Mark and I were fortunate to have Ultra Bra drummer Antti Lehtinen put us on his “friends and family” list, which entitled us to get discount tickets for the concert on Saturday, August 23. Tonight’s show was for the first date tickets went on sale, and when sales went through the roof, the promoters added a second show, which ended up being on the Friday, thus predating this one. Although yesterday’s attendance was pretty well near capacity, from our perspective on the field this evening, it was hard to find an empty seat in the stands.
Since it had threatened rain after we returned to Helsinki from Hanko, and even a few droplets came down, I decided to join the Ultra Bra raincoat brigade and wear my raincoat down there. It wasn’t necessary by the time we left the hostel as the sky was clearing, but still: I was one of the thousands of yellow raincoats marching down to the stadium:
We got down there about half an hour before showtime and the inside of the stadium was packed. We couldn’t find any water refilling stations that the ticket company had said would be there. When I look at the map below now, we were looking in the wrong places. Mark tried to refill his bottle in the washroom but the line to get in was too long. We ended up standing in the area in front of the four wheelchair symbols, behind the Golden Circle:
Look at all the raincoats on the field:
We were in the area behind the Golden Circle on the left side, so the stage was further away, yet anywhere behind the front row, where I stood yesterday, was going to be further away. We were not crowded and had plenty of room to move around and dance. I was worried that we’d all be squished in like sardines. Mark took almost all the photos this time but I did manage to get one shot of the single middle screen which showed black-and-white outtakes from the “Villiviini” video during the hour before showtime. As you can see, we frequently had to change position by hopping around to avoid the sudden appearance of heads that blocked our lines of sight:
Vuokko during “Haikara”:
The following are Mark’s photos. Just before showtime:
The set list was exactly the same as yesterday, except “Pärnu” was moved out of the regular order and played as the sole song in the second encore. In this case the band did leave the stage, albeit briefly, before the first encore began.
The explosion of white confetti at the beginning of “Tule pelaamaan meidän kanssa krokettia”:
Joel and Antti:
The carousel of band photos during “Musta, niljaisten lehtien kaupunki”:
Joel, Arto, Olli and Ilmari getting drenched during “Ken Saro-Wiwa on kuollut”:
Kari is on the far right in this shot:
Mark caught this large screen shot of Antti:
The start of “Lähetystyö”, and then the red, white and blue confetti:
Terhi and Vuokko:
As I was standing right up front last night I could barely see the fireworks that ended the show. Being on the field tonight gave us the full advantage of the pyrotechnics:
Kiitti jengi. Thanks guys.
The following pictures are from the official Facebook pages of Ultra Bra or Joel Melasniemi. This is from “Tule pelaamaan meidän kanssa krokettia”:
From “Musta, niljaisten lehtien kaupunki”:
From “Kalifornian ruosteiset kukkulat”:
From “Ken Saro-Wiwa on kuollut”:
From “Tyttöjen välisestä ystävyydestä”:
From “Lähetystyö”:
and other photos from Saturday night taken by Minna Hatinen:
As with last night, we got the Katajanokka tram #4 back to the hostel and got in by 10:45. Yet unlike last night where my tram was sardine-packed crowded, the tram we got still had empty seats in it by the time we left. I preferred the crowded tram, as I got to overhear all the concertgoers talking about the show. Mark and I had a dinner date with Antti and his wife Ilona two days later so we had plenty to talk and ask about, and I knew Antti would be able to answer some questions I had about the production, like what was really being poured over their heads during “Ken Saro-Wiwa on kuollut” and how they shot some of the background films. Too many questions to list here, in fact.
Two Ultra Bra concerts in two days. What an experience to be in the front row for one of them, and enjoying the show with Mark on the field amidst a sea of yellow raincoats, dancing and singing along for the second.
The Finnish national broadcaster YLE aired the full concert on television that night. You can watch it here.
A fan posted the entire second concert on YouTube:
Thank-you Ultra Bra and Antti! Kiitti jengi.
One Response
Your notes and content made we feel like I was there!