6.20.15 Adam News and Info

 
GMA Summer Concert
6.20.15 by Q3

Adam Lambert performed a four-song mini-concert in the center of Central Park in New York City on Friday, June 19, for ‘Good Morning America’ and its Summer Concert Series. Three of the performances were broadcast on TV. The fourth song was “only for the live audience” and was posted online.

Setlist

Ghost Town
The Original High
Whataya Want From Me
Evil In The Night (online bonus performance)

I did not plan to go to the show -- although I secretly was hoping I would find a way. On Wednesday afternoon I had a work schedule change that allowed me to take off for a couple of days. I took it as a sign that I should go and made the decision to drive over to NYC so I could be there. Like all of my previous “I just want to be there to see Adam” decisions, I have no regrets. The only regrets I ever have is when I decided to do the “rational” thing and stay home. I made almost no plans, booked a hotel, got in my car with Mr. Q3, and went.

I do not live near New York, so getting there involved a long drive – about 8 hours. And in the grand “Adam tourist” fashion, I am spending a long weekend in NYC which so far has involved some excellent food, some harrowing cab rides with cab drivers who need me to use my GPS to get to “secret locations” like Central Park, a visit to my favorite museum, shopping, and basically hanging out in New York.

Getting to the Show

First of all, I need to start with a shout out to the kind fan-friend who gave me one of her VIP passes. She knows who she is and it was a gift I will never forget. I expected to be in the back. I just wanted to be there. Everything else is just a massive bonus!

Getting to this concert required a bit of dedication, getting up at 4:00AM to queuing up in various lines. Many attending the concert had done the B&N CD signing on Wednesday so it was their second super early morning lineup day in a row.

Leaving my hotel, the city is mostly still, dark and strangely quiet. All started out well with my first cab to meet-up with some other AToppettes and head off to the show.

Normally I skip all the getting to the show stuff – and I promise to quickly get to Adam, but I need to tell you a bit about “the car ride to the park!” I met some fans at their hotel in Central Midtown, directly south of Central Park. The plan was to take a cab from the hotel about 20 blocks northeast to the 72nd street entrance to the park. It was 4:45AM and the city was so quiet. There was not a cab in sight but there was a van waiting in front of the hotel. We decided to take this non-cab, but licensed van to the park.

Our cab driver could speak no English, not a speck. We negotiated the fare using a calculator just like we were in a rural Turkish marketplace, piled into the van and headed off. The driver did not know how to get there, so I gave him my printed map of the park entrances and concert location that Mr. Q3 thoughtfully printed for me. He could not read that either. We should have been heading northeast, and we were headed south. Panic ensued!! After lot of gesturing and useless direction giving, and “Which side of the park are we on?” questions, he finally figured out where we wanted to go and got us there. With that I knew I was actually in New York. (If this sounds like a scene from a 1990’s comedy movie, that is what it felt like but without the laugh track.)

We arrived and got in line. There were two lines, one for regular people and one for people with VIP passes. There were a lot of people in both lines but not as many as I expected. The lines were diverse and filled with people from all over the country plus Brazil, UK, Russia, Canada and probably other countries. There were a few familiar faces but I overheard some people talking about seeing Adam live for the first time. [Yes, they were going to have "The Original High".]  Everyone was excited but well-behaved.

It was dark when we arrived but the sun rose, sort of. It was a gray day, on the border of rain the whole time. Some organized fans had brought plastic fold-up ponchos and trash bags, some had coats. Thankfully, it remained hot and muggy with a bit of drizzle now and then but never really rained.

Before the Show

If you have been in a TV audience before, you know that before the show, they do a lot of schtick and make you cheer and clap a lot. For the GMA concert there was more than two hours of this, including practicing to do a “Happy Birthday Lara” sign thing that seemed to take 45 minutes of rehearsal. Now clap and scream. Louder.

This show seemed to involve a lot more of this “audience training” than normal. We were mere props for the show but we had to be really good props. It was all boring to live through, so I will pass on writing much about it. Having been through this once, I can understand most locals seem to pass on these GMA concerts.

They filmed some audience cut-aways. (I have not seen the show yet but if audience looks uncoordinated or off-the-beat, it is because at least some of the audience shots were not actually live.)

Periodically, the crowd broke into a chant of “Adam, Adam” but the incantation did not work.

Meanwhile, there were people on stage making adjustments. Rob and Leah were there so we knew Adam was likely somewhere “back stage”. The band took the stand a played a bit.

The Rehearsal

The band was on stage a long time. Occasionally they played some music – always the accompaniment to one of the four songs Adam performed “later” in the morning. At one point the band played “Ghost Town” and the crowd sang along – many people knew ALL the lyrics. TALC captured the moment.

youtu.be/wkKgX6moeuM



Adam arrived. We really did not need to practice screaming and clapping in advance for this.


On TV you saw Adam arrive in a car, we did not see this GMA car arrival. He just appear on stage.

