Ok, here it goes.
First, I have to admit that I was an Adam Lambert Live virgin until today. I have seen nearly every video and recording in the last 5+ years, but as anyone who has been to a live event with AFL will tell you, you are UNPREPARED and you have no idea what the Real Thing is.
I have to say that WWTLF alone was worth the price of admission. I have heard every recording of Adam with Queen singing it, and the live version was something else entirely. In was more than 3D. It bent space and time (possibly giving those '39 chaps a chance to get back home ON TIME!). This might also explain why Adam has trouble with time - his gravitas and voice are affecting the space-time continuum.
Let me start from the beginning. Having a mild case of AFL addiction (my wife thinks I got too much water in my brain, I've got no common sense etc. etc), I knew about "The Adam Clock Paradox" and knew 8 pm was NOT gonna happen. I went to a sushi restaurant at 6:45 and we came out at 7:30, waited for the bus, went in (the line was already gone), bought some water and churros and exactly at 8pm we got to our seats. I told my wife we probably have another half an hour of waiting, so we set up our Etymotic plugs (whoever suggested them a few months ago, lots of thanks, they worked great and were a great investment), prepared our awesome theater binoculars and relaxed. The guy who sold me the binoculars in a telescopes shop - another connection to astronomy and astrophysics - told me: "Nikon made this little one simply because... they can". It makes things appear hyper-real, my wife said "when Adam looked our way, it felt like he was looking at me due to the extreme magnification".
As mentioned previously, I had a very short chat with the mother of "Freddie" sitting next to me. I took very few pictures and recorded no videos because I wanted to experience my first live Adam concert without any distractions. My wife took some though. Have not checked them out, but she is quite petite and there were too many tall people in front of her, so I don't expect much on that front.
Then the concert started. In my daily life, I have a VERY strong sense of time. I am the Anti-Adam that way. I can look at my watch at 9 am and tell you it is 10:30 an hour and a half later without checking again. But tonight, I did not look at my watch so I cannot tell you when the concert started, and I got lost in the above mentioned space-time disturbance for a few hours. The next exact time I am aware of was 22:55pm, waiting for a bus after the concert. Time lost its meaning during the period between the dimming of the lights and the playing of God Save The Queen...
My first impression of the audience though was they were very reserved in the first minutes. Of course, wearing the plugs for the first time, it is possible that they just filtered some of the energy that was actually there. For a while, I had the feeling that Adam wasn't feeling the energy flow either. He did not do the low-down-side-to-side move in SCC as intensely as usual, and he skipped the call-and-reply part in OOBTD which I think was a good idea, as it is a bit early to engage the audience during the third song. So it might have been planned in advance. But it could have been very well him feeling they were not ready yet.
Thankfully, the energy level appeared to rise as the show progressed, and as usual by the time of KQ and esp. STL, everybody was totally into it. I think STL was also much better live than on any recording I have heard to date. It is probably just the live effect - nearly everything sounded better.
The audience loved the Brian and Roger part of the show very much, of course. Brian's solo is wonderful, and no video recording technology can capture the beauty of the laser show, or the live sound of his instrument. Under Pressure worked great too.
For the few weeks since I first heard Love Kills, I had the feeling it was becoming my favorite "Queen" song with Adam, and it was really great as usual, but as I mentioned in the beginning, WWTLF came along and kicked it from the throne again. It was a nearly out-of-body experience, and the hairs on my arms stood up at the end of it. Then we all stood up too and applauded the Best Thing I Have Ever Heard in my freaking life!
After TYMD, Adam went to the VIP section and asked a nice Asian lady to sing with him. She sang pretty great and people loved it. It looked like Adam intended to continue this with the whole audience, but the band switched gears to the next song and I felt he looked a bit disappointed... I was ready to participate, so I was a little disappointed too.
Radio Gaga clapping got everybody up and doing what they should. I could not keep an eye at the whole arena, but it felt like the majority were following the correct routine
CLTCL was very similar to Calgary, including all three (Spike, Adam and Brian) banging on the keys. Plus the fantastic lower register Elvis-like passages. I had heard the advances Adam had made in his lower register - starting at the iHeart Radio Festival and the latest live recordings - but was still blown away by how good he actually sounds live when he goes really low. I guess the recording tech is once again not up to capturing it all.
During the slower middle section, I had pulled out the Etymotics a bit to listen to the unfiltered awesomeness, but when TSMGO came, I was suddenly on the "chipmunk" train and had to plug them back in to get the right sound. That being said, the last line of the song Adam went from a very low note to the highest note for an amazing result I have not heard in another show yet. Can't wait to find a YT and check it out to see how well it translated into bits and bytes. Probably just a pale shadow of the Real Deal, but I MUST hear that again.
BoRhap was of course majestic and touching and everything. The audience clapped like mad for the encore, and I must say this tour WWRY is a totally different beast compared to all previous incarnations. First of all, QAL performed the song twice each show in 2012 (6 shows, 12 WWRYs), and Adam got the lyrics right just twice or so. He messed them up at iHeart Radio Festival, even before the 2012 tour at the Montreal studio when asked to sing a bit. So imagine my surprise to find him singing the correct lines every freaking night on this tour without ever mixing up the "young man" with the "old man", the "shouting in the streets" with "pleading with your eyes" etc. It appears a lot of training has been involved, and the vocals are significantly "rockier" than ever before.
Of course, being a bit of a Simon Cowell when it comes to lyrics (I expect no lyric fails from a profession singer), I noticed a few errors here and there. In fact, given my extensive knowledge of QAL YT material, I nearly predicted where he might get it wrong. E.g. in I Want It All, he sang "if you want the truth" in the first bridge instead of "I heard him say" just as I felt in my guts seconds before he did it, but this time I did not care.
WATC was glorious. In a hockey arena with the whole audience singing, Adam pretty much left them take over and just "conducted" in some parts of the song.
So in the end, everybody was totally on board and happy.
After the concert, I was waiting around the merchandise stand and having my GNL cover image (Lambert in feathers) T-shirt on, a few people gave me thumbs up (including a girl wearing the EXACT same T-shirt), and her (I assume) mother who came by later. Then I saw a lady with the green ribbon of ATop and then got to meet her companions. Then outside on the street, I met even more ladies thank to my T-shirt (not too many men wearing Adam merchandise that I could see around) - please show yourself if you are reading this!
In conclusion, if you are going to your first concert in the coming days, nothing can prepare you for what it really is. If you are going to YET ANOTHER concert on this tour, I so envy you, I might be turning green...
