Member Since: 8/7/2010
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NJ - Beyoncé spellbinding at Revel
Well, I'm speechless. Lucky for me, I don't have to talk -- all I need to do is type a little about Beyoncé's spellbinding concert at Revel. The pop star held the stage at Ovation Hall for over two hours, barely taking breaks for costume changes. Beyoncé danced her body down to the ground, led singalongs, got up on top of a piano and testified, and led an eleven-woman band through an inspired set of chart-toppers, album sides, and shrewdly selected cover songs. She sang Whitney Houston's "I Will Always Love You," she sang Lauryn Hill's "Ex Factor," she even sang "Iris" by the Goo Goo Dolls. Although she'd been away from the stage for a year and she conceded she was nervous about the Revel performances, her confidence never wavered. The light show was as hypnotic as Laser Floyd, the costumes glittered like mirror balls, and the bass at Ovation Hall was so booming that I often felt like I was standing in a stiff wind. That's not an exaggeration: Ovation Hall possesses some potent subwoofers. I'm not sure I was ready for that jelly.
Because Beyoncé Knowles is a pop star, and not, I guess, an old man with an electric guitar, there's a tendency among fans of the rock (and even sometimes among fans of hip-hop) to treat her music as something less than consequential. That is a mistake. "4," Beyoncé's most recent album, takes a good hard look at fidelity and comes away with conclusions about romance that are anything but pat. Passion, pride, commitment, the dance of human relationships, attraction and the slow fade of love, jealousy, resentment, revenge, reconciliation: all of this is what Beyoncé fashions into entertainment.
Seduction, Beyonce told the audience, was not just about being bootylicious, although that certainly helps. Generosity, intelligence, mystery, and exclusivity were also required. The concert, which ran past midnight, was certainly generous; Beyoncé skimped on neither the floor-burners ("Single Ladies," "Countdown," "Crazy in Love") or the power ballads ("1+1," "Halo," "I Care"). Intelligence is never a problem for Beyoncé. Everything onstage was perfectly choreographed, right down to the goofy mid-song mugging that adds so much character to her performances. Exclusivity was handled by Revel Resorts. Ovation Hall only seats 5,500. Tickets to these shows have been hard to get -- although Michelle Obama, who received a warm welcome from the crowd when she was spotted in the balcony, might have been able to pull a few strings.
Mystery, on the other hand, is not really what Beyoncé does. She is utterly committed to clarity. Her voice is a fine-line red-tipped magic marker. She can be melismatic at times, but she never throws away a line. Like her husband, she makes sure you catch everything she has to say. While she wears her hip-hop influence proudly, her commitment to full-song storytelling owes just as much to Broadway theater and '70s pop and soul balladeers. Her version of Curtis Mayfield's "Resentment" was a full-scale psychological portrait in three and a half minutes. She brought it to life, as she does with all of her material, by being present to every word and note she sings. No other pop star sounds quite as awake as Beyoncé does.
I'll have more on this terrific concert in the newspaper and online over the next few days.
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Forever slaying.
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