Hockenheim 21.07.2023 #SpringsteenTour2023

Hockenheimring is a Formula 1 racetrack in the small town of Hockenheim and also the next venue for our next Springsteen concert. At first we were hesitant to buy tickets for the show since we had heard that it was in a remote area, but we (or at least I) also thought it would be interesting to see the concert in a different kind of venue.

From our hotel room in Mannheim we went by train for about 20 minutes to reach Hockenheim main station and from there on we had to walk for about 30 to 40 minutes. There was a steady stream of people walking in the same direction as us. In a forest area, we came to a sudden halt. The narrow pathway to the bridge that crossed the motorway had caused a bottleneck and hundreds of people were trying to get through. It was an hour before the official start of the show and I was getting a bit worried if we would get there on time. About 30 minutes later we reached the venue. I’ve later heard that many people didn’t get into the show until 2 hours after it started. Many of them were trapped in the traffic chaos, but I can imagine that some of them also came by foot. The show was scheduled to start at 7 pm but was delayed until 7:30 pm due to the mess outside.

The venue was interesting indeed. FOS1 was huge and wide. The stage was placed on the top of a slope and on each side of the stage (about 50 meter away) there were extra screens. In front of the stage the ground was asphalt and in the back of the pit, which was at the end of the slope, it was dirt. We decided to stand on the asphalt on the left hand side of the stage.

It was a good solid concert with the exact same setlist as Hamburg and Vienna. Bruce and the band were giving their all and the audience (including us) were having a good time. There were a lot of smiling and Bruce kept pointing at us shouting “You’re looking good!”. He also sat down on the railing a couple of times and let the people up front get really close. During the River someone turned on the subtitles for Last Man Standing a tad too early and that made us laugh (see pic below). Bruce also caused some confusion and laughter when he turned to the band during Glory Days to ask if they wanted to go home.

At 10:15 pm the concert was over. We decided to use the exit on the opposite side of where we had entered in hopes of avoiding the worst jams on our way back to the train station. The way we chose was less busy but longer and when we arrived at the train station there was already a looong queue for the train, that would come about 50 minutes later. To escape that crowd we tried other solutions; Uber, hitchhiking and grabbing a taxi.

We noticed that the crowd in front of the station building was getting bigger and bigger so we decided to walk towards the motorway to try and catch a taxi before everyone else and at last we succeeded. 80 Euro for a taxi back to Mannheim. 😖

I read on social media the day after the concert that we weren’t the only ones complaining about the organisation around the concert. Apparently there were people crowding the station until the early hours of the morning and people had to wait in the parking lots for hours due to the traffic chaos.

📸: @pita_oli and @AnnaLind1 Next show: Munich (23 July)

Setlist: