Robbie Williams - Hampden Stadium, Glasgow, Tue 25 Jun 2013
The ego has landed - the ex-Take Thatter makes Hampden roar
With 45,000 fans here to see the headliner, Robbie made sure that he wasn’t going to be upstaged by his support act, the charismatic telly-star of X Factor Olly Murs, whose energy kept Robbie's legion of adoring, largely female fans rapt in the run-up to the main course.
Appearing in spectacular style 20 metres above the stage from a gold-cast bust of his own face, it's safe to say Robbie made a big entrance. As he saluted the crowd and slid down a zip-wire through a haze of colourful dry ice on to a smaller stage in the audience, the fans went wild. It seemed that the ego had well and truly landed as an array of giant props reflected his image, alongside two massive screens and a stage consisting of a giant crown.
As the appropriately entitled 'Let Me Entertain You' belted out, Robbie's unbridled energy exploded as he ran around the stage and played up to the fans and cameras throughout. As he walked up to a secondary smaller stage, and like the clown character he often portrays, he put a pair of Scottish saltire boxers shorts on his head (thrown to him by an audience member) and outstretched his arms like a pop messiah. Returning to the main stage to a giant metal bust of himself, he posed and fooled around, as the head opened and released multi-coloured balloons.
‘Everything Changes’, ‘Rock DJ,’ ‘Strong’ and ‘Millennium’ were all crowd-pleasers, but the emotive ballads also held their own, with ‘She’s The One' and his biggest anthem ‘Angels’ sweeping the massive audience up in a immense singalong.
After his successful Take That reunion and subsequent return to being a solo performer, Robbie undoubtedly seems re-energised. A larger-than-life show from a very much larger-than-life performer.