Sting 3.0

Sting at Arena Zagreb – simply wonderful!

On Wednesday, June 17th, as part of his world tour STING 3.0, the English musician Sting held his ninth performance in Croatia at Arena Zagreb. Last night, the Zagreb audience had the opportunity to hear the greatest hits from the period of The Police and from his solo career.

He was joined on stage by Dominic Miller on guitar and Chris Maas on drums. Sting has performed in front of the local audience eight times so far: three times at Arena in Pula (1997, 2000 and 2017), four times in Zagreb (2010, 2012, 2022 and 2024), and once at Lisinski (2009). And he has another big concert in Pula coming up, announced for August 1st of this year.

The last time I heard Sting live at the same venue was in the fall of 2022, but then Arena Zagreb was sold out. Last night, unfortunately, it was only comfortably full. You could even walk around comfortably on the ground floor (which is apparently why tickets were on sale on the day of the concert at a promotional price of 21 euros). The audience, as far as I noticed, consisted of all generations – a mature crowd that has been following The Police's work since the eighties, to much younger people who have become addicted to the quality music of his solo career. It should also be added that the concert was adjusted to last night's match, so the start of the performance was scheduled for a slightly earlier time.

But let's start in order. The evening's pleasant surprise was the excellently chosen support group. It was the Irish rock band from Belfast, Dea Matrona. The band members are Orláith Forsythe and Mollie McGinn, who sing and play guitar together, and I would describe their music as if it came out of the Twin Peaks soundtrack – dreamy and wistful. They have two studio albums under their belt and successfully warmed up the audience in half an hour. If you want to discover new bands, this is a warm recommendation.

Sting appeared in front of the Zagreb audience a few minutes after 8pm and opened with The Police's big hit Message in a Bottle, and continued with a new song that he is promoting on this very tour – I Wrote Your Name (Upon My Heart). He continued with the hits themselves – If I Ever Lose My Faith in You, Englishman in New York, Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic. Communication with the audience was minimal, except for one moment when he looked back at the upcoming game and said may the better team win. Then, dedicating the song to his country, he sang Fields of Gold.

The setlist really consisted of hits alone, as a kind of combination of his solo career and songs with The Police. So last night, in the repertoire of 22 songs, we could hear as many as ten timeless hits by this British new wave band. From the very beginning of the performance to the end, this 74-year-old sovereignly ruled the stage. The highlight of the evening was undoubtedly the combination of three songs that seemed to melt into each other – Walking on the Moon, So Lonely and Desert Rose. This is where Dominic Miller's virtuosity on the guitar came to the fore, and the connection between the local audience and Sting at that moment was obvious and tangible.

He concluded the main part of the concert with the indispensable Every Breath You Take, and after a really short invocation, he returned to the stage and treated us to two more big hits: Roxanne and Fragile. The concert ended a few minutes before 10 pm, leaving the audience extremely satisfied. Although there were not too many deviations from his previous performances, the Trio played the concert masterfully. If I had to describe this concert in one sentence, it would be: "It was simply wonderful".

(c) Sound Report

Sting as an overture for Croatia and England...

When in the same evening in Zagreb you have Sting, the man who defined the soundscape of the eighties with his band The Police and their "White Raggae", and a football match of the English national team, you get a specific rock 'n' roll thriller. Gordon Sumner, better known as Sting, is a proud "Geordie", a die-hard fan of Newcastle United and of the English kind. That's why it's not surprising that the clock in Arena Zagreb - the first stop of his European tour after returning from America - was subordinated to the referee's whistle. The start a little after 8 p.m. was a gentleman's agreement with the audience: two hours of pure rock, and then a run in front of the screen. Sting didn't hide it, he made it clear to the audience during the concert. The situation was all the more tense because England was playing Croatia.

However, what we got on stage in those two hours was pure rock, devoid of the ragga sound that defined him in the 80s, because Sting arrived in Zagreb as a hardened rock trio. With his eternal comrade, guitarist virtuoso Dominic Miller, and a new driving force, drummer Chris Maas, Sting dressed the old classics in a rock suit. It was solid rock, perhaps more suitable for club gigs than stadiums, but clubs are slowly becoming a thing of the past anyway.

At 74 years old, Sting still seems like a boy on stage who enjoys performing songs just as much as he did at the beginning of his career, if not more. Relaxed and satisfied, he spread positive energy to the first rows, and also to the rest of Rena through the video wall, and several guitar solos were accompanied by a close-up of his fingers in action on the guitar. That level of energy, vocal consistency and physical fitness is almost rude to younger stage colleagues.

