My very first pop concert...

Well... I guess this wasn't my first pop concert; I saw George Lam at the Hong Kong Coliseum several years ago but that wasn't a "traditional" pop star's concert. I loved seeing George live, don't get me wrong, but he didn't have back up dancers, rotating stages, wardrobe changes and everything else I think of when I imagine a pop concert. I've seen all the TV concert specials (New Kids on the Block, Taylor Swift, Justin Timberlake, Beyoncė, etc) and I've always wanted to be there. Being right in the thick of it seems like it'd be an amazing spectacle.

This is the best picture I could find from the George Lam concert. It was in 2011 and phone cameras weren't that great.

Last year, Justin Timberlake's Man of the Woods tour announced that they were making a stop in Oklahoma City and there it was-- my golden opportunity! I've loved Mr. Timberlake ever since N'SYNC (speaking of N'SYNC, which one of them is the Rabbit on The Masked Singer TV show???) and Man of the Woods is one of my favorite albums by him. I purchased our tickets in March of 2018 and actually forgot all about the concert until I got an email reminder from TicketMaster. Saturday January 26th finally rolled around and the show did not disappoint. Totally worth the wait! I read an article stating that the concept of the show was to "bring the outside in," and boy did they! 😍 The stage was ah-mazing!!! I enjoyed the stage/props and lighting displays more than the actual concert... Justin Timberlake put on one hell of a show but it could have been anyone singing on that stage and I would have still loved it because the production was just that good. LOL

Let me try to describe it for you: the large main stage (where the band was set up) was situated toward the back of the arena and it lead out onto a winding catwalk lined with faux trees. The show was at the Chesapeake Arena, which is round, and Justin's creative team made sure that everyone sitting anywhere could get a good view of the performance. The winding stage ended at a round mini-stage that had grass that sprouted out from underneath the stage. All along the catwalk were trap doors that produced back up dancers and microphone stands. There was also a small campfire scene, some ramps, and a large projector that showed outdoorsy backgrounds on screens that hung from the ceiling. And LASERS!!! So many lasers!!!! I've decided that my favorite part of any concert is the laser light show. I've also decided that if reincarnation is indeed real, I am going to study theater and production in my next life (assuming I come back as a humanoid) so I can work on the artistic team of a large production because my favorite part of any concert, Broadway musical and movie is always the set design. Well, that and costumes.

The concert supposedly started at 7:30pm but we had to sit through two hours of DJ Freestyle Steve before Justin Timberlake came out. DJ Freesyle Steve was supposed to hype up the crowd and he sort of did--but I found him mostly to be annoying. He kept repeating the same things over and over... it was "OKC are we ready to party?", "Gurl I see you!", and "Where my die-hard JT fans at?" on a constant loop. We also saw Francisco Yeats. He is a Canadian singer and a pretty famous song writer (I had never heard of him so I Googled him as he performed his set). He sang a bunch of cover songs, but after discovering that he's a pretty prolific songwriter, they're probably songs he co-wrote, so not actual covers. He did a lot of Prince- and James Brown-inspired dancing (although I thought he looked more like Jimmy Fallon doing his silly dances) and he put on a Thunder jersey with Westbrook's number. That got the crowd to like him! Smart kid. And after all that, the stage cleared and we still had to wait another 45-minutes for the real show to begin. I thought it was a little weird because the opening acts wasted all their time pumping up the crowd just to have it pewter out during the long wait. By the time Justin Timberlake came out, everyone was playing games on their phone, scrolling through social media or just milling about the hallways. 

I remember really really enjoying the concert but I don't remember anything specific... except for that awesome stage. Justin Timberlake performed songs from each of his solo albums and I liked Mirrors (the projection screen showed a kaleidoscope of several Justin Timberlakes) and Morning Light (the stage turned into a campfire scene) the best. His Man of the Woods logo and surrounding lasers was absolutely mesmerizing. The choreography and back up dancers were also super entertaining (every time I see a concert or music video I always look to see if I can recognize any former So You Think You Can Dance contestants; I did not see any this time). Justin Timberlake wore his Russell Westbrook designed Nikės and at one point, incorporated "Boomer Sooner" into his lyrics. Oh and at the beginning of the show, the large projector showed a video of The Tennessee Kids singing Thank God I'm a Country Boy (John Denver). I already knew I would enjoy the concert, but surprisingly, Wes did, too. He even said he liked Francisco Yeats! LOL So that was the first concert of 2019. We'll be seeing LP in March and possibly Ozzy Osborne in June.  Get ready for more travel blogs! (And less craft show blogs.. we'll talk about that later...)