Weelll, we really enjoyed that. And having doubled up after Saturday, thought it was in almost every way the better gig. Far less hassle travel-wise - easier for other half to get to Bristol from West London than it was for us to get from hers to Stratford and into the stadium. None of that overblown behaviour from the stewards, smaller stadium meant the stage looked more imposing - and better sound where we were (by the B-stage, both times), and a much livelier crowd too.
It's a really fabulous show (deliberate italics). Everything from the stage design to the 'extra's and their costumes and most of the setlist choices tie in perfectly to the theme of the album. And it has totally changed our opinions on Break It To Me and Propaganda, which we were a bit meh about until hearing them live.
But if there's one criticism, it's the static setlist. It (and the big hike in ticket prices over the last couple of tours) have reluctantly put us off looking into Manc, for one thing. Don't know how much of that is down to the level of choreography and rehearsal, but I can't see it being too difficult to swap out something like Mercy - when the only cues in that seemed to be the confetti and streamer cannons. And having Mercy *and* Starlight in the same set when they're so similar... TIRO too - maybe give that a rest once in a while. Given how much they've swapped things up on previous tours, I'm wondering whether the same show every night is going to start to bore the band a bit. Even Matt's chat seemed almost scripted, very similar across the two nights. Although on the upside, they were so tight musically, incredible. No whammy pedal fail on Reapers this time either. ๐
And like someone said above, for what was as near to a hometown gig as they're going to get on this tour, it didn't have anything to really mark it out. @Jobby: you might be right on the 'Bliss slot' being cut because of timing, but last night still finished 10:45-ish - well before the curfew. They were a few minutes late coming on in London too (although probably still 10 minutes earlier than last night). Can't help but wonder whether another reason might have been the limp reception Bliss got from the London crowd - the group around us didn't react to it at all, and that seemed to be quite widespread looking at some of the YT vids.
Might look into getting some tickets for Amsterdam in September. Cos she's going to be working out there, it'll be dark pretty much from the start of the show, and maybe by then they might have changed the setlist up a bit. We'll see ๐