Go Back To The Zoo and VanVelzen @ TT Festival

Friday night before the races is the original TT Night, in the old days mostly known for the fights, the broken windows of the various shops in Assen and the occasional death. But those days are now long gone. Now you can easily find young families with buggies marching down the streets ate one o’clock at night, on their way to the fair with the slightly older child. And then there’s music of course, lots of it.

I must say that I am a bit surprised about the choice in bands. Seeing as the TT Night isn’t only visited by Dutch people (although they will probably outnumber the rest), TT Races attract a large amount of international visitors. Lots of Germans, Spanish people, Italians, English and many more. So I would have expected to see some bike oriented bands. Like Triggerfinger and Y&T a few years ago. Ellen ten Damme -Dutch, but also with a German career- was a great act too. But this year the bands are mainly Dutch. As on Wednesday with Jacqueline Govaert and Ben Saunders, who outside the Netherlands has heard of VanVelzen? Or Go Back To The Zoo? I willing to bet not many. Still, those were the bands on the main stage this year and they easily filled the Koopmansplein location where the stage was at, so no complaints there.

Go Back To The Zoo was up first and like Jacqueline Govaert it was my second run-in since Dauwpop. And again I was not very happy with the Dauwpop set of this band, so I was very happy to be able to take some decent shots ot the band now. Go Back To The Zoo is a popular band over here so the audience sang along with the hits and danced to the rest. Apart for a few over-active ADHD kids on LSD in front of me, the audience was great. The gig was great, it’s a fun band to see.

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After Go Back To The Zoo a DJ took over while the main stage was prepared for the next act and half an hour later VanVelzen and band started their gig. VanVelzen is a fairly big name in the Dutch Music scene, even though he’s a fairly small man. The audience had gotten a bit more crowded but knew just about every song VanVelzen and band sang. It’;s not my kind of music, but the band does create a fantastic atmosphere that works for the large crowd and on a night like this, that’s what counts. So in that view the gig was fantastic. However when it’s time to start a U2 cover, I’m out of there.

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Come next morning I see myself in the newspaper. Not that anyone will recognise me, but knowing where I stand (behind the bloke in the striped blue/white jacket) the top of my head is ‘clearly’ visible I should have had my camera lens pointing upward, than everyone would have surely recognised me.

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Related posts:

1. DeWolff, Baseballs, Blood Red Shoes, The Cult & Go Back To The Zoo @ Dauwpop 4/4
2. Cuby & The Blizzards and Mooi Wark at TT Festival