We’re fucked.<\/p>\n
I was standing in the back of the Palladium, all jazzed up, when I realized something.\u00c2\u00a0 Almost this ENTIRE SHOW was on hard drive!<\/p>\n
Let me paint a picture.\u00c2\u00a0 Although we could get a spot in the parking lot no problem, the hall was pretty full.\u00c2\u00a0 People were lining up to pay for balloon hats.\u00c2\u00a0 Maybe that was the first indicator, that this evening was not about music, but having a good time.<\/p>\n
It was an interesting amalgamation of people.\u00c2\u00a0 Gays, straights, thin, fat, not extremely young, but only a handful of baby boomers.\u00c2\u00a0 It was Friday night, and they were out to have a good time.<\/p>\n
Which Mika provided.<\/p>\n
One of the best shows I’ve ever seen, one of the best concerts ever, was David Bowie’s Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders From Mars.\u00c2\u00a0 Employing strobe lights before they became de rigueur, Ziggy entered the stage in his spacesuit, Mick Ronson struck his guitar and we were MESMERIZED!<\/p>\n
Mika’s show began with a presentation.\u00c2\u00a0 The band members, dressed as normal folk, sat on a couch facing a big screen.\u00c2\u00a0 Where a denizen of Mission Control spoke of losing an astronaut. The curtain rose, the "players" took their designated places and lumbering in from the back came a tall thin man in a spacesuit.\u00c2\u00a0 MIKA!<\/p>\n
It was a dramatic entrance.\u00c2\u00a0 He took off his helmet, stripped off his suit, and he was standing there in his underwear!\u00c2\u00a0 A bit of cheekiness goes a long way.\u00c2\u00a0 But rather than start to sing, Mika left the stage as the music played.\u00c2\u00a0 He returned in a sleek white suit.\u00c2\u00a0 The energy was palpable. The audience had their cell phones raised, people were bopping up and down, a good time was being had by all.<\/p>\n
And then, to follow up the opener, Mika played his most famous song, "Big Girl (You Are Beautiful)".\u00c2\u00a0 He brought out corpulent dancers in day-glo outfits.\u00c2\u00a0 It was a celebration.\u00c2\u00a0 But something was curious.\u00c2\u00a0 Mika was singing when he was not.<\/p>\n
Didn’t matter if he held the mic up to his face.\u00c2\u00a0 He was singing anyway!\u00c2\u00a0 The backup vocals, they were pure and pristine!\u00c2\u00a0 The keyboards played even though no one had his hands on any keys.<\/p>\n
Oh, these moments were not always glaring and obvious.\u00c2\u00a0 But when Mika spoke to the audience during "Blame It On The Girls", there was a consistent disco beat that was utterly perfect, done so well, with such power, that I don’t think Kenny Aronoff could have duplicated it live.\u00c2\u00a0 The drummer was hitting stuff, but the cymbal barely moved, and no kick drum sounds like that live.<\/p>\n
It was like listening to a record.<\/p>\n
Mika would move his head away from the mic, but his vocal would remain perfect.\u00c2\u00a0 But when he spoke, there was distortion, a distinct lack of clarity.\u00c2\u00a0 That’s what live sounds like.\u00c2\u00a0 Most of the time tonight, it was Memorex.<\/p>\n
I’ve been to so many shows, and I’ve never heard sound like this.\u00c2\u00a0 So perfect, it doesn’t sound like the record, it IS the record!<\/p>\n
I’m not saying everybody’s mic was turned off, that no one was plugged in.\u00c2\u00a0 But I don’t think Jeff Pevar could get that acoustic guitar sound live.\u00c2\u00a0 And, who are all these Mikas doing the backup vocals if he’s singing the lead?<\/p>\n
They were miming along to the hard drive.\u00c2\u00a0 I never heard a single mistake.\u00c2\u00a0 Even Jeff Beck admits he makes mistakes, hits a clam now and again.\u00c2\u00a0 But not Mika!\u00c2\u00a0 Not Mika’s band!<\/p>\n
The vibe was good.\u00c2\u00a0 Very English.\u00c2\u00a0 Irreverent.\u00c2\u00a0 Fun.<\/p>\n
But how much fun is it going out to hear a record?<\/p>\n
Then again, aren’t these the same people frequenting those clubs, those discos on Hollywood Boulevard where you bump bodies to studio creations?\u00c2\u00a0 They don’t feature live bands.\u00c2\u00a0 The audience doesn’t EXPECT LIVE!<\/p>\n
So I’m not saying everybody at the show tonight should have had a bad time.<\/p>\n
I’m just saying it resembled nothing I’ve ever experienced, nothing that turns me on about live music.<\/p>\n
Live music, when done right, is life itself.\u00c2\u00a0 Messy, with warts.\u00c2\u00a0 You try to get it right, but no one’s life is perfection.\u00c2\u00a0 You battle the mistakes.<\/p>\n
There’s no ideal beauty.\u00c2\u00a0 Even though actresses all plump their lips in pursuit of an elusive ideal. Hell, remake yourself until you lose your identity, like Jennifer Grey or Leeza Gibbons.\u00c2\u00a0 What turns us on are your imperfections!<\/p>\n
But I didn’t hear one imperfection tonight.<\/p>\n
I walked out.<\/p>\n
I just couldn’t take it.<\/p>\n
