Archive for the ‘a-ha’ Category

Amsterdam concert

Morten Harket and Paul Waaktaar-Savoy, Amsterdam, 10 October 2010

Amsterdam, 10 October
(Picture from gooddayz.nl)

The final leg of the farewell tour started at the Heineken Music Hall in Amsterdam on Sunday night, featuring some changes compared to previous indoor concerts earlier this year.

The stage was basically a scaled-down version of the Norwegian stadium concerts, using parts of the butterfly-screen as backdrop.

The setlist also seems to have been identical to the stadium concerts – 21 songs starting with “The Sun Always Shines On TV” and ending with “Take On Me”.

Some pictures from Amsterdam has been posted by Sandra here.

For videos from the show, check out Malin’s YouTube clips here. She has also written a report on the WOTM Forum.

 
Meanwhile, in the UK, the 25 collection has entered the album chart at number 10, selling 10,835 units in its first week. It’s the fifth a-ha album to reach the UK top ten. Well done!

Royal Albert Hall concert / UK promo

a-ha at Royal Albert Hall, 8 October 2010

Royal Albert Hall, October 8th

a-ha played at the Royal Albert Hall in London for the 6th and final time yesterday.

Like in Oslo earlier in the week, they were joined by members of the Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra and played both Hunting High and Low and Scoundrel Days in their entirety.

For some high quality videos from the concert, check out the ones that Chris is uploading to YouTube here.

HMV signing session, 6 October 2010

HMV signing session, October 6th

On Wednesday, following a signing session for the 25 compilation at the HMV store in Oxford Street, the band did an intimate gig at the Heaven nighclub for 300 lucky competition winners.

The setlist (with links to YouTube videos by Chris):

1. The Sun Always Shines On TV
2. Train Of Thought
3. The Blue Sky
4. I Dream Myself Alive
5. Here I Stand And Face The Rain
6. The Swing Of Things
7. The Weight of the Wind
————-
8. Take On Me

 

Earlier in the day, they did a few TV-appearances on ITV. A short interview on Daybreak (YouTube), then an interview on Lorraine Kelly’s show (YouTube) and a live performance of “The Sun Always Shines On TV” (YouTube).

On Thursday Magne and Morten were interviewed on Loose Women (YouTube), and Paul joined them for a live performance of “Take On Me” at the end (YouTube).

a-ha perform two full albums in Oslo

a-ha, Olso Konserthus, 4 October 2010

Oslo Konserthus, October 4th

a-ha surprised the audience at Oslo Konserthus last night, by not only playing the Hunting High and Low-album, but also the entire Scoundrel Days-album – 20 songs in all.

Another surprise was that Paul and Magne had decided to change sides on stage for the first time since 1994.

Clips up on YouTube so far:
Take On Me
Train Of Thought
Hunting High And Low
And You Tell Me
Living A Boy’s Adventure Tale
Here I Stand And Face The Rain
October
Manhattan Skyline
The Weight Of The Wind
Soft Rains Of April

The audience of 1300 people included Queen Sonja, Princess Märtha Louise and her husband Ari Behn.

Aftenposten has an article about the concert here, while Dagbladet has a review here.

There is also a review in Dagsavisen (5 out of 6) and an article at popsenteret.no.

Dagbladet’s reviewer Sven Ove Bakke gives the concert 4 out of 6, and is not entirely satisfied with a-ha’s collaboration with Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra:

(…) Adding string arrangements to cool and quite minimalistic synthpop is a challenge.

The strings should preferably seek out the darkest and coldest corners, and bring out the underlying unease and dark melancholy that run through the early a-ha material.

But Kjetil Bjerkestrand’s bombastic, light romantic string arrangements did little else than rub the a-ha material with the hairs.

On its best, it gave the durable a-ha classics a sort of extra pomposity, predictably mood-enhancing, but not too annoying.

Luckily “Here I Stand And Face The Rain” and “Soft Rains Of April” – both strong endings on their respective albums – benefited from effectively sweeping and ending credits-like dramaturgy.

In the worst cases – where “And You Tell Me” stood out as a horrible low point – you got an overly sweet Disney-Christmas feeling.

Mostly, they were positioned somewhere in between – arrangements so dead that Princess Märtha Louise in the seventh row was probably the only one who got something of value out of them. (…)

On Friday, the audience in London will get a chance to hear the same concert at the Royal Albert Hall.

Just Loomis photos – now on a-ha.com

Passing along a message from photographer Just Loomis:

Thank you all a-ha fans who purchased prints from my website: justloomisahaart.com. This site is no longer live.

The time has passed to do this on my own and I now announce that I am happily working with the official a-ha site now.
If you are interested in getting a print please go to the official site.

thanks again to all that supported my site,
Just Loomis

BBC Radio 2 live session

ButterflyShoot_12jul10

a-ha are now in the UK to promote 25, which is being released there next Monday.

