The gig year started with a gig at Palais des Festivals in Cannes, France. We had seen a party style roof terrace gig in the upstairs of the same venue just two years ago so I knew the general circumstances. The main auditorium of Palais des Festivals is extremely well known. The famous place itself wasn’t as fancy as I had imagined in advance, it was actually quite simple yet still stunning at the same time, and the view to the stage was absolutely gorgeous. I was in front and had a close view but the full view from the sloping seated area must have been amazing as well. The audience was close to the stage, the wooden floor of it was reflecting colours coming from the lights and backgrounds and all that created a beautiful scene and left space for Mika’s elegant outfits. I had high expectations for this first and officially only gig of the early spring and it was clear since the beginning that all those expectations would be filled during the night. 

 There were moments of collective gasps in the crowd before the first song even properly started. The band walked on stage and took their places and everyone could immediately notice that the tall guitarist wearing a hat was Tim, Mika’s long-time, widely liked musician who started in the band already in 2011 and who we hadn’t seen for a while. In a moment another, big gasp when Mika appeared on stage wearing his particularly elegant black suit and started the slow version of Lollipop. The best possible start for the gig and I couldn’t stop admiring everything. The beautifully lighted stage, the incredible black suit, Mika’s new, a bit longer hair style, the slower version of Lollipop that is perfect for stylish venues like in Cannes, first sitting on the piano and then cheerfully dancing, the beginning part of the song almost spoken:

 “I went walking with my mama one day and as always she told me what people say / that you must live you life until the love is found / cause love is gonna fuck you up and get you down / But baby I’m 41 (!) years old and know that bullshit I was told  / cause I lived my life and love was found - many times - and love never pulled me down”

 The astonishingly elegant opening for the show got only better when Mika started Origin - totally expectedly but in a particularly lovely way - and soon took off his black jacket revealing a black version of his prettiest top (that we saw in white for example at Solidays) and even a bold new necklace. He flirted with the audience playing with the necklace introducing the new accessory and added a sweet detail in the “Thank God That You Found Me” part spelling with his fingers: L-O-V-E, thank-God-you found-me. The front area of the audience who obviously knows the song well could instantly recognise the new detail and was clearly thrilled, what a start for the gig, it couldn’t have been better. At this point practically the whole audience was standing and dancing which must have been a small surprise for Mika because so often a part of the audience at “fancy” seated venues can be unenthusiastic and stay seated even until the end. Not this time. The vibe wasn’t overly energetic but people stood mostly up, danced and took part in the gig. For sure no one regretted travelling to Southern France in January even though we got pouring rain the whole day. 

 After Lollipop and Origin Mika continued with Talk about You and then did a particularly beautiful intro speech for Big Girl before rushing backstage to change his outfit. It was an unexpected pleasure to get the new speech detail in English and I have afterwards listened to my video of the speech several times just for his beautiful English accent I have always loved. The lines went like this:

 “I was sitting in a diner and this lady walks in and she looked like my auntie Mimi. She calls the waiter, she says, darling, bring me a Diet Coke and a pizza, please. I wanted to fall to my knees and scream: Diet Coke and a pizza please! Lady, you are beautiful! The problem was that that was the movie in my head and in real life I said absolutely nothing. So my friends of Cannes, close your eyes and we shall scream and sing the one phrase that I didn’t have courage to say out loud in the middle of the restaurant: Big Girl, You Are Beautiful.” 

 With piano on the background the little speech was a stylish detail and one of my favourite moments during the night and I loved the bouncing start for the song as well that reminded me of the performance in Basel where Big Girl had a similar bouncing energy to begin. This time rushing to the backstage and hardly 10 seconds, less than 20 for sure, before rushing back to the stage again for Big Girl and for a small walk in the crowd. Now wearing the pink rainbow suit mixed with the black top and black shoes from the previous outfit. He continued with Jane Birkin which is always one of my favourites with its atmospheric intro, some pirouettes in the middle and spiced with the crowd either beautifully singing or rather screaming, this time maybe the latter one. 

 Then Good Guys which is a huge highlight especially at venues like this one, the warm tone was beautiful. Definitely one of the biggest highlights of the night. This song has enormously grown in me during years, the performance has evolved and shaped the song and what started as a simple personal story has become something genuinely intimate, there’s a feeling something fundamental about the past is shared and again, I loved the performance in Cannes. At some point he went to sing in the middle of the glamorous choir ladies who I generally love as a detail, and in the end of the song took a string of golden stars from the audience (used as a decoration in the little meeting before the gig) which obviously fitted very well both with the song (“some of us in the gutter / are looking up at the stars”) and the film festival location. 

After Good Guys one of my favourite Mika songs, Underwater and as always I put down my mobile to purely listen and watch and the song was lovely as ever, the stage looked absolutely magical with the beautiful star-like lights and I simply watched and admired minding my own, peaceful thoughts, enjoying the stunning music and felt so safe until in the end of the song and Mika started to guide different parts of the audience to sing like he often does. 

After Underwater the setlist continued with energetic songs first in the glittery outfit with Relax and Bougez and then in the sharp pink suit with Elle Me Dit, Grace Kelly and C’est la vie. During Elle Me Dit he made the band play “piano piano” like “little people” and the choir was asked to join the dance and before Bougez and C’est la vie we heard long French talks that probably took a bit too much time because the lovely Happy Ending didn’t get the usual guitar ending part and in the end of the show there was no Love Today after We Are Golden. 

The gig was properly long and beautiful in every way and included many new and extremely lovely details like also the special beginning for Grace Kelly and after saying thank you we got the familiar Yo-Yo dance which I love as a ritual. Elle Me Dit was fun and of the ending part of the gig my personal favourite was definitely C’est la vie which I have loved the whole era. He was definitely giving a lot of energy throughout the whole night and the ending part pink outfit added the energetic vibe with the fresh colour and looked again really good with the pretty coloured Club Apocalypso sign and the colourful lights. Lovely gig, exceptionally elegant yet still somehow sweet and not overly polished at all even though the venue was seated and the location kind of fancy.