Kim Wilde: Hello Mr. Snowman

Kim Wilde with acoustic band and Christmas carols in Frankfurt in the Alte Oper.

Madonna has thrown off the metal breasts and hides behind the Kabbalah as a seething volcano. Nena grabbed a vegan guru and became the German schoolmistress. And what about Kim Wilde, the British corner in the Ducky Girls Triangle of the eighties? Opportunity to find out offered her appearance in the sold out Mozartsaal with unplugged band from brother Ricky, niece Scarlett and guitarist Neil Jones. It was announced “an evening of hits and Xmas songs”: “Wilde Winter Acoustic”.

If the epithet is “snotty”, let Kim Wilde’s “Kids in America” ​​conjure up the screen and keep silent. Girl Power was a real trump card in the eighties, whether on the New German Wave, at the mutant-joyful dragon lady Madonna Ciccone or in the sweet-blonde eyes of the London punk Bardot, whose super hit “Kids in America” ​​threatened the renegade colonies with their musical reconquest: “New York to east California / There’s a new wave coming, I warn ya”.

No wonder that in 2003 Nena grabbed Kim Wilde to record the old Nena song “Irgendwie, irgendwo, irgendwann” in English. What started as a jump start for Kim in the ongoing comeback. Compared to Nena and Madonna, Kim Wilde is today the incarnate Commonsense, as evidenced by her recourse to Anglo-Saxon Christmas delights: half maudlin, half cheeky-humorous.

Their “Wild Winter Songbook” from 2013 represents almost half of the concert, complemented by other hits. Good-humored announcements, scroungers with the audience and the family atmosphere paid off, after the break even with a Christmas sweater with more glitter for the niece. Was it just too cold outside for an encore after two hours?

“Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas” was soon followed by “Let It Snow!”, The swinging “Winter Wonderland” from the 1930s and so on. In addition Wildes “Hope” as an antidote to Christmas-skepticism and “New Life” as a greeting to the unborn, “White Winter Hymnal” in front of the funny “Hey Mr. Snowman” and as a bouncer in front of “Kids in America”: “Rockin ‘Around the Christmas Tree “. From outside the album, two year-end titles were added, the whimsy “Last Christmas” by Wham! and Irving Berlin’s “White Christmas”, the best-selling single ever.

The longer the evening, the more Kim and Anhang (two amplified acoustic guitars, tambourine, bells, background vocals) fired hits: “Checkered Love” and the painter’s picture “European Soul”, “Cambodia” and “Keeping the Dream Alive” , “Never Trust a Stranger” and “Four Letter Word”, “You Came” and “You Keep Me Hangin ‘On”. The British in the hall liked it even more, shouts from the audience accepted the “babe” agreeable and spoke to us as “favorite”. A nice evening, and that’s the point.