Glasgow, Nov 19 & 20, 2005 – The Final Farewell?

I arrived in Glasgow the night before the show. When I reached my hotel which was located right in front of the SECC I saw a handful of people obviously queueing in the blistering cold. They had blankets and chairs and were prepared to stay the night in front of the SECC! At first I thought they were queueing for Phil's show! However, I checked in at my hotel and went to my room. After a short break I decided to check out the SECC already before going to bed. So I walked back to the entrance. To my surprise it was still open though it was already 9.15 pm. I went inside and had a look around. As I walked past the box office I saw that Robbie Williams tickets for the concert at Hampden Park in September 2006 were going on sale the next morning. So it was likely that the people outside where rather queueing for the ticket sale start the next morning than Phil's concert 24 hours later. Totally relieved I could go back to my hotel and went to bed.
The next morning I could see that inside the SECC masses for queueing for Robbie Williams tickets but only a handful of people were already waiting for Phil's show. So I spent some time in the city and returned to the SECC at short past noon to join the queue which hadn't changed since the morning hours.
Queueing in Glasgow was a real treat compared with Dublin and Düsseldorf. We could wait inside the heated building. There were toilets, a café and a supermarket. Security staff was keeping an eye on the queue so no-one had a chance to sneak in from the sides. Even some people who had seating tickets and were just coming to us to say hello were asked what they were doing at the top of the queue!
The entry procedure was as organized as the queueing. A steward had told us how it would work hours before the doors opened. They would let in about 50 people at the top of the queue, guided by stewards so that running inside was impossible. Then they would close the doors for a moment until we had our positions in first row. Afterwards all the others would be let inside. So they could promise the first 50 people that they would stand in first row without a need to "fight" for it. And it went exactly as promised! Well done & thank you, SECC security!
The show started pretty much on time at 8.15 pm with the usual Souareba warming up the audience. The drum intro was again the slightly extended one like on the first night in Düsseldorf. On the opening speech after Don't Lose My Number Phil virtually didn't stop talking until he realized that it was getting a little long. So he said: "Enough of me, let's get on with the music."
Nothing much special happened until A Groovy Kind Of Love. Brad Marsh brought out the chair as usual but also gave Phil a little piece of paper. Then instead starting the song Phil said that he's going to do something they don't do very often – no, not Easy Lover but a proposal! The couple was somewhere in the audience and Phil should do the proposal for them. From the stage Phil could neither hear nor see them so in the end he said "Is this a 'yes'? I presume it is a 'yes'." Then he sang A Groovy Kind Of Love for them.
Another special thing was the bass pedal intro to In The Air Tonight that night. I had already felt that in Dublin it was powerful but this night in Glasgow it was even heavier! Brad Cole's girlfriend was standing in first row in the audience so maybe he wanted to show off a little.
During You Can't Hurry Love the band had a major fuck up! There is a short intermission thing in the middle of the song when the lights are dimmed for a short moment. Then – usually – the next verse follows and after that the song goes into Two Hearts. I think it was Chester who was a bit early that night to say the least. During this intermission it seemed like he already started Two Hearts instead of continuing You Can't Hurry Love for another verse. The whole mistake just lasted for 5 or 6 seconds but during the first 2 or 3 seconds it sounded so bad that I thought they would stop it and either restart the whole thing or continue with Two Hearts. But as they are outstanding professionals they somehow managed to get back into You Can't Hurry Love. During the intro of Two Hearts Phil ran around on the stage pretending to hold an invisible gun in his hands and aiming at some band members as if he wanted to say "Who's fault was it?"
On Wear My Hat Leland was the national hero once more. He now had a tartan hat with a ginger hair piece! He seemed to like it so much that he put it on again during his introduction at the end of Take Me Home.
The show then went on properly. When it was time for Phil to come down from the stage during Sussudio suddenly Danny Gillen appeared holding Nicholas on his arm. So Phil went towards him and made him sing Sussudio as well. He sang though it was hardly audible. As it was time for the 'one last chance to say the word' he even came towards me. Maybe he realized that it was unavoidable so one more time I got to sing Sussudio.After the band had bowed and left the stage it took a minute or two until the line-up for Always came back. So I knew which song would follow. Phil first did a farewell speech thanking the Scottish audience for supporting him and he remembered playing in Glasgow from the very early Genesis days on especially at The Apollo. At the very end of Always Phil said "That's for you, mum!" So finally, it was clear that June was somewhere in the audience that night.
During Take Me Home Nicholas was brought out on stage by "uncle Harry" Kim. Nick was wearing a plastic nose with a mustache and plastic glasses. Maybe it was a little trick to make him come on stage cos he was very shy and didn't really look towards the audience. I'm sure I would have done the same when I was 4 years old! During the song he walked towards Phil with open arms. But once he got close to his daddy he took off the mask and it took him ages to put it in his pocket. Phil was rolling his eyes and standing there as if he wanted to say 'What are you doing there?' After he finally made it, Phil took Nicholas' hand and sang the rest of the song. An awesome sight! Before the band introduction part Nicholas returned to "uncle Harry" and left the stage together with him. After the show I met up with a whole bunch of fellow fans and we had a drink in the Crowne Plaza Hotel which is part of the SECC complex.
