Madonna, Madonna OK

How was Madonna? It was OK. for the <$100 I paid for my ticket, I was happy. If I had I paid for the >$100 tickets, then I would’ve been pissed.
I’m not sure how much dancing and “production” one can expect from someone that is >50 years old, I for one was impressed with how fit she was. What I wasn’t impressed with is that she did not start until 9:30pm when the tickets said 7:30pm. Obviously I expected a delayed start, that is only reasonable when you have >50,000 people filing into a stadium. Which is why concerts usually have opening acts. They entertain those front row VIP’s that paid $600.00 for an evening of entertainment. The opening act entertains those fans that got in and are waiting for everyone to finish buying their concert paraphernalia, beer, water, popcorn etc. They keep us going for the 30min – 1 hour that they concert may be delayed. But TWO hours late. Woman I could’ve gone home, showered and most importantly kissed my monkey goodnight. I would not have had to freshen up with some baby wipes in a washroom stall at work (FYI, baby wipes are surprisingly good at freshening one up!).
Once she came on she was as good as could be expected. Any fan knows that Madonna’s not the best singer / dancer but she is a damn good entertainer. I was disappointed with her production and her effort. She barely engaged the crowd, did not have well choreographed dance routines outside of “Vogue” number. There was a lot of jumping around and guitar playing. Yep guitar playing, that annoyed the crap out of me because she ain’t no guitarist. The exception was the hard rock version of Borderline that was wicked! I totally want a bootlegged copy of it.
She took 3 FULL song breaks, as in the dancers were on stage but she was not. Again, she is older so maybe she needed them, I don’t know. When she sang anything before the Ray of Light album, I was totally into it. The more recent stuff was hit or miss for me. I knew some – Music, 4 minutes, Die another Day (she wasn’t on stage for that one) but pretty much nothing from the sticky and sweet album. I definitely was not the only. The crowd went nuts for borderline, material girl, etc but would quiet down for anything that was recent.
Her multimedia effects were very cool and she had a carachi band for La Isla Bonita, You Must Love Me and her new Spanish song. The carachi band was amazing. Overall it was a good show, but not as good as Lenny Kravitz or Pearl Jam for crowd engagement (and obviously those two have amazing music). Janet Jackson’s Janet and Velvet Rope concerts were way better for overall production. Yes I am that old. I will post pics when I get a chance. Now I must go read about epithelial cell development in Drosophila Melanogaster – you know that research that has no public good.