The Swiss music legend DJ Bobo celebrates the brilliant world premiere of his 30th tour anniversary at Europa-Park. But while the fans drive home enthusiastically after the show, the artist quarrels.
Rust – The last confetti for the mega hit “Freedom” has fallen, the crowd in the Europa-Park Arena cheers again and celebrates the artists on stage – then the world premiere of DJ Bobo’s “Evolut30” tour is history. René Peter Baumann, as the artist’s real name is, has stood for show spectacles for 30 years and also knew how to convince on Friday evening in Rust, as was easy to see from the faces of the fans. But the face of the main protagonist himself spoke a different language at the subsequent press conference.
At the world premiere of the “Evolut30n” tour in Europa-Park, DJ Bobo is struggling to split the stage into three
There, a visibly exhausted DJ Bobo looked around at the audience with slight worry lines on his forehead and you could see immediately that he was working hard. He hardly wanted to be elicited a positive conclusion. On the contrary: “Enjoy is still the wrong word,” the 55-year-old made clear at the beginning. The musician, known as a perfectionist, immediately shared what concerned him the most. “I’m not happy with the dramaturgy, there are still too many waves, too much up and down. And we’re still struggling a bit with the three stages. When I had the idea for it, it looked easier on paper than it really is,” said the Swiss.
In addition to the main stage, DJ Bobo uses two smaller stages for this tour – one in the middle, the other positioned at the end of the hall. He drew inspiration for this division from a visit to the United States, where the circus company Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus (The basis for the film “The Greatest Showman”) worked with three arenas. “For 30 years of touring, I wanted the opportunity to be close to the people – no matter what their seat in the hall. Everyone should get at least one chance to be up close.”
Despite initial coordination difficulties, which are also due to the construction of the Europa-Park Arena, the concept seemed to be popular with many visitors. All sorts of things were offered on the two additional stages: dance interludes, some of which were performed on roller skates, a fiery performance of the top hit “Pray” or a gigantic disco ball as an element. The latter also becomes a prominent debriefing topic on DJ Bobo’s team. “I saw from afar that the disco ball almost fell down. And I thought to myself: what are they doing? (Dancers around the ball, editor’s note.) there? They do a funny choreography, we didn’t practice it that way,” revealed the artist with a mischievous smile on his lips.
DJ Bobo enjoys playing with his fans and loosens up as the show progresses
But despite all the self-criticism of the Eurodance artist: Not everything went wrong and most of the viewers probably didn’t even notice many initial discrepancies. Rather, they let themselves be carried away by the show from the first minute, sang along loudly and were in the mood to dance. Although the main target group was between the ages of 35 and 44, there were also a few significantly younger visitors in the audience who enjoyed the entertainment skills of the likeable Swiss.
From the middle stage, the artist encouraged everyone in the arena to join in with a La Ola made of mobile phone lights and obviously had fun interacting with his fans. DJ Bobo also caused a few laughs when he played a video about halftime in which he was targeted by the Bullyparade, Otto Waalkes or Barbara Schöneberger – a slightly different, but definitely successful look back at the past 30 years . In general, it was noticeable that the longer the show ran, the pop star became increasingly relaxed, which he also confirmed: “Yes, that’s right. At the beginning I was still very concentrated, I thought: Where do I have to go next? what song is coming now But then it got better and better.”
Impressive stage design: sometimes a lion’s head, sometimes a monkey, sometimes Medusa – “like from another planet”
In addition to the musical performance, the stage design also amazed the audience. At the heart of the action: the majestic head of a lion. The installation reached just below the 14 meter high hall ceiling and was illuminated with different animations during the show. “The video mapping is out of this world,” said DJ Bobo. “We’ve been using this mapping technology for maybe eight years now. And I’m very glad we stuck to it. Now we also know what needs to be done to achieve the appropriate effects.”
The three-dimensionality of the video technology creates a liveliness in the stage design that allows the viewer to immerse themselves in other worlds. “When you can turn this lion into a monkey head, a disco ball and a Medusa, there’s so much variety possible – it’s infinitely awesome to me,” said the artist. “On tour we will be able to present the whole thing even more impressively on larger stages.”
Before the show came to an end, the audience got to hear a few songs from the new album in addition to cult hits like “Freedom” and “There’sa party”. The artist is still undecided whether he will keep the order in this way. “You have to be careful that you give people a brand new song three songs before the end, that’s dangerous,” he said after the show. “I can’t imagine that he’ll come that far down the tour again, because he has a hard time against all the big hits. I’m already thinking about what could be changed during the show.”
DJ Bobo: Songs from the 90s are experiencing a revival – “act fresher again than a few years ago”
His songs from the 90s are still of great importance to the artist. In the meantime he has the feeling that the songs are even experiencing a kind of revival. “Funnily enough, they seem fresher to me than they were a few years ago,” says the Swiss. “15 years ago I had the feeling that they had gathered dust. In the last four or five years, however, it has felt as if the zeitgeist is no longer as far away as it used to be. I also feel that a new generation is starting to like this music. We transport the music with pride. I also believe that the self-confidence of the Eurodance wave is greater than it was a few years ago – and we feel that too.” If he plays a song from that time today, it has a “completely different self-confidence” than it did before a few years ago.
DJ Bobo “EVOLUT30N” tour
The “EVOLUT30N” tour will celebrate its premiere from January 13th to 15th, 2023 in the Europa-Park Arena in Germany’s largest amusement park – as always since 2008. The Europe Park had the event hall specially built for DJ Bobo’s premiere concerts. On May 5th and 6th, the artist will be making a guest appearance with his tour in the Stuttgarter Porsche Arena, from there it continues through cities throughout Germany until mid-June.
The first hours after premieres are the “hardest of all” for the perfectionist DJ Bobo, he once again emphatically confirmed in the press conference. This is where the fine-tuning begins for him. “Now everything is still fresh – and everyone involved still knows exactly what’s going on. If you wait too long, you won’t have the information.” While the fans left the hall happily after around 2.5 hours, chatted enthusiastically about what they had experienced and made their way home, DJ Bobo and his team were expected to stay up until late at night sat on the notepads all night and continued to work on the concept – until the overall result is so coherent that the international star, who now has more than 30 years of stage experience, can enjoy his show to the fullest.