Already at the opening "Message in a Bottle" Arena was immediately on its feet and dancing. Although, the energetic crescendo of the evening belonged to the classic "Englishman in New York". It was a moment where Sting could comfortably put his hands down from the guitar, the crowd carried the song. It continued with an even more danceable "Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic". A special treat was "Desert Rose", which he originally sang with Algerian star Cheb Mami. This time, Sting sang the beginning of the song in Arabic, while the audience took over his parts in English, creating a wonderful symbiosis that transcends language and racial barriers.

Without much talk, with only the occasional greeting in Croatian, Sting hurried through the set list to finish the concert on time and expressed his wish that the audience would also get home by the start of the match. But if anyone in the hall had the right to “football fever”, it was Sting himself.

What fascinates about this English gentleman is the fact that, despite decades at the top and the status of a rock aristocrat, the heart of that same guy from the working-class north-east of England still beats inside him. He gave us a lesson in rock literacy, packed his bags on time and went to cheer for his team. Professional, powerful and without a hint of calculation. An Englishman in Zagreb.

(c) poprock.hr

Sting in Zagreb: modest, relaxed and excellent...

Sting has become a regular guest in Zagreb, so we got his concert again, which coincided with the date of the England-Croatia match at the World Cup. What kind of Englishman would he be if he wasn't interested in football, so it all started a few minutes after 8pm, so that it could end by the time the match started at 10pm.

Perhaps these frequent guest appearances turned out to be a small problem for this story, because just a few months after the announcement of the Zagreb concert, another announcement came that the same show would also be in the Pula Arena, just a month and a half later. I believe that this is where the fans had a problem, they started calculating what to go to, and so many tickets for the ground floor remained unsold, which is why the organizer remembered a trick and started selling them for the very popular 21 euros in the last days before the concert. The trick worked, the ground floor was well filled, the lower part of the stands was also almost full, while the highest rows of the stands were so-so. In short, the Zagreb Arena was pleasantly full.

The opening band Dea Matrona from Ireland has been around since 2018, and they met during a school talent show where they were competitors. As they explained to us, they gradually started playing together, and now they have introduced themselves to us with an additional tour guitarist and drummer. It is all nice, although not overly exciting. Their sound is pop with rock influences, but the gentle vocals are perhaps too gentle for my taste because sometimes they are not heard at all, as if they are trying to convey their songs in a whisper.

The "Sting 3.0" tour has been going on for some time, and he has already visited Zagreb with it. At first glance, the setlist from two years ago and now differ slightly in songs and their arrangement, so fans knew exactly what to expect. Since he has become such a frequent guest, I finally got the courage to see him live, and I must admit that I had a great time.

Sting is certainly one of those authors who has put together a handful of hits, so it is easy for him to put together a setlist that is drinkable and flowing from start to finish. Right at the beginning, he hit a few big hits and immediately won me over with his warmth and unpretentiousness, so I knew that I was in for a pleasant almost two hours of music.

I don't know why, Sting has always seemed a little stiff to me, and now I have completely changed my opinion of him. Unlike many other singers, he does not have a microphone in his hands, but rather a small one tucked behind his ear, so he has complete freedom to dance wherever he wants while playing his bass. It is precisely this relaxedness that gives his songs an extra charm that seduces every visitor.

'3.0' in the tour name refers to the number of band members. Sting went back to the ‘factory settings’ here because, alongside him on bass and vocals, there was a guitarist and a drummer. The three of them carried the entire show on their backs just as it should be. Nothing was missing, and nothing was superfluous, it was obvious that they had polished it down to the smallest detail, so there was no need to change the winning formula too much.

It all started with “Message in the Bottle”, which seemed to reveal to us what messages he would be delivering during his show, and when “Englishman in New York” started after a few songs, I don’t think anything was the same anymore, everyone was focused only on the stage, some with their cell phones in their hands, and some even without them.

Somewhere after the opening part, Sting told us how much of a football fanatic he was and how he was waiting for our national team’s match, and he praised us for having a good team. You already know how it ended, so let’s get back to the concert itself. That middle part calmed things down a bit, there were songs that weren't hits at first, but the band did a great job presenting them.

Towards the end, the atmosphere slowly started to pump again, so "Shape of my Heart" was a prelude to the following songs, and everything culminated in the choir singalong "Every Breath You Take" with which they concluded the regular part of the concert. We didn't have to wait long for the encore because the game was already around the corner, and for him there were "Roxanne" and the beautiful "Fragile".

