14-year-old dream has come true! The dream to visit a concert of the favorite band, that is Helloween! I've seen Metallica, Iron Maiden, Depeche Mode, Blind Guardian and now Helloween. There remains in my "must see" list only Motley Crue, who still haven't decided whether they split up or go touring. And now - a little more in detail about October 12th when Helloween did the final concert of their North American tour, before going to a set of shows in Europe.

We began our "concert program" in a usual way by gathering together in Russian Vodka Room. I must note that when you don't drink "Baltica ?3" (a popular brand of Russian beer) for about a year, it has some kind of sweetness, almost honey-like. The time of our meeting was planned so that after sitting in RVR for an hour or so we should come to the show right at the beginning of the pumpkins' part, which was due at 21-00. We didn't intend to see the supporting bands, Beyond The Embrace and Jag Panzer. At 20-45, coming to the entrance to BB KING Bar & Grill we were pleased to find a small crowd of people who evidently loved the headliner band. I haven't seen so many HELLOWEEN T-shirts during the whole three years I was in USA! I was glad to notice a complete absence of teens wearing shorts, basecaps and Metallica shirts with the same kind of teenager with a skateboard drawn on it. (Had Cliff seen such a T-shirt - he would have jumped out of the bus). The explanation for it was: first - age limitation, and second - teens don't like the pumpkin music. And God bless them, so to say. The security guard standing at the doors was about 400 kg of weight, I think. His size was like myself, DD, my wife and our another companion put together - that is every one of us who went to the concert. As our friend had no ticket we wanted to buy it at the entrance, remembering such a possibility at Blind Guardian show last year, which took place in a similar club, The World, just round the corner from BB King. But the huge security guy told us there are only two variants: to go behind the corner and buy it from a speculator, or to stand in line and wait if there'd be any tickets. A dude standing nearby said that the tickets at the entrance cost 30 bucks, not 25. So we got in line. The dude gladly answered my question that the tickets sale would start after the show has begun. Kind of wonderful news! But then there a very nimble-looking somebody came and offered us a ticket. The security (huge like gorilla), which stood just ten meters away, immediately roared "Fuck Off!! Behind the corner!!" DD asked the speculator: does you speak Russian, by the way? He told, he does. So we went behind the corner and asked - how much? The answer was 30. I gladly took the ticket, having a hellish laugh inside - for the speculator, while thinking that he makes some kind of extra profit, sold the ticket for its official price at the entrance.

The next obstacle was the prohibition of any kind of photo devices. A couple of days before the concert I had called the club administration and asked them if I could make shots. They had told - no. But let them say this to their own kind, and we're just tourists… In case of complete failure we intended to give cameras to the security and take them back after the show. So my wife had a digital cam hidden in her bag just in case, and we had a big Cannon thingy in a special bag. But nobody even noticed. Even though there were "nicht fotografieren!" signs everywhere.

The hall was an ideal place for a concert of BB King, but not for Helloween. It was perfect for a blues and a dinner. At its center there was a relatively small parterre, above it, so to say, the gallery, and the tables at the sides where it was possible to order some food (during the concert there was a smell of fried fish at times). Behind them, opposite the stage - a bar occupying the whole wall. While the support band played we took a place to the left of the stage, about 10 meters away from it. When we came Beyond The Embrace had already finished, and Jag Panzer was on stage. The band was remarkable, most of all, by its vocalist, who looked like a well fed B. Dickinson, and a very good solo-guitarist. Fat Bruce had riveted bracers in the style of B.D.-82 and took various postures full of pathos, just like B.D. Even his haircut was very much like B.D. As of their music, there is only one thing to say - when you're waiting for headliner, everything else sounds like shit. Had JP played together with System Of A Down, I would have banged my head off to their music - a fine midtempo power, with very interesting turns. But I came to see Helloween, and so I stared at my watch and couldn't wait to see this Bruce Dickinson and his comrades dismissed off the stage. But JP played till 21-45. It became clear that 1) there is a delay in the concert and 2) we were right to come in a car, or else we would have had to kiss Helloween goodbye at half past midnight and run off to a bus to our village. After JP had finally left the stage there appeared on the screens… the real Bruce Dickinson and his friends - Steve, Dave, Nicko and Janick. Maidens "played" Run To The Hills and Iron Maiden, from their tour of year 1990. It lifted the spirits a lot, reminding of IM's summer tour.

Taking a closer look at the public, we discovered a great many people in IM t-shirts. Just in front of us there stood a metalhead, of age about 40, who looked very much like both Jon Bon Jovi and Jim Carey's partner from "Dumb And Dumber". The guy was in a jeans shirt completely covered with badges. They showed it clearly that he was of our kind - also a fan of 80's metal. By the way - the show was completely sold-out. Not a frequent thing for a European band, which hasn't appeared on an American stage for 15 years. I hope Helloween commanders will take notice of this fact and this tour won't be the last.

Quietly we crept closer to the stage, for three meters or so. Just in front of me stood two Mexican metalheads, each of them 1m 5 cm high, opening to me a great view of the stage.

Meanwhile, on the stage the preparations for the appearance of the Pumpkins finished. At 22-15 some dude announced in the manner of "High Live" beginning - Please welcome - HELL-O-WEEN!!! That was the moment the two-and-a-little-more hours of celebration both on the stage and in the hall started.

The band spread over the stage in such a way that Markus played just three meters away in front of me. Sascha stood the next, Andi was at the center. Weikath played on the other side of the stage and came to our side only a couple of times. (But these were enough to notice what age did to the leader of Helloween. His stubble was all gray). In the center there stood the drumkit of Stefan and to the right behind the speakers the keyboardist (Jorn Ellerbrock?) sat on a stool.

