Okay. Deep breath.
Canadian songbird Nelly Furtado’s performance at the Save-on-Foods Memorial Centre on January 8 was special. Very special. The kind of special that makes you want to kill yourself. Now-deceased tyrannical Lybian leader Moammar Gadhafi got a full dose of Nelly when she and other pop stars like Usher and Mariah Carey played a Gadhafi-backed concert in 2011 (Furtado later donated the $1 million she received to the Free the Children campaign). I can only presume the complications from seeing Furtado live were insurmountable for him. (Sorry, that was mean.)
Deep. Breath. Let’s try this again.
Nelly Furtado was so awkward on stage. She seemed at times lost, disappearing inexplicably mid-song to change her wardrobe or, more accurately, put on a mismatched coat or vest. Her stage banter was so stilted it felt like she was a robotic servant of pop-music doom come to take us away to her leader (that being the grim reaper, who made two appearances: once so Furtado could read from a bucket list thrown together by dum-dum crowd members, and a second time to hold a gigantic singalong cue card that simply read “la la la la la.” Both of these things happened.).
Breathe, Jason, breathe.
Furtado’s DJ’s name is DJ Sean. Or maybe it’s DJ Shawn. I can neither disprove or confirm the spelling. But that’s a pretty sweet DJ name.
Alright. Inhale. Deeply. One more go at this…
Furtado’s hit songs sounded pretty decent, actually. Okay, not “Parking Lot,” my personal favourite Furtado jam, and the biggest reason I was in attendance. That one sounded putrid. But the other hits, like “I’m Like a Bird,” “Turn Off the Light,” and “Try” sounded sort of fine. She really does have a good voice when she’s not singing through one nostril. The rest of this show’s tunes though… let’s talk about the cover songs… a jam of Steve Miller Band’s “Fly Like an Eagle” (immediately following “I’m Like a Bird”) disintegrated after 45 seconds when Furtado vanished side stage to remove an item of clothing. Ahhhhhhh… psyche. Her encore cover of Madonna’s “Like a Prayer” was both vapid and inappropriate, considering most of the super sparse audience consisted of middle-aged soccer moms and prepubescent girls.
Last chance. One more deep breath.
Nelly Furtado’s stage moves consisted of a bounty of gypsy hand gestures, some Axl Rose swaying, and a few power squats. She should really work on her choreography.
Okay, let’s end this.
I know she’s a hometown hero and all. I know she’s got a pretty good set of pipes and all. I know she’s written some decent songs over the years and all. But, really, Nelly Furtado was one of the worst concerts I’ve been to. And I really just want to forgot all about it.
Immediately.
Whoa, there… that sounded like some full on Hate, bordering on character assault. The only thing I smell here is the giant crap you just took. Not a Nelly fan? Fine, me neither. I would not even attend her show, because I know I’m not into the music. I still admire and respect her though, because she has some serious chops, and has managed to step through the minefield of bullshit that is the music industry with some integrity to get her stuff out there, which a considerable number of people honestly do love and enjoy. Plus she’s a local musician and a mother now and we should be proud of her just for making that work, really.. I’m sure it’s not easy. Who knows, maybe she wasn’t feeling too well that night, and doing he best she could under the circumstances. You don’t know what’s going on, really, and I feel there should be a basic level of compassion and respect for performers. They put themselves out there and take a lot of shit from self-entitled consumers and critics who expect them to be perfect. These kind of “hate reviews” go a tad farther than necessary, plus it also kinda makes it look like your ego gets off on the judgement and being so much “cooler than thou” in trashing her like that. Really, no one held a gun to your head to get you to go to the concert, and how would you feel if someone didn’t like your life’s work and then pissed all over it? I’m sure there are kinder and more respectful ways to write a music review, even if you didn’t like it what you heard.
I thought I could smell something in the air that evening, wafting from the city. I wonder if it’s not like sports, home town teams always seem to do better on the road. That being said, I always thought she was a “one-shot-wonder”…the right place at the right time. That season of bad music is over…she likely should have left with it. Anyways, sometimes the truth hurts. It sounds like this was a concert everyone one got hurt, performer and fans.