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The gig took place in Milan at the Rolling Stone, a great rock-disco in the centre, instead of at the big Palavobis. Anyway, the venue was completely full (2000 people) as Richard came on stage at ten past nine, dressed in his leather jacket and blue jeans. His band was composed by Pete, a bassist (Pino Palladino?), a keyboarder, a percussionist, a trumpet- and a saxophone-player, and BJ Cole, who looked like a shoemaker behind his little work-desk. He opened with a good version of Brave New World, but the crowd exploded for the first time only when he announced Space and Time as second song. Richard played the electric guitar and sang very powerfully, shouting "make it all seem right, yeah!" with rising voice before letting the chorus take flight. Fantastic. He went on with I Get My Beat, which he sang without much conviction, in my opinion. Then was the turn of Sonnet, and the crowd exploded for the second time. Richard played the electric guitar another time but the shadow of Nick appeared clearly on stage when he tried to play the guitar solos. Anyway Rich's voice and the melody are so beautiful that it was a great moment, especially for a seventy-years-old man who danced along the song with infinite joy! After Sonnet, they played Come on People, which the crowd really appreciated (great Pete) and On a Beach, which the crowd didn't appreciate so much, although it was well done. Richard probably understood it, because he announced Lucky Man saying "this is a song you may like, Loocky Man", with a non-oxfordian pronunciation! I
would have liked him to communicate more with people, I think he was a
bit disappointed because he didn't have the huge attendance of Palavobis
in front of him. 'Bout Lucky Man, as always he sang pretty well, but I
asked myself what was that nice shoemaker there for. Second clear appearance
of Nick's shadow. The
first part ended up with New York, which could have been great with a
real guitarist. I expected another Verve song before the encore, as in
the other gigs (Velvet Morning, for example) but I've been disappointed.
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