5 posts tagged “jay-z”

I mean for real MIA? You have got to me kidding me. Dancing around half naked on a stage the same day you are supposed to give birth. That would have been hilarious if her water broke on stage. It's all about ratings people.

So yesterday while sitting at work and working hard (as if I do anything else) my friend calls and asks if I want to go to the Glow In The Dark Tour. I of course say yes and I'm glad I did. This show was 100 times better than the Heart of the City show.

The concert was at the Nokia Center which was smaller and more intimate than the Hollywood Bowl. The crowd was soooo young and predominantly Asian but everyone was respectful in the crowd and 100 % about the music.

Now to the acts...

We walked in while Lupe was on stage. His set was basic since he was first but his energy was impressive. I thought all the teeny-boppers were there to see him b/c they knew every word.

Then N.E.R.D came out (Pharrell could get it, LOL) and they too had a basic set but completely identified with the crowd and even incited a potential riot by telling fans to ignore security and jump out in the aisles. They played their hits plus a new song that was cool. I ended up meeting another friend in the lobby for a drink. This probably was the closest I have been to a Rave.

Next up was Rihanna. She really was in tune with her Rock side. Her outfits were cute and she sang most of her hits. It would have been nice to see Dream or Ne-Yo come out and surprise the crowd but she held it down. Her hair cut is continuing to look boy-ish. She reminded me of Tinker-bell/Peter Pan but her energy and vocals were on point. Being the only lady on the tour must be hard so she made sure the ladies in the audience got to sing their couple of  "Guys ain't S*it" songs since all the other guys on the tour were belting out lyrics about their hoes and getting brain.

After a substantial delay, Kanye came to the stage and the reason for the delay was obvious in his elaborate stage set up. It was set up as if he had landed on some planet and during the show he interacted with his female digitized voice rocket. Kanye's energy superseded that of all the previous performers and left Jay-Z's Heat of the City Tour performance in the dust. He was full on sweating and definitely left a part of himself on that stage.

Kanye sang a tribute to his mom and Lupe came back out towards the end to perform a song with him. Then when leaving, the ushers were handing out a book that I browsed through. It's like a self help book that Kanye apparently wrote with some other author in that genre but in honor of his mom. It seemed like it was done in an effort to show his mom that he completed a book and was able to share with his fans the lessons of life that he had learned. Great take away gift.

At the end of the show I realized that the actual glow in the dark effects weren't as prominant as I expected but the meaning of the tour seemed to be for us individually to glow in the dark or be our brightest and overcome in times of hardship, struggle and darkness. Kudos to you Kanye.

Last night was the much anticipated heart of the city tour at the Hollywood Bowl. The hottest ticket around, the opportunity to see hip hop and R&B in a rare venue. In getting the tix and preparing to go I'm thinking it's going to be a more top notch crowd and the vibe would be mostly upscale right? WRONG!

I thought I was at a Lil' Wayne concert featuring Pit bull. The amount of hood fab dudes in white tees was deplorable. How do these dudes even know where the Hollywood Bowl is? Then of course you have all the radio station winners in the front (nice crowd) and a bunch of older white soccer moms with their pre-teen daughters. What? Not only do these moms and kids not have any knowledge of Jay and Mary's importance to the music game, they were dancing off beat. To top it all off, the whole night was thrown off by the Jay-Z wanna-be's who thought they knew every word and performed the actual show themselves in their seats. So that's my take on the crowd. Overall I would give it a 6.

Mary's performance was amazing. Her energy level, fashion, swagger and voice were top notch and she definitely gave LA her all. Overall score for Mary - 9.5 (there's always room for improvement)

Now, let's get to Jay. He waisted our time by bringing Memphis Bleek out (please Jay, you can't always help the hood). Then he wouldn't event perform key hits. He messed around at the DJ booth and gave snippets of songs the crowd obviously wanted to hear but then moved on without performing them at all. His husbandly swagger was on point but he definitely didn't show up in the ways that I have seen him show up and show out for other concerts. Overall score for Jay - 6

I wish they would have performed more together. The set was nice and the venue did an amazing fire work show for the last song which I'm sure won't be happening for many of their shows. So all in all. It was a good night but I know Jay could have done better.

Check out video from them doing a duet on tour