Monday, March 23, 2009

23/3/09 Stockholm

We got up at 4:15 to get Amy to the train station. It actually worked too. It had snowed the night before, so there was a layer of snow on all the trees and buildings, it was pretty. I came back and slept until 9:45.

I went and mailed off some stuff for Amy and I grabbed a strawberry banana fruit cooler (like a Slurpee) at 7-Eleven. It was really good.

I then went and bought my shoes and a shirt, and I got 100 krowns off my shoes, so it was very worth it. I don't love them, but they'll be good for snow/rain and sturdier than my Primark shoes.

I got a pastry at the cafe that's sort of a part of the hostel I'm at (not really sure how that works) and went to where they award the Nobel Prize. It's at an ugly blue concert hall, I couldn't go inside.

Then I went into Old Town. I went into the oldest church in the city. The interior is from the 15th century, including a famous St. George and the Dragon sculpture made from oak from the 1400s.

I then tried to go to the Nobel Museum in the square with the well from the 1700s and where the Stockholm Bloodbath was (80 people were beheaded for opposing political beliefs in the 1500s) but it was closed on Mondays. Oh well.

So instead I went to the church where all the royalty is buried. And that was closed too.

Since I was close to the City Hall, I decided to give that a shot. It was open, but only for tours. There was a tour in English in about a half hour, so I wandered around and came back in time for the tour.

The City Hall's blue room is where they have the huge Nobel Prize reception. It is just sort of a big open room. The rest of the hall, the political side, was interesting. They had some impressive rooms, including the chamber for debating (nothing like Troy's city hall) and the Gold Room, which is made in gold mosaic and used in the Nobel ceremonies.

I didn't really know what to do next, so I decided to go down to the Globe and get my ticket for the show, as well as try to run into Bob Dylan. It was a significantly longer walk than I expected. It went though the City area of town, and it gave a different look to the place. The Globe is the largest circular building in the world I believe. The Wings are going to open their season up there next year.

My ticket was in the 12th row on the side of the stage. It didn't look as promising on the map the guy had, like I'd be directly at the side of the stage, it would depend on how they had the amps and everything set up as to whether I could see anything or not.

I took the subway back to the hostel and got some things together before the show. I also made a fake phone call so that people could hear me asking 'my friend' for the code for the day, but they didn't answer. So I asked one of the people in the room, and they told me the code was 1035. I could come and go as I wanted in the hostel until whenever I wanted to leave. My plan was to sit around there until 3 and work on stuff while I had the internet (which is what I'm doing right now).

I was hungry and I wanted to have some real food, so I went down to a pizza place (it sounded really good to me) and got a giant margherita pizza for a good price. I really liked it, European pizza tastes differently than ours I think.

I then took the subway back to the Globe (I 'read' a Swedish sports section. They had NHL box scores, I hadn't seen one in a long time). My seat was actually not too bad. It was directly across from the stage, but I was closer to the stage than the people sitting in the chairs in the front of the stage.

I walked around the area, it was just like any other area. I thought about buying a Dylan shirt, but it was really expensive, so I passed. I came back to my seat and noticed that they had a black draping over seats all the way up the aisle, so I went to the second row, moved the drape over one seat, and sat there (I thought this was a brilliant idea). The Isrealis saw me and tried the same thing. It totally worked.

Dylan came on and played hit after hit. I knew every song he played, usually after the first word he said. I feel like this is the 9th time I've seen him (seems sorta like a lot) but it was the best by leaps and bounds. The songs were fairly traditional (other than the acoustic songs, which the band destroys) so that I could even tell what song it was from the music (a good thing). Dylan's voice was in particularly good shape, he didn't do much 'upsinging' and came through less barky and pretty clear.

The best part was that he wasn't stationary at his keyboard hunched over. When he was at his keyboard, he would dance around, doing a little leg kick quite a bit. The best part about my seats (which I forgot) was that Dylan doesn't look out at the center of the audience, he looks off to the left the entire time. So he was looking right at me whenever he was at the keyboard.

But he moved from there an incredibly surprising amount. He grabbed an acoustic guitar on two occasions and went out to the center stage to sing. But better than that (and something I'd never seen/even heard of him doing) was he would grab a harmonica and wander over to a mic set up center stage, and just sing. He was very dancey all night, even becoming sort of a showman when he was singing.

Of particular note was "Love Sick." It's arguably his best song in the last 30 years (I'd listen to an argument for "Someday Baby") but in between lines he had with him his harmonica and a mic, so he went up to the center mic and would do a little haunting harmonica in-between the lines. It was not only better than the original version, but one of the best songs performed live I've ever seen.

I was allowed (or just took with me anyways and used along with everyone else) my camera, which as cool. The pictures don't justify how close I was to him and how much energy he had. It was definitely a top five concert for me all-time.

After the show was over (and after the encore he never comes back out, which I know but no one else there did) I got up and tried to get down to where the bus was to see him. I didn't make it in time. He doesn't mess around leaving.

The setlist for the show was this:


1. Rainy Day Women #12 & 35
2. Lay, Lady, Lay
3. Tangled Up In Blue
4. Chimes Of Freedom
5. High Water (For Charley Patton)
6. Stuck Inside Of Mobile With The Memphis Blues Again
7. Love Sick
8. Desolation Row
9. Rollin' And Tumblin'
10. Make You Feel My Love
11. Highway 61 Revisited
12. One More Cup Of Coffee (Valley Below)
13. Thunder On The Mountain
14. Like A Rolling Stone

15. All Along The Watchtower
16. Spirit On The Water
17. Blowin' In The Wind

I came back on the subway and stopped at 7-Eleven for some more Swedish fish and chocolate racecars, as well as a fruit cooler. I came to the hostel and went on the internet. The first thing I saw was an announcement that Dylan is playing a show for 3,000 people (general admission) on April 26 in...London. I'm really excited. Tickets go onsale at 9 am on Wednesday. I should be able to get some I think.

I don't have to leave until around 3 am, so I'm hoping to get some work done before I have to go. I can already feel how tired I am though.

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