Those about an hour and 45 minutes really nicely present Sting's career, both the initial one in the band The Police, and the later solo one. Unlike many big stars, he seems very modest and unpretentious, like someone you could have a few coffees, a beer or something with, and talk about life (and football, obviously). And when we touch on the music itself, there is nothing to complain about because his performance is truly at a high level and brings every visitor exactly what they came for.

(c) Muzika by Siniša Miklaužić

Englishman Sting thrilled Croatians at Arena Zagreb...

On the day Croatia played its first World Cup match against England in Dallas, a concert by British music legend Sting was held at Arena Zagreb. While the Vatreni lost 4:2 on the field in one of the most closely watched opening matches of the tournament, Zagreb offered a completely different musical spectacle that evening that attracted thousands of fans.

The concert started at exactly 8 pm and ended around 10 pm, which ideally coincided with the football schedule and allowed many to easily "catch" part of the game after returning home or via their mobile phones. Since we did not have agency photos from the concert available in the editorial office, we asked readers to send us their impressions and footage from the Arena Zagreb.

"It was great!", one reader told us briefly, and our reader Mladen sent us his impressions from the concert.

"The opening act was the Irish band Dea Matrona, consisting of two girls Orláith Forsythe and Mollie McGinn, who started the concert after 7 p.m.

A few minutes late (the concert was supposed to start at exactly 8) Sting took the stage and immediately started with the famous hit Message in the Bottle by his former band The Police. The sound system and lighting were impeccable throughout the concert!

The powerful trio, consisting of Sting on bass guitar and his long-term collaborator, guitarist Dominic Miller and drummer Chris Maas, presented the audience with a cross-section of a successful multi-decade career, both as a member of The Police and later as a solo artist. Englishman in New York, Fields of Gold, Mad about You, Shape of My Heart, are just some of the hits from the set list.

The audience was most familiar with the oriental (and a little bit of a tea party, in my opinion) Desert Rose, and the last song before the encore - Every Breath You Take (also by The Police).

For the encore, he played Roxanne (also a hit by The Police) and the gentle ballad Fragile, in which he sings about how fragile life is in today's world full of unnecessary violence," Mladen told us.

The English musician also commented on the game at one point. "I know it's an important game tonight. May the better team win... I know you have a very good team," he said.

(c) Index.hr

Sting in the Arena – A sure bet with the signature of a legend...

Sting long ago stopped being a musician who needs to prove anything to anyone, and Zagreb has already confirmed a few times that no one is asking him to

For the third time in the last few years, Zagreb is the stop of Sting's 3.0 tour and for the third time the Arena is full, not by chance. The format is a trio, taken from his parent band The Police, without an orchestra, without visual spectacles, without excuses and risks, focusing on the skill of the performance, songs and a voice that, despite its age, functions with atypical reliability. The fullness of the sound and the ease of the trio's performance delights every time.

Last night, however, there was an unusual external factor of urgency. Sting wanted to finish the performance by 10 p.m. because Croatia and England were playing the 1st round of the World Cup in America and Canada at that time, and the man is still a tiffos Englishman. The performance started a little earlier than usual, just after 20:00, but this did not in the least affect the quality of the performance or the setlist, which was almost identical to the one with which he recently finished the American dates.

About twenty songs stretching from "Message in a Bottle" with which he opened, through all the great solo material "Fields of Gold", "Shape of My Heart", "Englishman in New York", "Desert Rose" to the police evergreens "So Lonely", "King Of Pain", "Wrapped Around My Finger" and "Every Breath You Take" with which he closed the regular part, to open the encore with "Roxanne" and close with the timeless "Fragile", which this summer, along with the war that continues somewhere in the background of the collective consciousness, sounded harder than usual.

There are no special emotional climaxes, dramatic turns or surprises during the rehearsals. Sting long ago stopped being a musician who needs to prove anything to anyone, and Zagreb has already confirmed a few times that no one is asking him to do so. However, what he enjoys every time is the ease of the performance with which the trio sounds like a small orchestra, getting intimate with 10,000 people, as if in a club of a few hundred die hard fans.

In any case, great persuasion for new and new visits. He will soon be in Pula on August 1st with the same repertoire and it is quite certain that the Arena there will be just as packed. Some bets are forever safe, in fact they are not bets at all if you only play it safe – but winnings.

(c) Mixer by Anđelo Jurkas