Real Madrid vs. DC United

Ronaldo, Beckham, Zidane, Roberto Carlos, Emerson, Cannavaro, Baptista, Robinho.... you'll remember these as the stars from their respective countries at the World Cup in Germany. What you may not know is that these players all play for the same club when not representing their country... and that club is the legendary Real Madrid, who visited Seattle last night to play a friendly against Major League Soccer's best team DC United. We were fortunate enough to be able to attend the match which was held at Qwest Field, home of the Seattle Seahawks.

Truth be told, not all of the above stars made an appearance. Zidane has retired, and Ronaldo remained in Europe due to injury and general match fitness. Still, there was some awesome talent on display, and not all of it was from Real Madrid. DC United is a credible side, as demonstrated by the match's 1-1 result. Real had the edge (particularly in the second half), but United's 17-year-old phenom Freddy Adu showed why he's compared to a young Pelé or Ronaldinho.

I was a bit disappointed with the venue; Qwest Field is a new stadium, right next door to Safeco Field where the Mariners play, and to be honest it's nowhere near as good as its neighbor. For a start, we were frisked going in, and secondly the pitch was in terrible condition: most of the grass was brown, and there were visible lumps and debris. Although we had good seats quite close to the action, it was frustrating when the inevitable drunken idiots a few rows in front of us stood up and waved their beers around while making cellphone calls, oblivious to the calls of "down in front!" and the shower of peanuts and garbage being thrown at them. All it takes is one person to stand up, and this causes a ripple effect behind them. Essentially, we spent the last two minutes of the match standing up just so we could see the field at all. It also took a ridiculously long time to exit the stadium, a far cry from the five minutes it takes to get to the street after the last pitch at a Mariners game.

Sign of the times, perhaps: even with only three weeks notice, the entire stadium of 66,000 sold out. That beat the Mariners game that was played earlier in the day, and was in spite of the Tim McGraw and Faith Hill concert that was happening in Seattle at the same time. Needless to say, traffic was horrendous.

Apart from the venue, the match was great. Being a friendly there were an unlimited number of substitutions allowed, so Real played their entire squad during the course of the game. Robinho came on and provided some spark during the second half, and we missed Beckham who was replaced at half time.

Here's some photos from our vantage point:

Adu (center), and Beckham (bottom right; blue shoes)

Roberto Carlos (left; bald), and Adu (right)

The hightlight of the match was probably when Real were awarded a free kick just outside the penalty area, and Roberto Carlo came forward to deliver one of his thunderbolts. He blasted it around the wall, but keeper Troy Perkins made a brilliant diving save. The rebound caused a goal-line scramble, with the ball eventually flying just wide of the net.

All in all, an excellent and memorable event! This is the largest crowd I've ever seen a soccer game with, and it was encouraging to see just how popular the sport has become in the USA.

Varekai

Cirque du Soleil presents Varekai

Review by Murray Chapman

The first circus I ever went to was Circus Vargas some time in the 1970s. They had set up their tent in the parking lot of the Lougheed Mall in Burnaby, BC, and I remember the experience emotionally but not completely. Details such as how they had driven large metal spikes into the bitumen to secure the ropes for the tent are still clear in my mind (vandalism, I thought!), and the fact that they had lions, tigers, clowns, and trapeeze artists remains in my mind. I remember there were three rings, and although they did a good job of directing our attention to the ring where the action was occurring, as a small child the action at the far end of the tent seemed to be literally miles away. The smell of popcorn and gunpowder burnt itself forever into my memory, even if I can't remember the names of the performers or specifically what they did.

Fast forward to my next circus experience in around 1995: Circus Royale (I think), next to the RBH in Brisbane, Queensland. To say that it was a disappointment would be a dreadful understatement: even as we drove into the carpark it was unpleasant: we had to run the gauntlet of animal rights protestors who were trying to shame both the circus itself and those who attended. The entire experience reeked of fatigue and death: a tent that had obviously been in service since the early part of the century. Gilded props that were battered and torn. Animals - although probably not mistreated - that were certainly enthusiastic or even exotic. Costumes and design motifs that screamed "1972": flared trousers and Adam West-style capes. The performers were definitely "lifers": several generations of carnies hanging on desperately to a way of life that suffered a mortal blow with the advent of television, let alone video games and big-budget movies.

Perhaps I was just older and more cynical; was I seeing things with a different eye? Was Circus Vargas really the same, and I was just too young and naive to see it? By the time that "Captain Australia" had limped his way through his routine of checking his mighty cannon before being fired limply across the tent into a sagging net, I decided that circuses belonged in the same category as James Bond films starring Roger Moore: as a child they are the best thing you've ever seen, but as an adult you're almost embarrassed to watch them.