Today they did a live session on the Ken Bruce Show on BBC Radio 2 – their third live session at the BBC Maida Vale studios since 2006. In addition to playing five of their own songs, the band performed a cover version of Soft Cell’s 1982 hit “Say Hello, Wave Goodbye”.

Setlist:
1. The Sun Always Shines On TV
2. Butterfly, Butterfly
3. Analogue
4. Say Hello, Wave Goodbye (Soft Cell cover)
5. Take On Me
6. (Seemingly) Nonstop July (Bonus online track)

The whole show, featuring the live tracks and interviews with the band is available on BBC’s website for 7 days here.

 

On Sunday, a special programme about a-ha called “A Life in Music” was broadcast on Smooth Radio. The 25-minute radio special, featuring interviews with all three members, can now be heard again here.

 

In addition to the standard version of 25 there will also be a 3-disc Deluxe Edition released in the UK, which features a DVD with 17 music videos. Although not a complete video collection, the DVD includes “Dark Is The Night”, “Angel In The Snow”, “Shapes That Go Together”, “Butterfly, Butterfly” and “Take On Me” (1984 version) – all of which are being released on DVD for the first time. The DVD also includes the videos for “I’ve Been Losing You”, “Lifelines” and “Did Anyone Approach You”, which were previously only available on a 2003 Spanish promo DVD.

The 3-disc deluxe edition of 25 can now be ordered from Amazon.co.uk.

Oslo press conference

Morten at the press conference

Morten at the press conference

Morten held a press conference in Oslo on Friday, to talk about the upcoming concert in Oslo Konserthus on 4 October, where all the proceedings will go to the Christian organization Mercy Ships.

Also present was Lord Ian McColl, medical surgeon and chairman of Mercy Ships UK, who has done volunteer work for the organization since 1996.

Morten first heard about Mercy Ships one year ago, when a cabin neighbour told him about it. The neighbour, Erling Natvig, turned out to be the chairman of Mercy Ships Norway.

I couldn’t understand that I hadn’t heard about this fantastic project before. Therefore the most important thing about this concert is to spread the word about Mercy Ships“, Morten says.

They take care of people with limited resources, and heal them. It’s an impressive work.

For the concerts in Oslo and London, a-ha will be backed by 30 musicians from Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra.

This won’t be an ordinary charity show, where the program has been put together at the last minute. The audience will get to hear our whole debut album, “Hunting High And Low”, in a unique concert“, Morten says.

Links:
TV2: a-ha synger for sykehuskip i Afrika (with video clip)
Dagbladet: Morten Harkets giver-iver
VG: a-ha gir bort billettpenger til flytende sykehus
Dagen Magazinet: Harket hyller Mercy Ships

“Singin’ in the Rain”

Kristiansand, 11 September (Picture by Jakob)

Kristiansand, 11 September
(Picture by Jakob)

It was a rather wet evening on Saturday, when a-ha played their last-ever outdoor concert in front of 15.000 people at Sør Arena in Kristiansand. So instead of the usual Tchaikovsky intro we got Gene Kelly’s “Singin’ in the Rain”.

The roof over the middle part of the stage didn’t seem to be of much help, when the rain came in sideways. From behind a large protective plastic case, Magne commented that his keyboard had turned into an aquarium, while during the acoustic set Morten said that he was almost sliding off his chair, as it was so wet.

Kristiansand, 11 September (Picture by Jakob)

Kristiansand, 11 September
(Picture by Jakob)

But despite the weather and some technical problems, the show went ahead as planned. “We’ll try to do our part to make this night as memorable as possible for you“, Magne said before “Stay On These Roads”. The setlist was the same as in Oslo, Bergen and Trondheim – 21 songs starting with TSASOTV and ending with TOM.

Our very first concert in Norway took place in Kristiansand, back in 87. Thank you so much for inviting us back“, Magne told the audience at the end.

The concert gets 5 out of 6 from the local newspaper Fædrelandsvennen.

For Karl Oluf it was a special night, as he is originally from Vennesla, not too far from Kristiansand.

The audience sang along loudly and created a good atmosphere, even if the rain was pouring down. That was great. Magne was super-happy afterwards and Morten thought it was a special show, since Kristiansand is partly home territory for him as well“, he said in an interview afterwards.

Here is the first of my YouTube clips from Kristiansand:
Crying In The Rain

Kristiansand, 11 September (Picture by Jakob)

Kristiansand, 11 September
(Picture by Jakob)

 
The next concert is the Hunting High And Low-performance at Oslo Konserthus on 4 October. There was a ticket presale today; more info on a-ha.com.

