So nice in Nice - The Stranglers in Nice on
November 27th 2004
Friday 26th
 It’s 5am in Berlin. My friend and me stumble
out of bed, take a hasty breakfast and make
our way to the airport. The plane departs at
7:30am. The flight is smooth and we arrive
in Nice at 9:40am. The weather is absolutely
lovely compared to Berlin. A bus takes us
from the airport to St. Maurice in the north
of Nice where we get picked up by the staff
of our hotel, Villa Saint-Exupery. We are
shown to our room, a seven bed dormitory
which we’ve got for ourselves because of the
season. It could be quite nice if it wasn’t
for the people who have to go through our
room to the showers and toilets. Fortunately
there are not too many.
We are provided with a long list of
suggestions about what to do and where to go
in Nice and its’ surroundings. We take the
bus back to the centre and then another one
to Eze Village, a lovely medieval village on
a castle rock. It’s comfortably quiet and
there are many beautiful small paths with
little shops and restaurants. On top of the
hill there are the ruins of the castle and
the exotic
 gardens. We get an amazing
overview of the coast and the mountains.
Next stop with the bus is Monaco – Monte
Carlo. It’s about 5pm. The sun is already
setting and we get a lovely view of Monte
Carlo by night with all those huge hotels,
the mountains in the background and the
Casino of course. After a few more hours of
walking we take the train back to Nice and
descend to the old town where we rest in a
British pub with some Strongbow cider. Not
much sleep due to permanent noise… these
walls are way too thin…
Saturday 27th
 After breakfast we take the bus to the venue,
Le Palais Nikaia, to meet with Aurelia from
Belgium. As there is still half the day till
the doors open we decide to walk down to the
beach where we arrive after a little detour
to the airport. Again the weather is lovely
and we try the sea which turns out to be as
cold as it looks… some people are actually
swimming in there..
Hunger is creeping upon us and we try to
find a place where the dishes are affordable.
There is a pizza restaurant close to the
 beach and we take a look at the prize list
outside. Aurelia is about to go inside, but
I’m signing to her that it is way too
expensive. An older man who is taking his
lunch alone outside notices this and tells
us that he’d be pleased to pay our bill. He
gives us 100 Euros just like that… without
asking anything…. really unbelievable.
So we get inside and have a lovely lunch
with red wine. Afterwards we go to another
pub since it is still pretty early. Pubs
seem to be for men only in this area, but
 who cares? We certainly don’t… We have
another beer and take the bus to the venue
afterwards…
We arrive an hour early, but there are some
football players at the back of the hall who
amuse us with their warm-up. Doors open at
8pm. The venue is the smaller hall of a
pretty huge modern building. It takes about
500 people and the show is sold out. The
stage is not too big and not too small…
seems to be just the right size for the
Stranglers. But first to the support act,
Asyl from France, this is my first concert
of the French tour and
 I’ve heard differing
opinions so I don’t know what to expect yet.
They get on stage at 8:30pm and they turn
out to be really good. The music is well
played and they seem to be a tight unit as
they easily transfer their energy to the
audience. The singer has a charismatic voice
and is quite a showman. Nice start.
It’s time for the Stranglers at 10pm. The
place is already getting very hot and as
always we are welcomed with the Waltz In
Black. Right on time JJ, Jet, Dave, Baz and
Billy Idol (sorry Paul ;)) enter the stage
with good spirits and the
 audience is
already into it very much. After the first
two songs the barriers at the front don’t
seem to be able to hold the people back and
two boxes have to be brought for support. I
take some photos during the first few songs
and watch the rest of the show from the side
of the stage considering if I should go on
taking pictures or follow Chris’ advice not
to… I must have looked kinda bored since
Paul makes some signs into my direction, but
that was not the case… I was just
concentrating on my options and after half
of the show I decide to get my gear back. As
most of you already know there are no
changes in the set list apart from Nuclear
Device, but the band put everything into
each of the songs and you don’t notice that
they’ve been playing them for a year already.
Peaches seems to be getting scarier with
each show. Paul
 manages to rip his trousers
to shreds during one of his jumps. After
showing this little change to the audience
he covers it up with his shirt later on.
After the first encore JJ holds his French
speech which is a bit of a cool down for me,
but probably only since I don’t understand
much…. Altogether it was one of the best
concerts I’ve seen this year. One could feel
the power the band put into the show and
that’s what they got back from the audience…
It was great to hear Nuclear Device for the
first time.
After the gig we meet with Chrisinblack, his
wife Sarah and later with Paul to have a
drink and a little chat. We get back to our
hotel by 4am… Thanks to Aurelia for the
lift!
Sunday 28th
 3 hours of sleep… yawn… Up for a very sleepy
breakfast and then back to the city for our
last day in Nice. We descend to the old town
for some shopping and I finally find a
present for my brothers 16th birthday. Lunch
on the beach, a lovely walk around the
harbour, up to
 the city mountain with more
castle ruins and at last to the
old beautiful cemetery of Nice… After some beer we
head back to our hotel. On our way we come
across a huge number of police men near the
football stadium. It will probably be a nice
and quiet night… After being accompanied by
the police for some metres we finally reach
our destiny and drop to bed.
Monday 29th
 Not much sleep... again… We get up just to
realize that our plane departs in 40 minutes.
Don’t panic Alex! It's raining outside which
seems to be very suitable in this situation.
We ask the hotel staff for help and one of
the guys drives us to the airport. We arrive
to notice that the check-in has closed five
minutes before… Not panicking gets harder…
We book another flight for an hour later
which goes to somewhere in Germany at least.
Fast check-in and off to the gate… Due to
technical problems the flight is delayed for
ten minutes… for one hour… for two hours…
for six bloody hours! Oh the irony… We get a
coupon of about 28 Euros each to have lunch
on the airport. After looking for an
internet facility we head to the restaurant
and have a lovely dinner with some red wine
and Martini.
At last the plane departs at 5:30pm… to
Dortmund… we have to get to Berlin though…
The plane arrives two hours later and we
take the shuttle bus to the station and the
next train to Berlin. Everything goes smooth
for a change. We arrive in Berlin 13 hours
later and with less money than expected…
Sleep now… a lot please…
Alex
Click here to see
more photos of the Stranglers
|
|