I am a fifty-something lurker who has delurked to give a recap of musings on the Milwaukee concert. At first, I was hesitant to do so even though I have read and enjoyed the other concert recaps, but then I read a recap on another site that said that Adam got the biggest cheers of the night. Since that concert-goer was either blinded by fan-love or at a different concert, I decided to write this up. In Milwaukee, Gokeyville, Danny Gokey was Prom King. As for who was first runner-up, I really couldn’t say, except that Adam, Kris and Matt all got a whole lot of love.
I have watched AI since the second season and that is the season I remember the most, probably because it was my first. What I remember about it is was how Kim, Reuben and Clay all seemed to like each other. I remember that Frenchie and Kim sang a duet during Hollywood Week because none of the other girls would sing with them and that Frenchie’s disqualification seemed unfair because she probably had the best voice of the season. I think I voted for Clay once. The other seasons blend together. I even forgot how much I liked David Cook until I heard him on the GMA concert.
I have had a steady Tuesday evening engagement for the last few years so I got in the habit of recording Idol to watch later. We got a DVR this year and I am one of those who scrambled on YouTube to find Adam’s Mad World. After that I missed more of my Tuesday evening appointments than I should have. I was glad once the season was over so I could resume my normal life, but I haven’t. I have spent way too much time on the Internet reading about things Idol. I decided that I wanted to see a concert so, being naà ¯ve, I spent way too much on a ticket for the Chicago/Rosemont concert. While my seat would be great in a theater it probably is going to be pretty stinky in a stadium. Reading the recaps and all the comments here, I decided to go to a second show. That way it wouldn’t matter if my favorite’s set was over too quickly, I would experience it again. I looked at the ticket brokers MJ links to and finally, last minute and after much trepidation–I mean how can a normal-seeming woman tell her family that she wants to go to two American Idol shows? They thought going to one was a little too cute–I bought the perfect seat through Ticket Liquidator. I was a little worried about getting the ticket on time, but that worked out.
I arrived in Milwaukee from Northern Illinois at 3ish. Mrs. B. was right, the Idols started to come out around 2:30. So I missed Megan, Matt and Allison. According to the mother of two teen-aged Adam fans standing next to me at the barricades, Allison was very, very nice to the girls. I did see Anoop, Scott and Michael. I waited until 5:15 in the hopes that Kris or Danny (he had come out with the earlier group for just a second and had promised to come back) would come out. If they came out after 5:15, I missed them. I knew better than to expect Adam or Lil.
Now my observations on the concert. These are my impressions of the Milwaukee concert. I know there are some very dedicated fans on this site, but remember I am just reporting on what I experienced at the Milwaukee concert. Your experiences at another concert (or even the Milwaukee concert) might have been very different from mine.
First: it was Danny Gokeyville. I was seated in the third row on the Adam side surrounded by Gokey family. Danny’s grandmother, very sweet, sat exactly two rows in front of me.
To me Michael Sarver is like Corey the Idol Clown, even if I have never seen Corey the Idol Clown. He gets up there, warms up the audience and knows that almost nobody is out there for him. He made sure the audience knew that he knew Danny was Prom King. Since he has made the most effort to connect to the fans, he has started to get some love back. Someone in a pod seat tossed an orange boa onstage and he wore it.
Michael, Megan and Scott. Liked one of their songs (second, first, second); didn’t like the other one. Did not like Lil’s set at all. Megan, Lil and Scott don’t seem to understand that a performance is a conversation between performer and audience. They each had their planned routine and stuck to it. Megan is very pretty. Scott is not funny. And while I can’t remember if everybody mentioned Danny or not, I know for sure Lil didn’t.
Anoop is nice to look at, has a silky smooth voice and had plenty of fans in the audience, but something was missing in his set. I found his hand motions theatrical in the sense Kara meant: pretending to act like you think the character you are portraying would act (my words). In contrast Matt was wonderful; he has whatever it is that Anoop is missing: stage presence, charisma, enthusiasm, obvious love of performing? He is theatrical in the good sense: dramatic, entertaining. He knows it’s a conversation and he invites us in. He mentioned his hometown concert and how much it meant to him as a way to talk about Danny. Matt was the star of the first part of the show.
I liked the closing number and didn’t think Lil and Megan’s duet was as bad as other people thought.
