Robbie Williams has never been just a pop star. He’s always been the kind of figure you watch with the same uneasy fascination reserved for a reality show about a dysfunctional family. He’s never needed anyone to blame — his greatest enemy has always been himself.
On July 17, 2025, he brought his Britpop Tour to its only Italian stop: Trieste’s Stadio Nereo Rocco, which was completely sold out with nearly 28,500 people in attendance. The show was part of the “GO! 2025 & Friends” lineup — a wider cultural program supporting “GO!2025,” which will see Nova Gorica and Gorizia jointly serve as European Capital of Culture.
“Good evening Trieste, did you miss me? Of course you did”, he said with a grin. Then came the real punch: “Life is hard. And I dream of becoming the king of entertainment. But I can’t do it alone. Only together can we be the show”.
It was a perfect mission statement from an artist who has built his entire career on the fine line between bravado and emotional collapse. Just days before the concert, in Germany, he had opened up about his mother Janet, no longer recognizing him due to dementia, about his father Peter — a former showman and one-time stage companion — now unable to leave the house, gripped by Parkinson’s. And his mother-in-law Gwen, battling cancer, lupus and Parkinson’s at once. “I’m not ready for this”, he said. And you believe him.
But Williams is also the kind of performer who, moments after a gut-wrenching confession, will dive into Let Me Entertain You while descending from above like a circus acrobat, wearing a cartoonish grin and total confidence.
The setlist was a mix of memory and spectacle: Rocket, Let Me Entertain You, and a wild medley that mashed up Song 2, Seven Nation Army, Livin’ on a Prayer, Monsoon, Rock DJ, Love My Life, Strong, The Road to Mandalay, and other high-energy anthems. Then came the big closers: Feel, Angels, My Way, and She’s the One — a final act of emotional release.
He spoke of his family — Ayda, the wife who keeps him grounded, and the four children who have changed the way he walks through the world — and of his childhood in Stoke-on-Trent, that working-class past he still wears like a second skin.
Robbie Williams has long known he’ll never be the king of pop. But maybe, just maybe, he’s become something more meaningful: the king of going down in flames and still stepping back into the light. And anyone who can turn that into a show… well, they deserve a standing ovation.