I gave the circus one more chance in around 1998, this time at Dreamworld. As a permanent attraction, I hoped that it would be more professional and suffer less from the bohemian fleetingness that was all too obvious during my last circus experience. Alas, it was even worse: we fled the tent after less than 30 minutes, driven by the raw stench of elephant dung.

And so I gave up on the circus.

While the traditional concept of the Big Top Circus may have (mercifully) become extinct, the essence of the experience never died. Dormant for decades, it is reborn and reinvigorated by Cirque du Soleil, a French-Canadian troupe which has single-handedly redefined the entire concept of cirque.

Gone are the animals and the flim-flam cheesiness, replaced instead by art and the wizardry of modern technology and showmanship. Part dance, part musical, part comedy, but above all featuring acrobatics and atheticism, the events staged by Cirque du Soleil suppress individualism to present an abstract yet coherent spectacle of light, color, and motion.

Varekai is the fourth Cirque du Soleil show I have seen; Mystere was the first (Luxor, Las Vegas), followed by Allegria (on tour, Seattle) and O (The Bellagio, Las Vegas). I would rate O as the best, but that's probably inevitable, considering that it is performed in a custom-built featuring a 1.5 million gallon water tank (O = "eau" = "water", you see!) and thus has an unfair advantage!


Still, Varekai maintains the standards of previous shows. Acrobatics, music, dance, and comedy all share the stage, with never a dull moment. The highlight of the show for me was (as I expected), the acrobatic components: the "Russian Swings" (l) and the "Icarian Games" (r) -- two men who would juggle two other men with their feet, spinning them over and around like a baton.

Other highlights include the clowns (who start their performances from within the crowd as it files in), and the contortionists, who seem to be able to survive just fine despite being equipped with several universal joints instead of a pelvis and a spine. It's often difficult to follow all the action: things can build up in the background, or performers suddenly fly up out of a hole in the stage -- or indeed swoop down from the top of the tent suspended by their head tied to a pair of nylon stockings... watch out!

Cirque du Soleil only comes around every few years; I'd definitely recommend you catch it if you can! Unfortunately, unless you live in Vancouver or Australia, you've already missed them.

Seattle seems to be having a rash of good concerts this year: as well as Varekai, I also saw Queen + Paul Rodgers. Next up, it's a journey into life, love, death, and madness -- another performance I never thought I'd have the chance to see:

Return of the Champions

Here we stand, or here we fall;
History won't care at all.
Make the bed, light the light;
Lady Mercy won't be home tonight.

I had long ago abandoned any hope of seeing Queen live in concert: they hadn't played on stage in public since 1986, Freddie Mercury was dead, John Deacon had retired, and they hadn't released an album in over a decade. Imagine my surprise and joy at learning of their world tour with frontman Paul Rodgers (Bad Company, Free).

Tonight, Alex and I attended the Seattle concert... the fulfillment of a life-long ambition, all the sweeter because it never occured to me that it could happen.

Technically, it's only half of Queen: Freddie is still dead, and John is still retired. Nevertheless, even with only half the original members it's still an event to behold.

The concert was excellent; unlike some other classic British bands the vocals have not deteriorated at all over the decades. Brian May's guitar remains uncannily similar to how it sounds on the albums, and they even introduced some excellent new arrangements of some of their classic songs. I particularly liked the slow acoustical version of Hammer to Fall, which quickly swells to it's familiar arrangement for a hard-rocking finale.

There were only three disappointing parts of the evening: the lack of any material from ...A Kind of Magic; the elimination of I Want It All from the set list; and Roger losing a drumstick during the fast drum fill in Fat Bottomed Girls. :-)

Paul Rodgers has the impossible task of filling Mercury's shoes. He's a great vocalist, particularly on the slower tracks such as Reaching Out and Bohemian Rhapsody, and wisely doesn't attempt to mimic Freddie's vocal or performance style. Rhapsody was particularly touching as it was effectively a duet with (a recording of) Freddie Mercury performing the introduction with Rodgers taking over for the finale.

With Brian, Roger, and Paul all sharing lead vocals during the show we were completely spoilt. Brian's Love of My Life and Roger's These Are the Days of Our Lives were excellent, and Paul's rendition of the older Queen classics was superb.

There are only two dates left on the tour: Portland on the 11th and Vancouver on the 13th, so it's unlikely that you're going to catch them if you haven't already. Regardless, there is an excellent DVD of the concert already available.

As you can see, we had excellent seats; row 17 on the floor, only six seats away from the catwalk. At $200 each it was by far the most expensive concert I've been to... but this was a price I was happy to pay.