Photo Credit: Marco Torres/Houston Press Live at the Houston Rodeo: NRG Stadium
Show Date: March 17, 2015
Opening Act: N/A
There was a lot going against fairly new starlet Ariana Grande going into her 2015 Honeymoon Tour, particularly on its stop at the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo (HLSR) in Texas. On her end, she had some major sprucing to do with her stage presence, choreography and vocal delivery (i.e. diction, emotionality, unique styling). In the television performances I've seen, she frequently appeared to look petrified and/or apathetic, and very "I'm more of a natural singer than a dancer" uncomfortable. This was patently noticeable anytime she did hit single "Bang Bang" live with Jessie J, whose presence and vocals are nothing short of ferocious and supersede hers. On the end of the HLSR, the turning stage is small in circumference and is in the middle of a dirt base in a round stadium. Acts are often driven out to the scaffold. This means no convenience for costume changes or room for elaborate sets. There's a video backdrop, but it doesn't help much because the way things are set up, no matter where you sit (unless it's directly in the middle section), your eyes will rely on the jumbo screens above for decent viewing. The final kicker is that the contracted time allotted is usually an hour, which is pretty aggravating when the cattle show beforehand runs 2 hours, starting at 6:45pm. I know, I know, it's a rodeo and animals/cowboys would naturally would be a focus, but I'd bet my right hand that most of those who purchase tickets have music primarily in mind. All of this into account, I didn't expect much but to enjoy hearing live versions of my favorite songs from Grande's 2 albums, Yours Truly & My Everything. However, the 21-year-old pleasantly surprised me.
Show Date: March 17, 2015
Opening Act: N/A
There was a lot going against fairly new starlet Ariana Grande going into her 2015 Honeymoon Tour, particularly on its stop at the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo (HLSR) in Texas. On her end, she had some major sprucing to do with her stage presence, choreography and vocal delivery (i.e. diction, emotionality, unique styling). In the television performances I've seen, she frequently appeared to look petrified and/or apathetic, and very "I'm more of a natural singer than a dancer" uncomfortable. This was patently noticeable anytime she did hit single "Bang Bang" live with Jessie J, whose presence and vocals are nothing short of ferocious and supersede hers. On the end of the HLSR, the turning stage is small in circumference and is in the middle of a dirt base in a round stadium. Acts are often driven out to the scaffold. This means no convenience for costume changes or room for elaborate sets. There's a video backdrop, but it doesn't help much because the way things are set up, no matter where you sit (unless it's directly in the middle section), your eyes will rely on the jumbo screens above for decent viewing. The final kicker is that the contracted time allotted is usually an hour, which is pretty aggravating when the cattle show beforehand runs 2 hours, starting at 6:45pm. I know, I know, it's a rodeo and animals/cowboys would naturally would be a focus, but I'd bet my right hand that most of those who purchase tickets have music primarily in mind. All of this into account, I didn't expect much but to enjoy hearing live versions of my favorite songs from Grande's 2 albums, Yours Truly & My Everything. However, the 21-year-old pleasantly surprised me.
Photo Credit: Marco Torres/Houston Press Though several moves were repeated, Grande was at an improved ease with dance steps and was animated and bubbly, versus timid. She proved her chops weren't the concoct of studio magic, nailing all of her anticipated notes smoothly. The only time she seemed to be straining or overdoing it was when she was trying to spice up tracked choruses and fill in non-lyric gaps and rap verses with ad-libs. Impromptu ad-libs are an art form (that I swear Whitney Houston invented, though I know she didn't) Grande hasn't mastered yet. The fact there was a need to fill in and spice up brings me to one of the concert's pitfalls. Having an abundance of songs with rap features is the plight of the average commercial artist these days (it's not that I dislike rap; it's just every song doesn't need a rap). When on tour, this creates a problem because something has to go in that space. Over half of Grande's set-list included features; videos were shown of each rapper doing their lines, while Grande bopped around awkwardly waiting for her part to come back around. She could have done interesting sung renditions of the raps or harmonized delicately with them like her inspiration Mariah Carey does...or they could've just been deleted, with awesome instrumentation and dance breakdowns as a replacement (this would help with non-lyric moments too; can we say guitar solo?), but that would require a band. Pitfall #2 and another unfortunate, regular occurrence with today's performers is there was DJ instead of a band and background singers. This was likely the result of a limited budget, but I was teased with a couple of "live" tracks that left me wondering why every song wasn't done that way. DJs playing studio cuts, especially when they don't do any scratching, mixing or swerving tricks and the headliner isn't great at diverting from original vocal arrangements, turns a concert into an album listening party with no free food. Grande's DJ got plenty of spotlight, as she made unnecessary exits from the stage (again, no costume changes, so what was the point?) and struggled to figure out what to do or say during transitions and delays. The DJ was kind of cute, wore a nice suit and was sometimes a MC Hammer of sorts with the dancers, but despite his concerted efforts to be entertaining, he was just annoying. On a miniscule note, he kept calling her "A.G." Not only did it fail to sound cool or have a nice ring, but her fans don't call her that. "Ari" is a lot cuter. Sidebar: speaking of fans, I heard the most raucous during "The Way," "Problem" and "Break Free." I looked around and only saw a handful of people mouthing the words to every song. How was it I knew more of her material than those in her target market and wearing Grande paraphernalia? I hope her audience isn't that superficial overall. Sidebar over.
Apart from needlessly leaving the stage 2-3 times, not using the entire hour (I heard abbreviations of my jams "Lovin' It" and "Be My Baby" for what reason? Where was my other love, "Honeymoon Avenue" on the Honeymoon Tour?), a very anti-climatic opening (she just stepped on the platform and started singing) and stumbling through changeovers, Ariana Grande herself was fine. It was mostly the design of the show that kept it from being the best it could. Sure, there's still some tweaking to be done for Ms. Grande, but I'm confident she'll get there.
Apart from needlessly leaving the stage 2-3 times, not using the entire hour (I heard abbreviations of my jams "Lovin' It" and "Be My Baby" for what reason? Where was my other love, "Honeymoon Avenue" on the Honeymoon Tour?), a very anti-climatic opening (she just stepped on the platform and started singing) and stumbling through changeovers, Ariana Grande herself was fine. It was mostly the design of the show that kept it from being the best it could. Sure, there's still some tweaking to be done for Ms. Grande, but I'm confident she'll get there.
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