Tour of the Mongoose

Tour of the Mongoose (also known as El Tour de la Mangosta in hispanophone countries) is the third concert tour by Colombian singer-songwriter, Shakira, in support of her first English album, Laundry Service. It is also noted as the singer's first global tour, reaching North America, South America, Asia and Europe. The tour successfully grossed close to $72 million according to Sony Music.

Background

Performing "Whenever, Wherever" in Chicago

Clear Channel Entertainment announced the "Tour of the Mongoose" in September 2002. The tour came shortly after Shakira reached international success with her third studio album. During a press conference in New York City, Shakira summarized her show as an "entertaining rock show", stating "I'm not saving any effort to make sure that this concert [tour] will be the best I can offer to my fans. And it's going to have a strong spirit of rock and roll, so you will see a rock-and-roll show, but it will have all of the nuances and the subtleties of a show that attempts to entertain."

At the same press conference, Shakira explained the tour's name as symbolizing the strength of the mongoose, stating "...I was really impressed by it because it is an animal that can defeat the snake with just a bite. It's like a living miracle, this animal, to me, because if there's an animal on earth that can defeat the snake—a venomous viper—with a bite, I think that there's got to be some way for us to defeat, or to bite the neck of hatred in this world, no? "It's called the Tour of the Mongoose, and the mongoose is basically one of the few animals who can defeat the most venomous snakes with just one bite and that's why I decided to name my tour that way, because I think that if we all have a little mongoose inside that can defeat the hatred and the resentment and the prejudice of everyday, we can probably win the battle." At the tour commencement, Corey Moss of MTV compared the singer to Britney Spears, Tommy Lee, Elvis Presley, Sheryl Crow and Rage Against the Machine. The show sparked some controversy due to a perceived anti-war message in a video played prior to the performance of "Octavo Día", displaying war footage and later revealing the Grim Reaper to be a puppeteer.

Shakira defended the video stating

"I think that we see war as a virtual thing and we even get to believe that bombs fall on top of cardboard cutouts and stuff like that, they don't. They kill real people, real children, real mothers and millions of innocent people. I come from Colombia, which is a country that has been under the whip of violence for more than four decades, so I've seen the consequences of war and I've seen the psychological damage that it does in a society. And I think that we're never ready for war. I just feel that there are always pacifist solutions, and I think that the leaders know the exit to the conflict, it's just that sometimes they don't want to use them, they just want to continue playing their little game of power. And I feel that us people have the responsibility and also the obligation to demand to our leaders to give us the pacifist solutions. To give us a world in peace. I might be sounding like an old fashioned hippie, but I believe in pacifist revolutions and I think that we have to look for those solutions, otherwise there's no way to survive in this world. In the First World War, 13 million people were killed. In the Second World War, 40 million people were killed. I think that if a third war takes place, nothing is going to be left on the face of earth. 'Octavo Dia' talks about God when he created the world, the eighth day he went for a walk to outer space and when he came back he found our world in an infernal mess and he found that we were being controlled and manipulated by just a few leaders and that we were like pieces of a chess game. Not always do the governments represent their people. Not always do the governments make the right decisions, because the governments are controlled by just a few, and those few do not always represent faithfully the ideals of the people."

Broadcast and recordings

Main article: Live & off the Record

The tour was shot in Rotterdam, The Netherlands on April 22, 2003. The tour was chronicled on Live & off the Record. The disc included selected songs from the concert, along with a documentary showing the performer preparing for the show, her song writing process and her ideas about social responsibility. It also includes a live CD that features ten songs that were performed during the show. The CD spun off two singles, "Poem to a Horse" and "Whenever, Wherever Live".

In a special edition of "Fijacion Oral, Volume 1" the performances of "Fool" and "Donde Estan Los Ladrones?" were included.

Setlist

Anglophone

1. "Ojos Así"
2. "Si Te Vas"
3. "Te Dejo Madrid"
4. "Fool"
5. "¿Dónde Están Los Ladrones?"
6. "Que Me Quedes Tú"
7. "Ciega, Sordomuda"
8. "The One"
9. "Dude (Looks Like A Lady)"
10. "Back In Black"
11. "Rules"
12. "Inevitable"
13. "Underneath Your Clothes"
14. "Estoy Aquí"
15. "Octavo Día"
16. "Ready For The Good Times"
17. "Un Poco de Amor"
18. "Poem to a Horse"
19. "Tú"

Encore

20. Objection (Tango)"
21. "Whenever, Wherever"

Hispanophone

1. "Ojos Así"
2. "Si Te Vas"
3. "Inevitable"
4. "Ciega, Sordomuda"
5. "Dude (Looks Like A Lady)"
6. "Back In Black"
7. "Rules"
8. "Que Me Quedes Tú"
9. "Estoy Aquí"
10. "Octavo Día"
11. "Ready For The Good Times"
12. "Un Poco De Amor"
13. "¿Dónde Están Los Ladrones?"
14. "Te Dejo Madrid"
15. "Tú"

Encore

16. "Te Aviso, Te Anuncio (Tango)"
17. "Suerte"

