You know, I never even blogged about the fact that I finally decided to go to the Soul 2 Soul II 2007 concert on Saturday. I only decided for sure last Saturday and since work was so crazy busy all week, the last thing I wanted to do when I got home was get BACK on the computer just so I could blog. Anyways the concert was in-freaking-credible! I had talked myself OUT of going probably a half a dozen times. Last weekend though I got a call from Janik saying that his friend had an extra ticket. I decided to bite the bullet and go for it and am I *ever* glad I did.
Janik and I met Katherine (she's the one I gave the Dierks tickets that I won in January too) at her house and we drove into New Westminster together. We parked by the Old Spaghetti Factory there and had dinner before catching the sky train into GM Place. At OSF we met Janik's friends Shelly, her mom Sue and Ashley (who had the tickets). The tickets were split into groups of three. Katherine, Janik and I were together and the others were somewhere else.
The place was pretty much packed. I had a very lovey couple on one side of me and behind us where what Janik dubbed "the fun police". They didn't want to stand at all or get too excited about the music. The concert itself was fantastic though. I realized on the way in that this is my first *concert* at GM Place. I've been to hockey and basketball games as well as Disney on Ice and stuff but all the large concerts I've attended in Vancouver were at Pacific Coliseum. The only other "big" concert I've been to was at Qwest Field in Seattle which is an open air football stadium and while there was a lot of people there, I was totally not prepared for the light show that they put on at Soul 2 Soul.
Lori McKenna opened for them. She wrote three tracks of Faith's "Fireflies" album. The title track, "Stealing Kisses" and "If You Ask". We arrived in the middle of her set but from what I saw she sounded good.
They "entered" the stage by standing on these risers that raised them up through trap doors in the floor (you can see the square Faith is standing on at right.) They opened with a duet that I didn't recognize. Steve (the radio guy) this morning said that it was a cover of SnowPatrol song. They sang one more after that and then Tim disappeared and Faith did her set. It was actually quiet long and covered all her big hits.
Faith was really good. I dubbed her "Rock Star Barbie" and Janik agreed. She's very blonde right now and with legs up to her ears, clad in a glittery flowing pantsuit with a deep V down the front, she looked great.
The stage itself was amazing. It was huge. The cat walks (there were four sticking out from the center pod) all were shinny so they were reflective but they also digital displays so images were projected on or from them. I found myself watching the stage as much as the singers! The pictures I got don't really do the stage justice. They had all sorts of images displayed from pictures of Tim & Faith and their girls to movies of sychronized swimmers and crashing waves. It was amazing.
This picture of the whole stage, the lights and the disco balls is one of my favourites. It shows how vast the stage was. GM Place holds about 18,000 people and I truly don't think anyone would have felt left out of the "concert experience".
After Faith's set, Tim came back and they sang a few more duets including "Angry All the Time" and "Like We Never Loved At All". For those two they were inside this netting. Those are very emotionally charged songs but putting them essentially in a little "room" made it even better.
After the duets, it was Tim's turn. During Faith's set, the images on the stage were all happy flowers and butterflies and stuff. When Tim came on it was much darker more "masculine". Mechanical bugs and swords and stuff. It's hard to explain or capture the impact in words but it was just that. Visually impactful. Yes it was about the music but the lights and the stage and everything made it a visual feast as well.
Tim's set was great. He's very confident on stage but not arrogant at all. He sang my all time favourite song "Everywhere" and all his hits like "Live Like You Were Dying" which got a HUGE response from the crowd, "The Cowboy in Me", "Real Good Man", "When the Stars Go Blue" and quite a few cuts from his new cd including: "Last Dollar (Fly Away)" which he brought four little girls up on stage for (I'm not sure if they were his kids or not), "Suspicions" and "Between the River and Me".
The picture above is him singing "When the Stars Go Blue" and I told Janik that it was MUCH better then the music video. Note the constellations on the stage.
His encore was "If You're Reading This" and another one. Then they moved into a final duet section. I admit that a lot of the songs ran together for me because I'm not intimately familiar with the lyrics but it was still very enjoyable.
This picture here is *so* cool. They only showed that shot a few times (it's Tim in the middle of the stage, from above) so I was lucky to catch it.
Faith came back out after Tim's set and they sang "Shotgun Rider". He told her "that guitar looks better on you then it did on the rack" LOL
Their final encore was "I Need You" which they sang using one microphone and sitting facing each other. It was so awesome. There is something special to the music when you know that this couple loves each other, respects each other and have been married for ten years while living in the public eye. It lends an electricity that is hard to capture otherwise.
Their final good-bye's were done pretty much hand in hand. It was very sweet.
So yes, an amazing concert and one that I am really glad I talked myself into attending.
~Heidi
My loyal blog readers will remember me talking about "Steve" the morning show DJ on my local country station. I call him all the time and generally make a pest of myself, in a good way. Sometimes he plays our conversation on air, sometimes not. Anyways, this morning I called him to tell him that Doc Walker was coming to town and to ask if he'd heard anything about it yet. He told me that no, he hadn't (which wasn't a surprise). 
It progressed to "What are you doing this weekend". Standard question. For some reason whenever I call him I have nothing planned. It's rather funny. He asked if I was going to the Willie Nelson concert tonight in Vancouver. "No, because I'm too cheap to buy tickets and because no one would have gone with me anyways". He asked if I WANTED to go. "Of course!" Then he said, "Well, I have tickets here but there's one stipulation..you have to go with me." The promoter gave him tickets and he, like me, has no one to go with. He is NOT a country fan, but he does like Willie. None of his friends are country fans either and they don't even want to see Willie.
It was a lot of fun. Willie's getting old and you can tell. It was a small concert. Large enough venue but not a large turnout. Same place I saw Dierks in January but there were probably twice the people there for Dierks. We were seventh row up off the floor but still had a good view. Very interesting concert. He sang for quite awhile and did all his hits plus quite a few off the new album and a BUNCH of covers. Well, I don't know if you can call them covers but they were all big songs for other artists. He probably wrote half of them. I just don't know his catalogue well enough to be sure. 
He's a whiz on the guitar though (even if poor Trigger is falling apart) and his sister was brilliant on the piano. He had his two youngest sons on stage with him too. It was a an interesting experience. Once in a lifetime because I'll proably never go see him again but I am really glad I was able to.
