Sonisphere 2013

The Story Ain’t over in Barcelona

After 3000km travelling to Avantasia concerts, I thought after a little break it is time for another story. For Germany very bad weather was announced and I had a long weekend break from job, so I booked my flight to Barcelona. They announced very strong rain for Germany, so I had some fears for my car and my house, but nevertheless more about this later.

My flight started on Thursday 30.05. and I arrived in Barcelona at noon. The weather was ok, not too cold and not too warm. I already checked on the first day the venue of the Sonisphere festival. The next day the weather got even better with a lot of sun and nice temperatures. I spend the whole day with a lot of sightseeing and enjoyed it very much. But in the evening I also check regularely the weather information for Germany. Sadly the weather situation changed from very bad weather into a catastrophe and a lot of flooding started. It seemed my region was not so much hit by it, so I could only hope that everything would be fine after I returned home.

The next day was the day of the festival and the weather got better again with sun and around 24 degrees. I left my hotel for the festival around 16:30 and arrived for the band Tierra Santa. A friend recommended this band to me and they were quite nice with lots of Iron Maiden influences. After this band finished I started my biggest mistake of the day with my first big beer and it was not the last one. The next band was Newsted and I didn’t like them at all, so another beer. After Newsted the band Ghost followed and they were another recommendation of a friend. They were really nice, but I guess an evening slot would have fitted better for their performance.

After a little longer break, Iron Maiden started and they did a solid performance. I saw them several times before, but they somehow didn’t blow me away. The stage design was good, Bruce had a better day and everything else was good as well, but I missed some energy from previous performances. After Maiden finished I ate something and drank another beer. This stated to become a problem, but I still had to wait such a long time. Then Anthrax and Megadeth played and I’m not a fan of both. So I guess for fans of their music it was a quite solid performance. Sadly many people left after Megadeth.

And finally after another break and more beer, Avantasia started. People were more enthusiastic during the Avantasia concert. They had to do a reduced set-list and there was less talking of Tobias. They had again the known opener ‘Spectres’ and the first guest singer followed in ‘The Scarecrow with Ronnie Atkins. Bob Catley folled later as well, but many ‘Kiske, Kiske’ calls were hearable before Kiske entered the stage for ‘Reach out for the Light’. Michael Kiske did an outstanding performance and nothing was hearable from his flu influenced problems that he still had in Amsterdam. Surprisingly ‘Breaking Away’ made it back to the set-list. But later I really got some problems with the too many beers and first lost the battery of my camera on the ground (I found it after the concert). So sadly I couldn’t do more pictures. I also don’t have that many memories of the rest the second half of the concert as well. But I remember at least that they played ‘Shelter from the Rain’. Somehow I got back to my hotel and immediately felt asleep.

The next day I had terrible headaches which didn’t disappear even with medicine. I left my hotel at noon and at the airport I had to wait some time. During my flight back to Frankfurt I realized that some guys of Avantasia were in the plane as well and Eric Martin was sitting quite nearby me. Yes it took a long time to realize due to me having still terrible headaches and trying to sleep. But since I’m not the person who stalks others in their free time, I didn’t disturb them. After the plane arrived in Hamburg and was very happy being back in my house without any damages of the flooding which sadly destroyed many parts of Germany.