Posts Tagged ‘st petersburg’

Cast In Steel Tour: Kazan and St. Petersburg

Paul in Kazan, 8 March (Picture by Oksana Orlova)

Paul in Kazan, 8 March
(Picture by Oksana Orlova)

a-ha played the second concert of their spring tour at Basket-Hall in Kazan on Tuesday, 8 March. The setlist was identical to Yekaterinburg two days earlier, although “Here I Stand And Face The Rain” was played during soundcheck – a song they have only played a few times since the 1991 tour.

Here are some YouTube-videos from Kazan:
Giving Up The Ghost
Sycamore Leaves
Living At The End Of The World
Crying In The Rain
Velvet    Lifelines
Mythomania
Under The Makeup   The Living Daylights   The Sun Always Shines On TV

Magne in Kazan, 8 March (Picture by Oksana Orlova)

Magne in Kazan, 8 March
(Picture by Oksana Orlova)

Yesterday’s concert at the Ice Palace arena in St. Petersburg, however, included several changes. Most notably ditching two songs from Cast In Steel; “Giving Up The Ghost” and “Mythomania”, in favor of two oldies; “We’re Looking For The Whales” and “You Are The One”.

This means that although it’s called the Cast In Steel Tour, a mere two out of twenty songs last night were actually from the new album – the lowest number of new songs they’ve ever played on a tour supporting a recent album.

The order of the songs had also been shuffled around quite a bit last night, compared to the first two shows.

They usually experiment with different setlists at the beginning of a tour, before it settles, so we’ll see how it evolves from here. Next tour stop is Moscow on Saturday. Keep an eye on a-ha live on Twitter, as I’ll try to live-tweet during each concert.

Morten in St. Petersburg, 10 March (Picture by Oksana Orlova)

Morten in St. Petersburg, 10 March
(Picture by Oksana Orlova)

One special thing about St. Petersburg was the local support band Red’s Cool, an “uncompromising hard-rock band”, which certainly stands out among the many support acts a-ha have had in recent years. Here’s a short video clip of them on stage.

Mew/Apparatjik vocalist Jonas Bjerre attended the concert last night, as Magne’s guest.

And there’s a great photo gallery from the show on Facebook, taken by Andrey Lukovnikov.

St. Petersburg setlist:
1. I’ve Been Losing You
2. Cry Wolf
3. Move To Memphis
4. Stay On These Roads
5. Living At The End Of The World
6. The Swing Of Things
7. Crying In The Rain (Morten & Tini)
8. Mother Nature Goes To Heaven
9. We’re Looking For The Whales
10. Velvet (Paul & Tini)
11. Lifelines (Magne & Tini)
12. Foot Of The Mountain
13. You Are The One
14. Sycamore Leaves
15. Hunting High And Low
16. Scoundrel Days
——————-
17. The Sun Always Shines On TV
18. Under The Makeup
19. The Living Daylights
20. Take On Me

On March 9th a-ha did a press conference in St. Petersburg. There’s a photo gallery from the event at spbdnevnik.ru.

They have also done a few more TV-interviews:
Channel 5 interview   ETB interview

Dates added in Russia, Latvia, Belarus and Luxembourg

An ad for the Moscow concert

An ad for the Moscow concert

Seven new dates on a-ha’s Cast In Steel Tour 2016 have now been announced:

6 March: Sports Palace, Yekaterinburg, Russia
8 March: Basket-Hall, Kazan, Russia
10 March: Ice Palace, St. Petersburg, Russia
12 March: Olympic Stadium, Moscow, Russia
15 March: Arena Riga, Riga, Latvia
17 March: Minsk Arena, Minsk, Belarus
27 April: Rockhal, Esch/Alzette, Luxembourg

Tickets are already on sale for St. Petersburg, Moscow and Esch/Alzette.
The links can be found on a-ha.com.

This will be the first a-ha concert ever in Luxembourg, although Morten performed there on the Night of the Proms Tour in 2013.

St. Petersburg concert, April 26th

St. Petersburg, April 26th

Morten ended the Russian part of the tour on Thursday, with a concert at the Little Ice Palace in St. Petersburg.

No changes in the setlist, which has been the same since the second concert in Novosibirsk.

But after Morten missed his cue (once again), Crying In The Rain turned into a real trainwreck – demonstrating how difficult it is to correct things when you’re using a lot of pre-programmed sounds.

Check out other YouTube clips from the concert here.

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