dragojustine: (Glam)
dragojustine ([personal profile] dragojustine) wrote2010-07-22 02:38 pm

ADAM FUCKING LAMBERT

Many many many awesome fangirls ([personal profile] sherrold! [personal profile] seperis! [personal profile] boggit!), two drinks, three hours standing and waiting, many ridiculous pairs of shoes and truly awesome costumes, one tube of body glitter, and an absolutely unquantifiable amount of squee later, I am finally almost coming down from my Adam high. (Honestly, I've barely had time to breathe since Tuesday- meeting with Grandparents and working and selling the car and how did I get so busy anyway? But I've floated through all of it on a little cloud of "OMG THAT ACTUALLY HAPPENED!")

Anyway! This is not a full concert report.

-No Orianthi, which is fine- longer set than Allison would have done otherwise, which is great. But, seriously, I get that your opener routine is now disrupted, but do NOT leave us standing there for 45 minutes (this is not an exaggeration- I timed it) between the end of your opener and when you actually show your face on stage, okay?

-But Allison! OMG I so did not expect to love her so much. Girl still doesn't articulate, and her sound mix was lousy, and she needs better songwriters, but OMG SO AWESOME. Rock on, Allison. I hope she can pull her career out of the total stall, because I am right now reshuffling my budget to try to justify buying her whole album.

-On a somewhat related note, Allison is so hot I feel a little creepy. I did not see that coming at all- on AI she was firmly in "adorable" camp. But she's hot, and her drummer is really hot, and her guitarist is- okay, actually, Dave ends up more in "doofily endearing" than hot. But Allison? Way hotter than expected. About 10% of Adam's stage presence, obviously, compounded by only having about 5% of the production and staging awesomeness backing her up, but she's got this strut that really works for her and a throaty voice that hits me right in the sweet spot.

-Pretty Tommy is, in fact, actually that pretty. I had begun to suspect he was some kind of internet hoax. So sad he's left the tour, so happy I got to see him before that happened, so many best wishes.

-It turns out that LP also rocks pretty hard, in an understated, spotlight-never-on-him sort of way. They don't draw attention to it, but holy GOD that man is impressive. Wow.

-Okay, now insert about five thousand words of MASSIVE SQUEE AND FLAIL over THE VOICE THE VOICE OMG HOLY SHIT THAT VOICE. Seriously. It's... unbelievable. There's just no way a human being can open his mouth and have THAT SOUND come out. It's clear and beautiful and rangy and supple and expressive and SO INCREDIBLY POWERFUL all at once. It's overwhelming, live. The power of it just doesn't come across in recordings, and sure the sheer volume at a concert helps, but there's a difference between volume and POWER, and holy shit.

-Soaked and Aftermath significantly re-arranged from album: liked immensely. Whattaya Want From Me somewhat sped up: not a fan, but okay. Mad World sped up: it really loses what made it special. Whole Lotta Love: OH MY GOD OH MY GOD OH MY GOD

-It's no secret that I like the rock end of the spectrum more than the dance pop end, so let me just say that Music Again MADE MY NIGHT. Oh my lord.

-Who the fuck is the guy in the picture for Sleepwalker?

-I didn't like Voodoo much before. With the dancers, though? And the staging and lighting? Oh my GOD it was MAGICAL and transporting and I GET IT NOW.

-C had a similar revelation with Ring of Fire, which she hated to the extent of not letting me play it around her ever, but she admitted after that it was so hot live. Which, yes.

-Adam both enjoys and is very good at working a crowd. He's gotten comfier moving and dancing, obviously, and obviously knows exactly what we like and what we'll respond to. Not just being all touchy with Tommy and doing eye-popping hip things, though he obviously does that to work the crowd- other things, too. He milks "baby you're beautiful / and there's nothing wrong with you" and "thanks for loving me / because you're doing it perfectly" for absolute maximum fan hysterics. It's obviously a lyrical snippet that feels personal and emotional to him, and he's very willing to openly sing it to the fans, and that's wonderful. Plus, he worked the hell out of us at the end of Soaked. I mean, he made us BEG for that last line. Not to mention making us basically beg and plead and work for the encore- Oh, Adam.

