“Jagger doesn’t run on worn carpet”
Boris Shevtsov residing in Samara:
There were two buses from Samara, tickets were sold in one complex – I think for 800 rubles for a concert and a bus.
The ride was “Sex, drugs, Rock-n-roll” – 16 hours there, 16 hours back. It’s all rubbish, but it was fun.
It certainly wasn’t difficult to buy tickets from us in Samara. I suspect this is because the city is large provincial and low awareness. I was related to the Samara rock club and these tickets generally sold out in their own way.
At the time, it was something truly unbearably impossible in terms of its steepness, especially for me as one of Kuibyshev, the coincidence of two moments – visiting Moscow at the same time and a concert – doubled everything.
We once had the opportunity to either hear or watch some Vladimir Kuzmin or Alexander Barykin speaking at the Samara Sports Palace. We had great acoustics about it. If you want to see, sit close, you won’t hear. And then suddenly top-notch equipment. And I understood Jagger more than Makarevich (known in the Russian Federation as a foreign agent). This is a very sharp contrast.
We touched “Spleen” in the opening curtain. I don’t know why they were chosen. It seems to me such a strange choice that everyone is laughing heartily.
From the sharp moments – after them the carpet was removed, because Jagger does not run around with a shabby carpet.
With us was a man about 50 years old, very far out of the way. We tried to carry him to the concert with our shoulders, but the cops stopped him. And that’s what shocked us all at that moment – the policeman ran away, brought him a thermos of coffee, made him sit down, told him to solder himself and then go over to him to pass.
For us at the time, such a relationship with the police was prohibitively impossible – so we
They didn’t beat me with sticks, they didn’t kick me out, they didn’t drag me anywhere because Samara has strong morals, it’s still not the capital.
Then – how the police work at the end of the concert. I had never seen anything like it in my life when they entered the crowd in big jets and took them through the exits. Needless to say for the youngsters now, but it was very rare for us back then – how to take such a big stadium and build it in such a way that it wasn’t too loud and not too hectic.
It was raining during the concert, which of course doesn’t care at all. All drunk, happy, cheerful, singing, satisfied, nowhere else to go.
After that, I went to Kiss a long time ago, but now I will not have such feelings. And then it happened for the first time.
“I got an autograph from drummer Charlie Watts”
Tyumen resident Daniil Sizov:
I came to Moscow on purpose, having learned on the radio that in April my favorite band was going to perform for the first time in Russia. The day before the concert, I got a completely free ticket, waiting in line for 15 minutes from the box office of the Luzhniki stadium. At 4:30 p.m. on August 11, a large crowd of people began to throw.
Items could be left in the custodial offices set up there, but I still carried a small camera-soap box with me (photographs and videography were officially forbidden).
My ticket was 120 rubles, so it was a place standing in front of the stage. Because I arrived earlier, I managed to get very close – right in front of the fence.
The Rolling Stones concert started around 9:30 pm at sunset. That was the purpose of this tour, which was named “Bridges To Babylon” after the name of their new album from ’97.
The musicians stepped onto a huge stage with a giant screen where all the action aired, the first riffs of “Satisfaction” played, Mick Jagger ran in a red and blue cape, and the magic I could only dream of began. .
In the middle of the concert, in a private elevator, the band was transported to a small stage in the middle of the stadium, where they played four vintage rock and roll. That was the meaning of the show’s name “Bridges to Babylon” – a trip back in time to the period of the first half of the 1960s, to their earliest hits. The only downside is that I didn’t see drummer Charlie Watts live (on screen only) because the stage was too loud and he was sitting in the back.
The next afternoon, I went to the Baltschug-Slavyanskaya Hotel, where the Rolling Stones were staying, as the on-stage security told me. Nobody is there, five minutes later a silver car comes and drummer Charlie Watts comes out himself. I went and got his autograph.
There was a Russian translator with him, he says, “You can ask him anything,” but I just muttered in surprise and bewilderment: “Do you like jazz?” and I even forgot that I had a camera in my pocket – the same “soap box”. What can be the frame!
But I have a signature! About two hours later a crowd flocked in, Mick Jagger came out, gave some autographs, I took a picture of him from afar, but there was no way to get close.
“Someone nearly hit Vasiliev with whitewash and Jagger with a plastic bottle”
Moscow resident Vladimir Kudryavtsev:
I bought a ticket to the stalls in advance for $ 30 (180 rubles). At around 5 pm on August 11, I approached the Luzhniki Stadium. The police moved back and forth in columns. There were also horses. A sergeant suggested that those who wanted to go to the concert should be in the column (sorry for my disapproval as I had a “soap box” with me, I then had to deliver it to the warehouse of the Yunost Hotel). He passed the check and almost reached the stage fence.
People relaxed with beer. One of the “grateful population” warmed the “Spleen”, almost hit Vasiliev with a belyash.
The spotlights were not yet on, the front rows noticed Watts sitting at the drums, and a wave of “welcome howl” swept through the arena. Then spotlights and fireworks and musicians jumping onto the stage caused a tsunami. Parter was shaking.
Finishing the song, Jagger said, “Hello Russia! We are finally here!” The degree of insanity increased.
No one noticed the pouring rain. In the middle of the concert, a special bridge entered the middle of the arena and the band made a few hits there and someone tried to hit Jagger with a plastic bottle but missed.
It started to rain quite seriously towards the finale, but the musicians put on their hats and continued the performance.
There was also Lisa Fisher licking her toes. I saw how rain spray flew at least a meter from Keith and Ron’s electric guitars.
It’s good to have a canopy over the stage. A rain of gold confetti and fireworks scared off at the end of the ventilation unit. After the final hit, Charlie threw the sticks to the ground. The musicians said goodbye, and the satisfied people moved from the police chains to the free subway that evening.
On the way I heard a speech: “There was both Michael Jackson and Roxette, but they didn’t see it THAT way.”