The next day I started queueing again at around 11.15 am and was among the very first in line. So apart from the normal tension the doubts about a place in first row were nearly gone. That day it was a bit chillier inside the SECC. They didn't seem to have turned on the heating. The café was closed and in contrast to Saturday there was nothing going on inside apart queueing for Phil's show (no exhibitions, no ticket sales). The entry procedure worked as well as yesterday – excellent! As I said before I've never seen any better kind of organization. So I ended up standing first row. Mission accomplished! 12 standing concerts for me on this tour – 12 times first row in front of the stage. But altogether it took me more than 3 days of constant queueing!
The show began on time as yesterday. Souareba – lights off – Phil coming out… STOP! No, it wasn't Phil this time! A guy I didn't know so far entered the stage. Taller and a bit "bigger" than Phil. It was Peter Kay a very popular comedian in England – judging from the audience reaction. He said some introducing words, e.g. that he is a big fan of Phil's music. Then he did some jokes and finally sang a short version of (Is This The Way To) Amarillo with the whole SECC singing along! After he had finished he introduced Phil who finally came out and hugged Peter Kay.
Then the show finally started as usual. Did I say usual? Sorry, the drum intro was really unique this time! Basically the same but yet very different from what I had heard so far. Not in matter of length but what they did was extremely subtle. Especially Chester drummed like hell maybe feeling a bit challenged by what Phil had done before. Unbelieveable!
This time Phil's introduction was way shorter and right afterwards they were about to do One More Night as usual. The song started and Phil started singing: "I've been sitting here so long…" Oh my god, wrong line. Second verse instead of the first one! Phil tried to continue singing the rest of the first verse. But anybody who knows the lyrics is aware of that it wouldn't really work. So he said: "Sorry, my fault. We do it again." And they started it over once more. After the first – correct – lyric line I clapped a bit. Phil recognized it and looked in my direction. Lucky me, more people had started to clap a bit. So it wasn't just me - no reason to blush. But as Phil is someone who can laugh about his own mistakes he made a funny gesture as if he wanted say "Well done after all, right?"
That night instead of a proposal Phil just introduced A Groovy Kind Of Love with the words: "This is from Buster". Not really spectacular but I never heard him introduce this song that way before.
After the lyric problem during One More Night the show went on quite well until You Can't Hurry Love. Again You Can't Hurry Love! Somehow suddenly Phil's voice sounded strangely low. He seemed to check his IEMs (In-Ear-Monitors) and even removed them for a moment. Finally it got as bad that he partly had to stop singing and instead made the audience sing the song. And that worked excellent. Supported by the background singers the Glasgow crowd sang most of the song! Not quite sure what the reason for this incident was because during Two Hearts it obviously was better again. As far as I heard it wasn't a pure technical issue but it seems that they somehow had some acoustical problem on stage.
During Wear My Hat Leland had this tartan hat again. They seemed to have two cos one flew into the crowd thrown by Phil. Phil himself got a Nessie hat during the song which he wanted to get rid of very soon. So in the end Lamont Van Hook was the "lucky" one to get it.
Then it was time already for the "last Sussudio". Would Phil let me sing again? No way, I sang yesterday. So I wouldn't get the mic again. Well, when he came down during Sussudio he did the usual walk along the front row. When Phil finally came towards where I stood, I got the mic one last time! But in contrast to yesterday night I only got to sing "Su" cos Phil let me and the two people to my left sing "-su" and "-ssudio". So in the end I got to sing Sussudio again – "against all odds".
Phil did pretty much the same farewell speech as the night before. The first encore was Always again. I love It's Not Too Late but Always has had a special meaning to me from the first time I on that heard it. So I was happy to hear it on my last show for the "foreseeable future" – with a slightly wet eye, I have to admit.
The inevitable Take Me Home of course ended my (so far) last FFF Tour concert. After all these two shows in Glasgow proved to me that the whole band and especially Phil seemed to be a bit tired after all this touring and the extreme climate changes. As these two Glasgow concerts were the last UK shows for Phil for the near future, he wanted to do it very right both nights and we all know that especially in this case mistakes are very likely to happen. But that's what makes a live show special. I like these fuck ups – don't get me wrong, I love shows without mistakes. But these little incidents make the difference and that's what keeps a it interesting and special every night.

Hope you liked reading this very long report. But it's hard to cut it down because there are so many memories and incidents I wanted to mention. Not sure if the tour will continue in the next couple of years. Of course I wish it would though I'm aware that a tour of Asia, Australia and maybe South America is a logistical challenge – but yet not impossible! However, if it happens someday I'll surely try to be back on the road…

Author: Ulrich Klemt