After Leeds the tour continued with two French festivals, La Nuit de L’erdre in Nort-sur-Erdre and Mainsquare in Arras in Northern France. The schedule was tight and after the first festival there was a 5-6 hours drive to the next one without any break. For that reason the experience felt like one even though it included two festivals and I added my notes in one post.

La Nuit de L’Erdre in Nort-sur-Erdre, France 5/7/2025

At La Nuit de L’erdre the line-up was exceptionally outside my taste with experimental music, French rap artists and DJs. The sound was extremely loud during the artists before Mika and when the singer’s T-shirt said “if the music is too loud you are too old” I thought the slogan was half right. The sound was too loud but on the other hand, I was way too old for the line-up as well and it felt hard to wait a long day before Mika’s performance. I worried the sound would be too loud also for Mika but luckily that wasn’t the case and when he started everything was better. 

The audience was very mixed and not overly enthusiastic, meaning Mika had to work and use his charm to win people over which he did of course and I once again felt we were witnessing magic in front of our eyes. The atmosphere couldn’t be compared to Leeds two days before but the night in Nort-sur-Erdre included many really nice details to remember. To my great pleasure we heard Underwater which this season is not always obvious on the setlist and magically some rain appeared exactly that moment and made the song extra special. 

There was a lot of interaction and this time Mika didn’t communicate only with the audience but also with the security making two guys in front dance and during Elle Me Dit he joined the dance with them. I loved the French songs and we got both C’est la vie and Jane Birkin and during Jane Birkin a little girl was asked on stage from the audience and her contagious happy dance made everyone at the festival happy. The time didn’t allow Mika to include Love Today in the end but Grace Kelly with the new “crowd choir parts” sounded good and had a lot of energy.

Mainsquare in Arras, France 6/7/2025

Mainsquare in Arras on the following day was quite different. The line-up was more colourful and the band before Mika had particularly talented musicians making the waiting more interesting compared to the previous festival. Mika’s performance was a compact one hour and included the big hits (WAG, Lollipop, Relax, BG, EMD, GK, LT), festival hits (Ice Cream, Yo-Yo) and Jane Birkin, which was the perfect addition to complete the set. As a tiny totally new detail we saw a lovely parrot suit in beautiful garden colours.

The audience had a great energy and it gave an enthusiastic response and my only worry was that the time limit would again cut the performance before Love Today. However, when it was time for Love Today and the giant heart I saw Mika’s face expressing the kind of determination that I knew he would fit the song in the performance and offer us the heart experience and I sighed for relief and the ending party with the heart was absolutely great.