It would be like taking off all your clothes, getting under the covers and finding a mannequin, or a porno magazine, when you expected a real person there.<\/p>\n
I haven’t left a gig in the middle since 1969.\u00c2\u00a0 And no, Don Henley, it was not in California.\u00c2\u00a0 It was in Boston.\u00c2\u00a0 Some weird iteration of Manfred Mann’s band.\u00c2\u00a0 It was awful.<\/p>\n
Mika wasn’t awful tonight.\u00c2\u00a0 He just wasn’t really there.\u00c2\u00a0 You could see him, but what you paid for, you didn’t get.\u00c2\u00a0 Live music.<\/p>\n
YouTube is riddled with clips of Britney dancing, not moving her lips while perfect singing is playing through the speakers.\u00c2\u00a0 Janet Jackson and Madonna do the same thing.<\/p>\n
They’re selling show.\u00c2\u00a0 They’re selling a good time.<\/p>\n
But I got into it for the music.<\/p>\n
I really like Mika’s records.\u00c2\u00a0 Did I expect the live show to sound just like them?<\/p>\n
NO!<\/p>\n
That would be like expecting "Live At Leeds" to sound like "Tommy".<\/p>\n
Live is its own unique thing.<\/p>\n
But tonight wasn’t unique.\u00c2\u00a0 It was just like every other night, just like the recording.\u00c2\u00a0 It WAS the recording!<\/p>\n
So, first we’ve got CDs.\u00c2\u00a0 Which sound so bad, they kill acoustic music, warm music, almost overnight.\u00c2\u00a0 Hell, bass-laden hip-hop is one of the few genres that even SOUNDS GOOD on a CD.<\/p>\n
Then we’ve got Milli Vanilli.<\/p>\n
And then, after everybody complains, we’ve got live music for a minute on the VMAs, and then live music on television disappears.<\/p>\n
You lip-synch the National Anthem.\u00c2\u00a0 You don’t risk at the Super Bowl.<\/p>\n
You’ve got to get it right.\u00c2\u00a0 So people will be impressed.\u00c2\u00a0 So they’ll overpay to see you in concert.<\/p>\n
I saw better playing in Nashville in a bar than you see at most major shows.\u00c2\u00a0 I felt it.\u00c2\u00a0 Music isn’t dead, but the business is trying to kill it.\u00c2\u00a0 You might think Ashlee Simpson doing a hoedown when the tape breaks on SNL is long in the past, but that mainstream game is not completely dead, unlike Ms. Simpson’s career.<\/p>\n
Having tweeted what I said above from the Mika show before I left, Perez Hilton responded on Twitter thusly:<\/p>\n
\n@Lefsetz You sure know a lot about bullshit – you’re full of it! Mika is amazing!!!! A true talent! Look at this audience – they are LOVING!<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\nI guess that’s why Perez’s tour failed.\u00c2\u00a0 He thought it was about the trappings, about everything but the music.<\/p>\n
I don’t know what brought these people to the Palladium tonight.\u00c2\u00a0 But I do know the future of the music business is authenticity.\u00c2\u00a0 About being able to play.\u00c2\u00a0 About being honest.\u00c2\u00a0 And forthright.<\/p>\n
Entertainment is one thing.\u00c2\u00a0 Hell, is’t that what reality TV is, entertainment?<\/p>\n
But music, when done right, is not evanescent.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s the foremost, most formidable medium.\u00c2\u00a0 It touches you like nothing other than another human being.<\/p>\n
As that old seer said, we’ve got to get back to the garden.<\/p>\n
Honestly, there are a ton of people who already have.\u00c2\u00a0 They’ve given up on this faux show.\u00c2\u00a0 If it’s not real, they’re not interested.\u00c2\u00a0 And radio and SoundScan mean less than ever before.\u00c2\u00a0 They’re not truly mainstream, they’re the sideshow.<\/p>\n
Whoa.<\/p>\n
I genuinely like Mika’s music.\u00c2\u00a0 But, after tonight, I’m no longer a fan.<\/p>\n
Stars might be interesting, but we revere true talent.\u00c2\u00a0 In the music game that always meant you could sing and play.\u00c2\u00a0 If you’re faking it on stage, why in hell should we believe?<\/p>\n
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We’re fucked. I was standing in the back of the Palladium, all jazzed up, when I realized something.\u00c2\u00a0 Almost this ENTIRE SHOW was on hard drive! Let me paint a picture.\u00c2\u00a0 Although we could get a spot in the parking lot no problem, the hall was pretty full.\u00c2\u00a0 People were lining up to pay for […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2349","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-live-shows"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p96vPs-BT","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2349","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2349"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2349\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2350,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2349\/revisions\/2350"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2349"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2349"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2349"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}