Second half.
Okay, here it goes. Allison has a strong, marvelous voice, but, maybe because she is young and immature or maybe because she is lazy and has bad habits, her set was sloppy. As others have said, she only sang part of So What. There was a section where she just stood and let the back-up singers take the lead. I thought maybe that was the way Pink did it and went to YouTube to watch Pink in concert and Pink sings the whole song. It wouldn’t have been so odd if Allison had gone over to the back-up singers and played with them like she does with Tim Stewart, but she just stood on her mark and waited for the chorus so she could join in. Then while both Barracuda and Cry Baby had wonderful moments, there was too much ‘mush mouth’ (when I couldn’t understand a word) in them for me. She did interact with the audience and got loud cheers when she mentioned, Danny, Adam and Kris. But she had a very weird moment during Slow Ride when she turned away from Adam to play with Aaron Spears inside his plexi-glass cage. I thought that was a bit self-indulgent. The dance is between Adam and her and there is no room for another partner no matter how much she might wish for it.
I can understand why people think Danny will have a hard time finding an audience. He doesn’t know how to present a song. His was the only set I felt the presence of Bandzilla. I liked the first two songs. The Rascal Flatts songs sounded the same to me and I zoned out. And I don’t think he can do country. He might have a message, but I didn’t feel it. He did go on a long time with his speech, but I felt it was appropriate since these were his people and he was thanking them for their support. They loved him.
Adam, like Matt, really gets the relationship between audience and artist. Milwaukee was a sitting audience. As far as I could tell, they only stood for Danny and for Whole Lot of Love. Floor seats, however, stood for most of the concert. Adam thanked the audience for voting, even if they voted for Danny. I thought that was a pretty funny joke. Whole Lotta Love was wonderful. Yeah for ‘woman’! ‘Slow Ride was fun. Helium voice was on for at least parts of the other three numbers, which almost ruined them for me. If I hadn’t heard him sing Mad World without helium voice live at the Today Show and been warned about chipmunk voice by the posters here, I would have horrified. The people sitting around me seemed to think it was evidence of how amazing his voice is. It might be part of the reason why some posters have called his voice feminine. No glory notes, but I half-expected that since it was the first of three concerts. No objects thrown on stage. Somebody besides Michael got something thrown earlier in the concert, but it was thrown behind them and the performer, I forgot who, didn’t notice.
Maybe Adam toned down his performance for family-friendly Gokeyville (I’ll find out at the Chicago concert), but the transition to Kris was fine. Like Adam, Kris got lots of screams. The Gokeys in front of me sat down after WLL. So I sat after Heartless. It is to hard stand for three hours. But I was bopping, dancing in my seat to the ATTTID. I swear Kris looked over at me–since the Gokeys in front of me were seated, he had a clear view of me. I had to really bop and sway to the music to show that while my feet might be sore, I liked him. A note, the people in front of me talked during Adam’s set. I shushed them, but then decided if I made a stink of it, I’d miss the set. So I ignored them. The people behind me talked during Kris’ set. Since they were behind me, I just ignored them. Lights, glow sticks all over the place. Very few people left during Kris’ set. Some may have left during DBS.
The problem with Kris’ set is that same lack of interaction I noticed with Megan, Scott and Lil. His comments to us came when it was either dark or when he was behind the piano. His voice, song artistry are all lovely, but it feels more like we passed his bedroom door on the way to the kitchen and paused to listen than like we were at a concert. This is not the difference between a ‘performer’ like Adam and a ‘sing/songwriter’ like Kris. This is the difference between someone who sings and someone who puts on a show. For example, I have been to Indigo Girls concerts (my husband loves them), in open air parks like Ravinia and Wolf Trap, arenas like GW University stadium, concert halls. It’s just the two women, their guitars and one or two back-up singers/instrumentalists. It is a quiet concert. They sing; we respond. There is a connection. The only time, I felt that with Kris was during ‘Hey Jude’ and DSB. I think he is more comfortable when the other performers are on stage with him. And it was interesting to me that it was during DSB–at the end of the concert–when he jumped all over Danny and made it very clear that this was Danny’s special show.
In conclusion, I really liked the show and am glad I went. Now I am looking forward to the Rosemont/Chicago concert.