 
And Happy Birthday to Morten, who is 51 today!

“It’s our gift to the audience”

Kristiansand, September 7th

Kristiansand, September 7th

Magne and Morten were in Kristiansand yesterday to promote a-ha’s last ever stadium/outdoor concert.

Fædrelandsvennen has a video interview here, while Radio Sør has an audio interview here.

There was also a TV report on NRK Sørlandet, which can be seen here (starts after 7.45 minutes).

Magne:We’re now ending the most grandiose stadium tour in Norwegian history in Kristiansand on Saturday, so that will be a special concert for us and it will be very special for those who are coming to see it as well.

We have lots of friends and family down here, so it will be really cool to put on a real show at Sør Arena. We have brought along the world’s most amazing stage production and I think people’s jaws will drop. There’s never been anything like it in Norway and I don’t think any other band besides us could have done the same. And I don’t think anyone would have been crazy enough to pay for such a big production for so few shows. You need to tour for a year in order to pay for a production like this. It’s our gift to the audience.

13.500 tickets have been sold for the Kristiansand concert so far. The rigging of the stage is being streamed live here.

 
And here’s a new interview with director Steve Barron about the “Butterfly” video:
promonews.tv

Stavanger, Tromsø and Trondheim

Stavanger, 2 September (Picture by Jakob)

Stavanger, 2 September
(Picture by Jakob)

The band had a busy few days this past weekend, with three concerts in three days in different parts of Norway.

Stavanger, 2 September (Picture by Jakob)

Stavanger, 2 September
(Picture by Jakob)

In Stavanger they played at the first annual Rått og Råde Festival in front of 10.000 people. The setlist (18 songs) was a bit shorter than the stadium concerts, leaving out the acoustic set. The local newspaper Stavanger Aftenblad gives the concert 5 out of 6.

I will be uploading some of my video clips from Stavanger on YouTube – here is the first one:
Stay On These Roads.

In Tromsø, 13.000 people saw the band at the Døgnvill Festival – where a-ha also played in 2007. Anneli Drecker, who was a-ha’s backing vocalist from 2000 – 2002, came on stage for a duet with Morten on Crying In The Rain. Many of the other songs can also be seen on YouTube here. The concert gets an outstanding review from iTromso.no (6 out of 6) and a more moderate review from nordlys.no (4 out of 6).

At Lerkendal Stadium in Trondheim on Saturday they were back on their own Butterfly-shaped stage, with an audience of 15.000 people. The concert included the full 21-song set for an appreciative crowd, despite a chilly temperature. Some reviews can be found at adressa.no and NRK.no. NRK also has a picture gallery here.

 
Apparatjik have announced their third concert, which will take place in London on 23 September at the Serpentine Pavilion in Hyde Park. More info on apparatjik.com.

 
And happy birthday to Paul, who turns 49 today!

Trondheim, 4 September (Picture by Jakob)

Trondheim, 4 September
(Picture by Jakob)

Magne and Morten visit Rockheim

"How on earth could you wear that, Morten?" Magne studies old a-ha photos at the Rockheim museum in Trondheim today. (Picture from NRK Trøndelag)

“How on earth could you wear that, Morten?”
Magne studies old a-ha photos at the Rockheim museum in Trondheim today.
(Picture from NRK Trøndelag)

Magne and Morten were in Trondheim today to promote Saturday’s concert at Lerkendal stadium. Adresseavisen has a video interview with the guys here.

They also made a visit to Rockheim – the new interactive center/museum for Norwegian pop and rock, which opened earlier this month. The a-ha exhibit seems to be prominently featured at Rockheim, and Magne found some early Bridges photos that he had never seen before.

They are both touched by the reception they’ve been getting at the Norwegian concerts.

Morten: “It’s special for us to be at home in Norway and be met like this. I’m proud of the band“.

Magne: “There’s a really good atmosphere, we can feel that we’re being embraced and that this means a lot to people“.

A video report from their visit to Rockheim can be seen here (starts after 13.30 minutes): NRK Midtnytt 31.08.10

 

Here is another of my video clips from the Bergen concert: Cry Wolf

Be also sure to check out Lena’s videos from the soundcheck (there are 7 so far):
a-ha Bergen 28.08.2010 Soundcheck Part 1

And Claudia’s videos from the concert, like “Crying in the Rain”.

 

Several fans have asked me to mention a new petition for a-ha to stream the last concert on December 4th online. So, here it is: petitions24.com/signatures/a-halivestream/

But, as Catherine writes on WOTM, management is already well aware that fans want the final show to be streamed, so there really is no need for another petition.

 

And here is an interview with graphic designer Jeri Heiden about the HHAL album cover: Uncovered: a-ha, “Hunting High and Low”

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