Tour dates

Date	City	Country	Venue
North America
November 8, 2002	San Diego	United States	San Diego Sports Arena
November 10, 2002	San Jose		Compaq Center at San Jose
November 12, 2002	Anaheim		Arrowhead Pond at Anaheim
November 13, 2002	Los Angeles		Staples Center
November 15, 2002	El Paso		Don Haskins Center
November 16, 2002
November 20, 2002	New York City		Madison Square Garden
November 22, 2002	Auburn Hills		The Palace of Auburn Hills
November 24, 2002	Philadelphia		First Union Center
November 25, 2002	Uniondale		Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum
November 27, 2002	Montreal	Canada	Bell Centre
November 28, 2002	Toronto		Air Canada Centre
November 30, 2002	Boston	United States	Fleet Center
December 2, 2002	Miami		American Airlines Arena
Europe
December 10, 2002	Barcelona	Spain	Palau Sant Jordi
December 12, 2002	Cologne	Germany	Kölnarena
December 16, 2002	London	England	Wembley Arena
North America
January 18, 2003	Chicago	United States	United Center
January 20, 2003	Dallas		American Airlines Center
January 22, 2003	Houston		Compaq Center
January 23, 2003	San Antonio		SBC Center
January 25, 2003	Las Vegas		Mandalay Bay Events Center
January 28, 2003	Denver		Pepsi Center
January 31, 2003	Phoenix		America West Arena
February 2, 2003	Oakland		The Arena at Oakland
February 5, 2003	Laredo		Laredo Entertainment Center
February 6, 2003
February 8, 2003	Guadalajara	Mexico	Estadio Tres de Marzo
February 9, 2003
February 11, 2003	Monterrey		Auditorio Coca-Cola
February 12, 2003
February 14, 2003	Mexico City		Foro Sol
February 15, 2003
February 23, 2003	Albuquerque	United States	Tingley Coliseum
February 25, 2003	El Paso		Don Haskins Center
February 19, 2003	Panama City	Panama	Figali Convention Center
South America
February 28, 2003	Quito	Ecuador	Estadio Olímpico Atahualpa
March 5, 2003	Lima	Peru	Hipódromo de Monterrico
March 8, 2003	Santiago	Chile	Estadio Nacional de Chile
March 12, 2003	Bogotá	Colombia	Estadio El Campín
March 15, 2003	Barranquilla		Estadio Metropolitano
North America
March 22, 2003	San Juan	Puerto Rico	Hiram Bithorn Stadium
Europe
March 28, 2003	Paris	France	Palais omnisports de Paris-Bercy
March 30, 2003	Vienna	Austria	Wiener Stadthalle
March 31, 2003
April 2, 2003	Zürich	Switzerland	Hallenstadion
April 4, 2003	Frankfurt	Germany	Festhalle Frankfurt
April 6, 2003	Munich		Olympiahalle
April 10, 2003	Stockholm	Sweden	Stockholm Globe Arena
April 13, 2003	Berlin	Germany	Max-Schmeling-Halle
April 14, 2003	Hamburg		Color Line Arena
April 17, 2003	Milan	Italy	Fila Forum
April 21, 2003	Antwerp	Belgium	Sportpaleis
April 22, 2003	Rotterdam	Netherlands	The Ahoy
April 25, 2003	Madrid	Spain	Plaza de Toros de Las Ventas
April 27, 2003	Lisbon	Portugal	Pavilhão Atlântico
South America
May 1, 2003	Punta del Este	Uruguay	Conrad de Punta del Este
May 3, 2003	Buenos Aires	Argentina	River Plate Stadium
North America
May 6, 2003	Santo Domingo	Dominican Republic	Estadio Quisqueya
South America
May 8, 2003	Maracaibo	Venezuela	Estadio José Pachencho Romero
May 11, 2003	Caracas		Poliedro de Caracas

Personnel

• Shakira - Producer, songwriter, vocals, guitar, harmonica
• Gonzalo Agulla - Executive producer
• José Arnal - Executive producer
• Tim Mitchell - Producer, arranger, guitar
• Dana Austin - Producer
• Bettina Abascal - Post producer
• Dominic Morley - Engineer
• Richard Robson - Engineer
• Neil Tucker - Engineer
• Matt Vaughan - Engineer
• Richard Wilkinson - Engineer
• Adrian Hall - Mixing engineer
• Chris Theis - Mixing engineer
• Mike Fisher - Audio post-production
• Mike Wilder - Mastering
• Ramiro Aguilar - Video director
• Pablo Arraya - Editing assistant
• Rita Quintero - Backing vocals, keyboards
• Adam Zimmon - Guitar
• Mario Inchaust - Backing Vocals, Guitars
• Albert Sterling Menendez - Keyboards
• Pedro Alfonso - Violin
• Dan Rothchild - Bass guitar, photography
• Brendan Buckley - Drums
• Rafael Padilla - Percussion
• Jeff Bender - Photography, cover photo
• Frank Ockenfels - Photography
• Ian Cuttler - Art direction
• Frank Carbonari - Graphic design
• Rose Noone - A&R

External links

• Shakira's Official Website