Fashion Rocks (though mostly not)
Thursday night I went to see Fashion Rocks at Radio City Music Hall. While I was overjoyed to see Bowie on stage again, the show as a whole was crap. First off, I was sitting by a bunch of pop fans, especially these two high school girls next to me who didn't know who anyone was and talked through the whole show. They did really like Rob Thomas and Nelly, though. Also, there was no fashion. As someone said after the show, "the biggest fashion statement of the night was a seventeen year old with bare feet." Some of the performances were good, namely Duran Duran (Girls on Film), Shakira, Gwen Stefani, Tim McGraw and Alicia Keyes. Well, and Bowie/Arcade Fire. Billy Idol was a disappointment, and I think should have stopped when he originally stopped. I won't even talk about how much I didn't give a shit about Destiny's Child, Joss Stone (especially her duet of "Stop Dragging My Heart Around" with Rob Thomas,) Thomas solo, Nelly, Pharell, and most of all Diddy. The hosts were lame and the writing was terrible. Why have Mark McGrath and Poppy Montgomery (who?) host this? Why?! And other than Iman and Morgan Freeman, it was disappointing to see all the celebrity introducers they had. Even Jimmy Fallon and Eugene Levy weren't funny. But Bowie...ah Bowie.
First he did an amazing version of "Life on Mars?" with just him and Mike Garson. He wore a too-small suit with these glossy red leather shoes and a wrist brace and had a made-up black eye. This was the only real fashion statement anyone made all night. The performance itself was absolutely stunning, perhaps the best performance of this I've ever heard. Then there were some other artists and I was bored. Then Arcade Fire and Bowie performed "Five Years" and it was wonderful to hear the classic with the new instrumentation brought by AF's various constituants (mainly the violins and cello.) This song was sadly left off the final broadcast (as was the first Billy Idol song, which sucked anyway.) I thought that would be it, but then they did the AF song "Wake Up" with Bowie singing lead. It was the highlight of the night and definitely the song that rocked the most. I feel bad for AF, though. In what I think is their first US network television performance, they didn't even sing their own song--one of the most established artists around does it instead. I hope they get the recognition they deserve from it, though. After that it was pretty much crap.
Those three songs alone would have saved the night in terms of the quality of the show had there not been so many and such long resets between everything that messed up the pace. They took that opportunity to show all of us the same five commercials from the sponsors over and over again. Thanks. After the show I met up with a ton of Bnetters who were all there for the show as well. We went to a bar called Faces and Names on 54th and 7th. It was an ok place. But I had no money 'til I got paid yesterday so I just sat there. I did get to see Sax and Shannon and Mary and Nicole and Kip and Louis and other friends from last year's Bowie world tour. It took me forever to get home from the bar, and when I did, I went right to bed. Quite a long but great night.
First he did an amazing version of "Life on Mars?" with just him and Mike Garson. He wore a too-small suit with these glossy red leather shoes and a wrist brace and had a made-up black eye. This was the only real fashion statement anyone made all night. The performance itself was absolutely stunning, perhaps the best performance of this I've ever heard. Then there were some other artists and I was bored. Then Arcade Fire and Bowie performed "Five Years" and it was wonderful to hear the classic with the new instrumentation brought by AF's various constituants (mainly the violins and cello.) This song was sadly left off the final broadcast (as was the first Billy Idol song, which sucked anyway.) I thought that would be it, but then they did the AF song "Wake Up" with Bowie singing lead. It was the highlight of the night and definitely the song that rocked the most. I feel bad for AF, though. In what I think is their first US network television performance, they didn't even sing their own song--one of the most established artists around does it instead. I hope they get the recognition they deserve from it, though. After that it was pretty much crap.
Those three songs alone would have saved the night in terms of the quality of the show had there not been so many and such long resets between everything that messed up the pace. They took that opportunity to show all of us the same five commercials from the sponsors over and over again. Thanks. After the show I met up with a ton of Bnetters who were all there for the show as well. We went to a bar called Faces and Names on 54th and 7th. It was an ok place. But I had no money 'til I got paid yesterday so I just sat there. I did get to see Sax and Shannon and Mary and Nicole and Kip and Louis and other friends from last year's Bowie world tour. It took me forever to get home from the bar, and when I did, I went right to bed. Quite a long but great night.