Setlist:
Your Turn, My Turn
Magic In Here
Right Here
Head Full Of Steam
Baby Stones
Streets Of Your Town
Orpheus Beach
He Lives My Life
German Farmhouse
Going Blind
Draining The Pool For You
Bye Bye Pride
The Clock
Spring Rain
--
Spirit
Bachelor Kisses
Easy Come, Easy Go
--
Surfing Magazines
Apology Accepted
--
Danger In The Past
One Plus One
The Columbia Fritz is the smaller of the two Columbia venues in Berlin, but is still pretty large; Converted from a cinema (by taking the seats and the air out) the capacity is 1000, and it was pretty much full. Robert had changed from the cream suit he'd sported at the afternoon in-store appearance into the red stripy suit; Grant was content to stay with his Plexiq t-shirt.
It was a windy evening in Berlin, though not as bad as it was in other parts of Europe; still, Robert thanked the audience for "coming out in the hurricane to see us play." Starting, as had become standard, with "Your Turn, My Turn" - but with Grant taking the vocal - the set mixed old classics with the bulk of the new album. "Baby Stones" was filmed for breakfast broadcast on 2TV the following morning (causing great surprise for Adele, who looked up to find a camera inches from her face); Grant, especially, was on great vocal form all evening, with particularly beautiful performances of "Orpheus Beach" and "Bachelor Kisses." Robert wasn't far behind, either; "He Lives My Life" stood out, and we were treated to a bitter, cynical version of big city classic "Danger In The Past." Robert got a more talkative towards the end of the show - "The Clock" was introduced as starting "with an extremely complicated, many-noted riff," and "the next song starts in D-minor, which some people in Manchester told us was the saddest of all keys, though it's not a sad song" introduced the set-closing "Spring Rain."
Musically, however, the band were still developing; competent, but the spark dividing the good from the great was just out of reach...
Jonathan Turner, 25th November 2000