Paolo Nutini at House of Blues, San Diego
Surprisingly enough I often have problems coming up with what to review each week or so. Sometimes it is because I am mainly playing a game I have already commented on in the past or reading book 6 in a series of 10 and reviewing it might be a little difficult. Today's post comes from one of those weeks where I have things I could write about but nothing "feels" important enough to share. Except that this week the family and I have been "watching" (read playing and skipping forward 2 -3 minutes to get through the parts we don't care about) the iTunes Festival that ran in London at the Roundhouse for the month of September. The festival, which has run for several years, is hosted by Apple and has different artists performing every night for the month of September (there is also a second iTunes Festival that ran earlier in the year in Austin, TX as well this year). Tickets to the show are free to those who can get one to be there for a show live.
This year's list of performers is a broad spectrum of musical genres and generations with everything from electronic/club music to classical and rock and pop and alternative in between. Seriously, we're talking Placido Domingo, Tony Bennett mixed in with Maroon 5, Robert Plant, Lenny Kravitz, Jessie J and Deadmau5, David Guetta and 5 Seconds of Summer not to mention Pharrell Williams, Mary J. Blige and a whole hoard of newer acts opening each night. Great thing for you is that for the month and a little time afterward you can watch any of the shows for free through iTunes or on an Apple TV.
For the last few years, we have cherry picked the few acts that we cared about and fast forwarded through the usually 60 - 90 minute shows to get to the songs we really were interested in seeing. The best parts are often when the bands are interacting with the audience rather than the performances. This year we gave a listen to a few of the acts and I am summarizing them here:
David Guetta and Calvin Harris - I am not much into the club DJ type music, can take it or leave it. However, both of these guys have songs that I do like (Titanium and Summer, respectively). Those were the songs that I was looking for when watching and both were there, of course. In between you have pounding base and strobing light shows. Being at the performances of either would probably be like going to a giant night club, which if that is your thing you would probably have really liked it.
Lenny Kravitz - Lenny has a great catalogue of excellent rock songs and he was belting them out. It was surprising to find out that this was the first gig that he had played with the latest configuration of his backup band because they sounded really good and worked well together. Certainly worth giving a listen to and he definitely made a couple songs into massive jam sessions that are fun (but easier to handle when you can move things along a bit with the clicker).
Blondie - Debbie Harry and the band were fantastic. Hard to believe that she is 69 years old when she is out there playing hit after hit. Almost every other song I turned to my wife and said, hey I forgot Blondie sang that one. For several songs, even after all these years, her vocals were almost identical to how I remember them on the radio. Worth checking out.
Paolo Nutini - The girls in our house have been fans of Paolo for a couple years now and they like a couple songs on his latest album as well. We had actually bought tickets to see him live at the House of Blues in San Diego in September, which happened to be a week or so after he performed at the iTunes Festival. Paolo puts on a soul/blues-vibe infused concert, which we watched live in San Diego and then went back to see if the iTunes performance was the same. Other than the sound and power of the performance being much better live than through the TV, Paolo ran through the same set list for both shows. If you can't get to a live show yourself, the iTunes Festival replay isn't a bad way to go.
Paolo Nutini
All-in-all, being able to see interesting shows from the comfortable confines of my living room without having to go to a festival and mosh around with 100s of people all lifting their phones to take pictures/video is pretty nice. You give up a bit in the audio quality, but maybe that would be better if you watch it on your computer with headphones. Hey and you can even move past the songs you don't care about and try out some bands you may otherwise have never had a chance to hear about. For free, you can't beat that. iTunes Festival gets 4 Mick Happies.
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