Bruno Mars with The Moonshine Jungle-Tour in Zurich

My last half holiday day in this year I used for the Bruno Mars concert – and it was worth it!

I was standing at the Hallenstadion from around 2.30 pm. Of course I went straight to the east entrance as there are usually less people waiting. Yes, most go directly from the tram to the closest queue. I guess there were about 80 people – mainly teenage girls. Somewhen the rain started pouring down. When a Hallenstadion employee put up the friends & member label at the entrance, the whole crowd moved as not all of them were members and so I was standing in the shelther under the roof. Somewhen someone gave ballons around, which should been blown up for the song “Runaway Baby”.

Queuing at Hallenstadion for Bruno Mars
Queuing at Hallenstadion for Bruno Mars

The doors opened quite in time at around 6pm. And I was standing front row. It was much easier than before. In the first half an hour there was a lot of squeezing and pushing until everyone finally
calmed down. And there I spotted already the first known faces among the security guys. During waiting I got to hear horror stories of the Justin Bieber concert, been discussing ticket prices and Bruce Springsteen, and got told about the reported arrogance of some international musician, and how they wouldn’t deserve their success. Well, that can happen. And still I like to listen to them…

At around 8pm the supporting act started. Mayer Hawthorne, a 34 years old US american soul singer as Wikipedia lets me know. He and the band came in grey suits on stage. And no, I please never want to see and listen to them again. His music I thought was actually quite good. Kinda liked the songs. Just the show…. This children show and this fidget, posed and somehow… I have no idea what this should have been in the end. Just didn’t suit the picture at all.

At 9.15 pm Bruno Mars should have started his show, it was 9.30 pm then though. The huge curtain, that was put up before, came down at once again and the screaming started.  I first had to put in the earplugs – not cos of the loud music, but because of the screaming. My first thought, when I saw him was like “Man, is he small?!” haha. The show startet with “Moonlight” and new and older songs like “Treasure”, “The Lazy Song”, “Marry You”, “If I knew” and then “Runaway Baby” followed. It didn’t really work out with the balloons.

In the background there was a huge, sprakling disco ball hanging. Once the light in the background was green, and then the stage turned into red. The band was a big part of the show – they danced, did flirt for all one’s worth. The background singer was just fantastic. Peter aka Bruno Mars was sometimes dancing along, then playing the guitare or sat down behind the drums for a solo. Hits as “Grenade” and “Billionaire” couldn’t be missed either. When finally “Just the way you are” started, I was kinda shocked. Finished already? There wouldn’t be much left. And that’s the way it was. As encore they placed “Locket out of heaven” plus “Gorilla”, and then the spectacle was ending with pyros and golden rain after quite exactly 90 minutes.

Great show, even as I probably liked the last one better. Maybe cos I didn’t know the new songs very well. But the only things really to criticise are the supporting act as well that the Bruno Mars show definitively was too short.

Infos about the bands:
www.brunomars.com
www.mayerhawthorne.com