16-02-2008 Beatsteaks

Venue: Melkweg, Amsterdam (Netherlands)
By: Sabine  van Gameren & Sofie Bergen

When we arrived at the venue in Amsterdam only ten minutes after the doors were opened, there was still an huge queue in front of the door. We decided that we could better go for a drink first and return after a while to see if the line disappeared. At the time the first band was starting there were still many people waiting outside. When we got in, the support act was almost finished.

Beatsteaks, the headliner, told us during the gig that they were surprised to see so many people there. They played the smaller stage of Melkweg before and they thought they were playing that one tonight as well. At the biggest
stage of Melkweg the area was really packed! We found out that a lot of people came from Germany to see this German band playing here in Amsterdam. The band is born in the summer of 1995. The punk music they make was successful enough to become the support act for the Sex Pistols in 1996 while they only played nine gigs before. During the years the band built up a fantastic reputation and so come they filled the venue tonight.

From the first seconds the band came on stage it was clear that this would
be a night full of action (and reaction), energy and entertainment. Already
at the first songs some people did some crowd surfing and stage diving. This
went on and mostly the guys who made it to the stage stayed there for a short victory dance with one of the band members. At some point, the band thought it got a little too dangerous and they asked the guys to stop crowd surfing and mind the girls in the audience. As a reaction on it, quite some girls started to do some crowd surfing as well. One thing was for sure, the band is very aware of their appearing on the stage. The singer changes his clothes just as much as an average songfestival participant.

The audience could not get enough of this band and demanded that they would play more. The band actually returned four times after leaving!
This band is definitely a wonderful live act. Not only by their entertaining way of performing, but musically they are a great band as well. They use influences of many different genres in their music. All together this makes this concert one of the best acts we have seen so far in this year. A serious compliment to the Beatsteaks!

Photo’s by:Sabinevangameren.com

Links:

Beatsteaks Myspace
Beatsteaks Official