For starters, he looked great. Honestly, I have never seen Adam look or sound this good. Never.

And he seemed really happy.

When he arrived, he recognized the crowd and then spoke to the show director about the staging, sequence and so on. We could not hear this but we could see them pointing at spots on the stage and briefing him.

The rehearsal was in front of the audience so we saw all four songs performed twice, in sequence. During rehearsal, Adam stopped a few times to talk to the keyboardist or the cameraman or someone else about how he wanted things. There was no doubt Adam was in charge.

At one point they made a mike adjustment but it appeared that they had already done a band soundcheck and this was solely for the vocals and staging.

Everyone from the crew and GMA team seemed to really like him and be thrilled to meet him – and they kept calling him Mr. Lambert. It made me smile. I think of Mr. Lambert as Eber, not Adam!

Adam spent a lot of time adjusting his pants -- a fan captured some of this in this video.

youtu.be/zEbjw1getD0

Adam mugged around a bit with the cameraman – there may be video of this somewhere. It was pretty funny. (I know there has to be video of this and hopefully it will appear.)



The Show

The whole GMA crew arrived on stage and Robin introduced Adam and called “Ghost Town” one of the songs of the summer.

Adam started singing “Ghost Town”. He was intense and focused but seems very much like the same person who was on stage during rehearsals. I was directly in front of his mike stand, 3 people from the stage and his eyes we like steel.



Toward the end of Adam’s performance of “Ghost Town”, inexplicably, these giant GMA orange and yellow balloons appeared. The crowd was supposed to pop them up in the air as part of this Summer concert celebration. Under the gray, misty sky, with “my heart is a ghost town” ringing in our ears, these balloons looked ridiculous. At one point near the end of the song, one of these balloons burst loudly right near Adam. He broke character for a split second and started to crack up, then got back into character. If you watch the video, I think you will see him smiling at the end of the song. It was too funny.

I tried to ignore the giant balloons that were reigning down on me. Most people in the audience seemed annoyed by them.

Here is the ABC video of “Ghost Town”: abcnews.go.com/GMA/video/adam-lambert-ghost-town-live-performance-2016-good-31885067

The performance ended and before I could catch my breath, Adam and the band were gone and they were setting up some chairs. Vince Vaughn appeared on stage with Laura. The orange balls were still flying everywhere. He was there to promote his HBO show, True Detective. He looked out at the crowd of Adam fans. He looked puzzled, we looked puzzled. I am not sure if he realized we could not really hear him. Lara asked him about Adam, Vince said “Adam Lambert, he’s has got game. He’s not fooling around.” The crowd responded at the mention of Adam’s name. Then he went back to answer some questions about the show. Most the people around me had no idea who he was.

Here’s the interview: abcnews.go.com/GMA/video/vince-vaughn-interview-2016-true-detective-season-role-31885326

Partway through the interview another balloon burst sounding a bit like a gunshot. Lara jumped a bit. The production crew tried to get all the balls back.

The interview ended. The band and Adam returned to preform “The Original High” and “Whataya Want from Me”. Robin interviewed him briefly. We could barely hear it.



“The Original High” was so good. The crowd was dancing and clapping. It was the highpoint of the mini-concert. This has to be the next single from TOH!

Birthday Wishes

The audience did the sign thing for Lara -- HAPPY (held by ABC interns) and BIRTHDAY (held by some audience member who were carefully trained). Lara was surprised. A couple of the production team members were really happy with how it was done. Phew! We passed as a birthday audience.



While the commercials were on TV, Adam and the audience sang “Happy Birthday” to Lara and then Adam gave her some singing instructions.

One more song

We were reminded to wait for one more song. (Like they had to tell us!) Some people yelled in vain for two songs.

After the GMA broadcast was over, Adam performed “Evil In The Night” for the audience and as a bonus, online only song. TALC also provided a video of this song.

youtu.be/TSL-BYkQmRc

And then he was gone.

After the Show

The crowd quickly vanished. The security guards politely but firmly told any stragglers we had to leave. Like all things involving Adam it was over way too soon, but worth the wait and effort.

Having been up since 4:00AM, I was starving. We headed off for breakfast and many cups of coffee with a few peaks at the iTunes charts just to make sure that “Ghost Town”, “The Original High” and the album were headed up the charts.

Until the next “Adventure in Adam Tourism”, have fun and don’t forget to dance!

Just let me feel the rush like the first night
Wanna breathe it out cause I'm going out my mind
Gotta feel the touch like the first time
Cause I'm chasing the original high
Chasing the original high
Chasing the original high
Chasing the original high
Chasing the original high


Photos in this recap from Adam Lambert Pics ‏@adamlambert_pic
451 HQ pictures of @adamlambert - Good Morning America - June 19, 2015:
www.imagebam.com/gallery/k31w3gfotjr555jck7u7kbaw3mbas1kc …