It seems years have no power over Markus - just the same face, even comparing with the photos of WoJ times. With a broadest smile during the whole show, waving to the public, shaking hands, jumping onto the speakers, throwing picks into the hall - he simply ruled. He didn't run all over the stage like on High Live but that was because there was virtually no free space on it. My wife noticed that he looks like Arkadiy Ukupnik (a Russian pop singer). I got my digital camera out and began the shooting. After three songs a security guard came to me and showed with gestures, "nicht fotografieren". I nodded with a comprehending look and kept shooting, using the moments when the security was busy in the center - something like reversed stage-diving happened there. The folks were thrown from the hall to the stage, or rather into the space between the stage and rope-fence. The security guys stood in this space and caught the jumpers. They did it not because of pity - just if somebody of powerfully thrown would stuck with his head in Stefan's drums, and would choke after having so spent the two hours, the club would face a big fat court case. Therefore the process in the center took away all the security's attention, where bodies of about 150 kg of weight sometimes landed. After their jump these bodies were brought back to senses by the guards, then ran round and back into the hall and in a five minutes the same body flew right into Deris. I took some pretty good photos. Though, mostly these were of Markus and Sascha.

What wasn't quite pleasant -the light on the stage. When one of the musicians came to the brink of it to its left or right (often it was Markus to the left and Weikath to the right) he was completely hidden by darkness - absolutely nothing can be seen (I had a 20-second video shot with my cam, which demonstrates this effect quite well). What was pleasant - the sound. Loud, thick and amazingly clear. All the guitars were heard, the vocals were clear, and bass literally shook the air. I had a ringing in my ears till 2 PM of the next day.

It is prohibited to smoke in the clubs of New York, and so Weikath was without the usual cigarette in his mouth. But during the action with the public on Power (similar to that on High Live) he sat on a speaker close to the keyboards and had a smoke, By the way, he was the only one on stage who went for beer - the others drank mineral water. The behavior of Weikath surprised me a bit. With all his appearance he demonstrated that he has absolutely nothing to do with all this, and kept himself sort of out-of-body all the show. Just yesterday I have watched "High Live" DVD - and there he was the same, so perhaps it's just his image. Markus played two bass guitars: 5-string Yamaha and 4-string Fender. Some songs he played with fingers, some (like If I Could Fly) with a pick. By the way, this song was the only one from the Dark Ride - so great was the desire of Weikath to keep away from that album and everything connected with Grapow and Kusch. (Yesterday I have read a rather large interview of him, where he speaks quite harshly about the events and people of that time - and many things about the set-list immediately get clear. Had Treasure Chest been released now - a good half of the songs would be different). Deris explained to the respectable public the meaning of the new album's name. By translating it into Spanish slang and back, he announced that the real meaning is "Pussy don't come easy" (Weikath came to the microphone and, having raised his forefinger, said: Which is true!) While living on Tenerife, Andi had learned to speak Spanish really good. The Mexicans screamed "Amigo!! Amigo!!" to him, from time to time.

They played three songs of the new album. The public knew the new material rather bad. But the rest of the set-list was met simply excellently. It was a big surprise that they played the whole Keeper of the 7 Keys song. (Andi asked the public to sing the chorus at the end. The hall answered, but weakly. So Deris stopped the other musicians and asked if we was tired. He said that their band is famous for its six-hour concerts "so go on and sing!" Thus, Keeper was perhaps 17 minutes long). I was very curious how Andi would manage this song. He managed and managed it great! Of course he isn't Kiske, but his singing has significantly improved since High Live times, and he doesn't fail on Michael-era songs like he did then. And he doesn't even try to copy Kiske's manner - he just does it all in his own way. The same is true about the songs from Hansen era. With Deris's voice they sounded more interesting and emotional, I think.

And yet Sascha and Stefan don't quite fit in the team. It's clear, why - the new members after so many years. A period of time should pass. Especially this concerns Sascha (and I'm not speaking about his haircut in the style of Nikolai Trubach, another Russian pop singer) - I believe they should have taken someone of the same age as the rest of the band, like Stefan, for example. Though Sascha's back-vocals worth a special notice - a very good strong voice. A fitting replacement of Roland, at least in this respect. He played the intro to Sun 4 The World (that is, Sascha's solo) on a guitar of a weird scary shape, which sounded like a sitar.

The show was concluded with How Many Tears. After playing first half a minute of the song, they stopped. Something wrong was with Sascha's guitar. Deris said that the song should be played with two guitars, but this one (he pointed at Sascha) was fucked up. I wonder - was it a prepared joke or a real accident? The slow part nearer the end of the song lasted about three minutes because of a long Sascha/Weikath guitar solo.

Having played for 2 hours and 15 minutes, the Pumpkins bowed to the crowd, threw them their picks and drumsticks, shook hands with the front rows (I took photos and therefore didn't take part in that). When Stefan came close to us, I noticed that on his left hand, on its inner side, the letters "STEFAN" are tattooed - the Russian letters.

We had previously planned to wait for the musicians after the show and have all my Helloween booklets signed. But because of the one-hour delay and the Monday that had begun (and also largely because of the protests of my wife) we went home. As I have learned afterwards from the official Web board, 45 minutes later Markus and Sascha came outside and signed everything they were given. But in these 45 minutes I was already entering my village.

On the whole - the dream has come true. I've been to the show of the band number one of my rating, and in a couple of meters from the stage, too.

Author: Stug42 aka Alexandr Sorokin