woman tried to put my T-shirt back in her waistband, another took a temperature! In Hamburg, on the other hand, we did two people touched my penis at the same time,” the former Take That star, who throughout the evening reported at length about the depths of his boy band life in stand-up comedy style, smirked his bare buttocks in a video leaked to the Take That debut single “Do What U Like” from 1992 (“It’s melted by now!”) and abruptly broke off a cover of “Could it be magic” when he saw a man on the 2nd tier making his way to the Toilet made, as Williams found out after a short chat.
Speaking of 2nd rank. With a view of the seats almost at an angle backstage, Williams invited four visitors to leave their “fucking seats” to be seated directly in front of the catwalk jutting into the auditorium. And so these fans were suddenly there when Williams talked about his break with the boy band and closed the Take That chapter with the Oasis cover “Don’t Look Back in Anger”.
The 90s in general: “Sex! Do you remember? That was something we did in the 90s,” he alluded to the very high average age in the town hall. “Today is therapy for me and entertainment for you! Can I show myself vulnerable?” The audience accepted with cheers. And so he performed the song “Love My Life”, written as a thank you to Spice Girl Geri Halliwell (“She got me through my darkest times!”).
After further therapeutic confessions (“I’ve been dry for 23 years!”), the music was the focus again in the second part of the evening and Williams performed ballads like “Eternity” and “Feel” as well as danceables like the Kylie Minogue duet ” Kids” and “Rock DJ” for the best. It got intimate again during the encores, when Williams asked a young woman in the front row what she did for a living, then had the canine physiotherapist give her an extensive massage and then dedicated the tearjerker “She’s the One” to her.
And then the evening came to an end after two hours with “Angels” and a concluding a cappella medley of the greatest hits, with the strong flashes of the many mobile phone cameras. Robbie Williams is back and it’s obvious that his fans loved it.
Source: Nachrichten
