Roger Waters’ first night at Altice with his Us + Them Tour proved to be epic and dazzling in visual and musical terms. The author who forgives us the enthusiasm but the concert of Roger Water was a celebration to Pink Floyd!
With a two-part, surgically aligned alignment of 20 minutes, Roger Waters led a guided tour of the Pink Floyd universe’s best memories but with a revised, augmented, and very up-to-date recreation on stage. If the first part is punctuated by strong images in a giant screen to make of scenery with highlight to the classics Time, The Great Gig in the Sky, Wish You Were Here or to a version of Another Brick in The Wall with figuration of Portuguese children, before the interval, the second half is marked by the appearance of giant screens crossing the Altice Arena!
For the beginning of the second part there are Dogs and Pigs and the surprise in the room is general when a giant pig flies over the audience with a message: stay human.
Between the stage and the bench at the other end of the arena came down from the ceiling giant screens facing the two central benches adorned with chimneys to recreate the industrial environment of the famous cover of the album Animals. The reproduced images are strong, social and political intervention context. For the record, the strongest message ends in bold lyrics: ” Trump is a Pig .”
The finale apotheosis is with Roger Waters to thank the affection of the Portuguese public while displaying a flag of Palestine that later offers to the audience.
A final highlight for the excellent sound quality that thus honors the 20th anniversary of the Atlantic Pavilion, so named in 1998.
A concert in the good old way.
Words courtesy of Roberta Martin
Capacity 20,000+
Plans to build a multipurpose arena in Lisbon date back to the first discussions of the Expo ’98 Master Plan. At the time, the city lacked a versatile facility able to accommodate concerts, congresses and sporting events of big scope. The existing structures, both in Lisbon and in Portugal alike, either had limited capacity (up to 4,000 people), or were difficult to adapt to non-conventional events, such as world class indoor sports competitions. Another shortcoming of existing venues was the lack of technical infrastructure deemed necessary to host modern concerts, musicals and to allow for proper live TV coverage.
The country needed an arena to fill the existing gap between smaller indoor halls, like the Lisbon Coliseum, and open-air stadia. As a consequence, Portugal would not host games of important indoor sports championships and no major concerts would take place in the country in periods of cold and rainy weather.
The decision to build the Pavilhão Atlântico within the masterplan of Expo 98 allowed the arena to have a catchment area well beyond the city of Lisbon. Being a short distance from Gare do Oriente and several major highway interchanges, allows the arena to draw spectators from all over the country.
In July 2012, the arena was sold to Arena Atlântico S.A. for €21,2 million. In May 2013, Portugal Telecom acquired the naming rights to the venue, re-branding it as MEO Arena after its services brand MEO In October 2017, following the acquisition of Portugal Telecom by Altice, the venue was renamed Altice Arena
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