-Liked the dancers more than I thought I would. I mean, sure, I like band interaction better, and sometimes the stage gets a little busy and crowded, and I really would rather spend more time looking at him (or Tommy), but they MADE Voodoo, and... look, Adam wants backup dancers. He wants them like he wants fog machines and lasers and projected images and big staircases and glitter and leather and four costume changes and a pimp cane and pretty Tommy rubbing all over him and a big scarlet letter on his top hat, you know? He wants crazy over the top spectacle with lasers and backup dancers, and by god, the man should have what he wants, so yes, I like the dancers.

-Adam has a very distinctive innuendo face. He says something with a complete straight face, and then a split second later he just cracks, with this "Did you hear me just say that? I can't believe I just said that!" expression. In this case, it was mimicking Tommy moving his left hand on the bass, and going "I like when he slides it like that..." and then... Innuendo face! Completely and totally adorable. Oh, Adam.

-I also completely adore how bad he is at between-song patter. I mean, I'm sure he'll get better, but mostly his patter consists of "So this next song is about..." and it's so bad it's just funny, you know? Like, when the music and the lasers and the choreography are going he just OWNS the stage, but "now stand around and chat for a minute" leaves him a little uncertain, without the security of all those props, and he resorts to the worst kind of cliche. And he's so incredibly earnest with his messaging. It's just beyond cute.

-I knew the guy was 6 foot 1, but... okay, in my family, that does not actually qualify as very tall. Certainly not enough, by itself, to make me think "big guy!" But Adam is huge. Between hair and boots and broad shoulders and the fact that he has great posture on stage and INCREDIBLE outward-directed presence and charisma up there, he projects well bigger than he actually is, and just gives his overwhelming impression of hugeness. Larger-than-life-ness. It's really quite startling in person, and doesn't come across at all in recordings.

-I... could babble forever but am out of time except OH MY GOD I NEED TO SEE HIM AGAIN. That was the most amazing thing I've seen in ages and ages and OH MY GOD ADAM. It's just... how is he EVEN REAL?
sothcweden: birds flying high at sunset/dawn (Default)

[personal profile] sothcweden 2010-07-23 12:45 am (UTC)(link)
Thanks so much for sharing your squee! That's the only thing that was missing from my AL concert experience: someone who is as enthusiastic as I am; now I kinda feel like I got that from reading your post. Nobody I know in RL likes his stuff, at least not enough to go to a concert. So, I went by myself, dammit. Twice. I was NOT missing this; my budget will just be a little tight for the next two months.

And so much word to what you said about the between-song chat. Adam trying to talk onstage was just so adorably awkward. But when he's singing....just about blew me away! Squee, flail, vapors, oh my!

I know I'm going on and on, but I was thinking about Adam's Innuendo Face TM. I think that's right in line with something [livejournal.com profile] no_detective put in a meta post: I can't describe Adam's erotically charged performances as shameless or guilt-free, because he performs as if shame and guilt are not even on the radar, like they don't exist as concepts....It just IS, in the most free-love, flower power, liberated/liberating, sensual, INNOCENT (yes, that's the perfect word for it) way possible. More than anything, despite the sensuality of his performance, to my eyes the concert is mostly about expressing a childlike joy with no reservations. And the Innuendo Face goes right along with that in my mind, because the persona Adam's inhabiting at the beginning(sexy/mysterious) only goes so far before the guy who's life has turned inside out over the last two years comes peeking out to share his excitement at all of this. (And that he gets to say things like that live on stage!) And that joy is what I got from the show, and why I shamelessly fangirl him.

Glad you had a great time, and I'm now eagerly awaiting whatever he comes up with next...
bluemeridian: Blue sky with fluffy white clouds through a break in the tree tops (Default)

[personal profile] bluemeridian 2010-07-23 03:32 am (UTC)(link)
!!!! *insert totally inarticulate fangirling squee-flail by proxy here*
boggit: (adam plaid happy)

[personal profile] boggit 2010-07-23 06:18 am (UTC)(link)
YES. What you said, in large part.

I have to add to the OMG TALL thing: OMG THIGHS.

I totally need to write up something like this--when I stop being in the damn car all the time!!!
boggit: (adam lambert is beautiful)

[personal profile] boggit 2010-07-24 12:37 am (UTC)(link)
Truly, there was too much hot to handle.