Jingle Ball with a 14 year old daughter
The 14 year old and I went to Jingle Ball at Madison Square Garden last night. Not quite ready for prime time in Manhattan, she was stuck with me. We do both love music.
With eight acts, pyrotechnics, guest celebrity interludes during set changes and 15,000 fans, the majority girls between the ages of ten and sixteen, it was an event. Jordin Sparks, launched by last year's American Idol, gave a spine tingling performance with her exceptional voice and somehow veteran stage presence. Alicia Keys was an unlikely match for much of this crowd, but it turned out that she was drawn as an anchor performer by the charitable beneficiary of the event, an autism research organization. Seemed to me that she was not quite comfortable with her effort at the first to rock out and give the crowd what it wanted, not quite comfortable literally as her platforms made some moves a little awkward, but when she sat down at the piano and went to a few ballads, the performance was somewhere beyond wonderful. Timbaland postured as an untalented arrogant hoodlum impresario. Back Street Boys, now a "men band", provided comic relief as an unintentional parody of what they were if that's possible. 14 year old laughed but sang along with lyrics that she liked when she was seven, as the act was a sort of an oldies set for this crowd. Avril Lavigne seemed an aging rocker in her mid-20's, but had a big act with dancers, solid band, and pink goth style with pink guitar, pink mike, pink steaks in hair, heavy black eye make-up, black gloves, a skull and crossbones on tartan plaid with a heart in one eye as some kind of symbol hanging overhead, you get the picture? She tried some new songs but "Complicated" got the full attention of the crowd and "Skater Boy" brought down the house. The Jonas Brothers, when introduced, were met with such seemingly never-ending intense young girl screams of delirium that my second molar cracked. They are talented, but to me just today's version of the pretty boy band genre, a better version, but 14 year old totally disagrees with this overall assessment of her favorite group. Fall Out Boy was a tight Boston style metal band, a combination of foul mouthed comments and Darfur video clips running above them if that makes sense. Great guitars, lots of talent, if one's inclined to like their style of music, and a little over or under the heads of much of the audience. And then there was the lighter younger Boston metal Boys Like Girls, got the t-shirt, and they've got potential, and a newcomer teen folkie, Colbie Caillat, who, while charmingly gratified to be there, looked every bit the stunned one hit wonder.
Big event. Great time.
With eight acts, pyrotechnics, guest celebrity interludes during set changes and 15,000 fans, the majority girls between the ages of ten and sixteen, it was an event. Jordin Sparks, launched by last year's American Idol, gave a spine tingling performance with her exceptional voice and somehow veteran stage presence. Alicia Keys was an unlikely match for much of this crowd, but it turned out that she was drawn as an anchor performer by the charitable beneficiary of the event, an autism research organization. Seemed to me that she was not quite comfortable with her effort at the first to rock out and give the crowd what it wanted, not quite comfortable literally as her platforms made some moves a little awkward, but when she sat down at the piano and went to a few ballads, the performance was somewhere beyond wonderful. Timbaland postured as an untalented arrogant hoodlum impresario. Back Street Boys, now a "men band", provided comic relief as an unintentional parody of what they were if that's possible. 14 year old laughed but sang along with lyrics that she liked when she was seven, as the act was a sort of an oldies set for this crowd. Avril Lavigne seemed an aging rocker in her mid-20's, but had a big act with dancers, solid band, and pink goth style with pink guitar, pink mike, pink steaks in hair, heavy black eye make-up, black gloves, a skull and crossbones on tartan plaid with a heart in one eye as some kind of symbol hanging overhead, you get the picture? She tried some new songs but "Complicated" got the full attention of the crowd and "Skater Boy" brought down the house. The Jonas Brothers, when introduced, were met with such seemingly never-ending intense young girl screams of delirium that my second molar cracked. They are talented, but to me just today's version of the pretty boy band genre, a better version, but 14 year old totally disagrees with this overall assessment of her favorite group. Fall Out Boy was a tight Boston style metal band, a combination of foul mouthed comments and Darfur video clips running above them if that makes sense. Great guitars, lots of talent, if one's inclined to like their style of music, and a little over or under the heads of much of the audience. And then there was the lighter younger Boston metal Boys Like Girls, got the t-shirt, and they've got potential, and a newcomer teen folkie, Colbie Caillat, who, while charmingly gratified to be there, looked every bit the stunned one hit wonder.
Big event. Great time.
posted by John Borden at 11:07 AM
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