Okay guys, here it is: my review and description of *NSYNC's "No Strings Attached Tour". This is for all of you who didn't get a chance to go (I'm so sorry if you didn't, cause it was awsome), and those who did but are just curious to see what I thought or whatever...anyway I went to the concert on July 26 at Madison Square Garden in NYC (Joey's hometown)and HBO was there filming some footage to air the next day in preview of the concert they were broadcasting live. It was really cool, because at the beginning, *NSYNC's manager, Johnny Wright, was explaing to us about the cameras and telling us to "smile and look pretty" because we might get on tv. And also, since it was in New York, there was a lot of famous people in the audience like Carson Daly, Ananda Lewis, Aaliyah, Brian McKnight, Darren Henson (*NSYNC's favorite choreographer), the Fatone family, the Bass family, and Lynn Harless (Justin's mom); so *NSYNC had a lot more interaction with the crowd.
At 7:30pm the first opening act, Ron Irizarry, the first artist signed to Chris' FuManSkeeto Label came on. He performed three songs (I don't remember what they were called). My opinion on his performance was that he kinda stunk. He did do this one song where Ruben joined him on guitar, that one was ok just because of him. After his set was over, the girl group Innosense, which is managed by Justin's mom,went onstage.They also did three songs, the two I remember were called "Go Baby Go" and "Say No More". They wern't really that good either, but we cheered loudly for them anyway because of Justin's mom and because we knew that when they were done we would be that much closer to seeing who we really came to see...*NSYNC. The final opening act came on after about a 20 minute delay. It was new R&B superstar, Pink. She sang a ballad, some fast song, and then her popular first hit single, "There You Go". The crowd went pretty crazy for her, especially when she sang "There You Go"--everyone was singing along. Although I don't really like her music, I have to say, she is a great performer, and she sounded really good live.
Before the lights cameup, Johnny Wright came onstage to tease the crowd. he told us that *NSYNC would be starting a little late because Joey couldn't decide whether to wear the purple, red, or leopard thong. We all laughed and then the lights came on and there was an intermission that seemed like it would never be over. Soon my friend and I started chanting "*NSYNC, *NSYNC, *NSYNC" and the whole crowd joined in, it was pretty cool.
Finally, at about 9 p.m. when we almost couldn't take the waiting anymore, the lights went out and you could feel the excitement in the air. The stage was pretty big and it had ramps on each side that led up to a raised catwalk that spanned the whole length of the stage. Lights beamed from the arch in front of the catwalk, and *NSYNC was spelled out in red and blue lights. A wide video screen was above it all to show closeups of the guys while they were performing. Then all of a sudden I heard the first notes of that Pinochio song "I got no strings to hold me down..." and I looked around for Justin, Chris, Joey, Lance and JC. I spotted them hanging overhead in the shadows like puppets, just like in the "Bye Bye Bye" video! They quickly dropped to the stage in patched, sparkling outfits (Justin had a top hat on that matched the outfits). After doing some puppet choreography, there was a loud "bang!" and some explosions and they began performing "No Strings Attached". Justin threw off his hat and you could see he was wearing a sparkling, black bandana with his curls just slightly peeking out the back.(He looked adorable.)The whole opening number was literaly an explosion of sight and sound and lights; it was awsome!
Next came "I Want You Back", but the guys threw a little twist into it. The song was sort of a remix of itself with tension-building pauses and robotic dance moves, with the *NSYNC logo flying wildly over the video screen. (Yes, they did the classic *NSYNC flips still.)Then the guys ran offstage, and soon Lance came back onstage to introduce, as he always does, "(God Must Have Spent) a Little More Time on You". Then Justin, Chris, Joey and JC came back, with their jackets now removed to sing the song.
Then suddenly after the song was over, MTV's Ananda Lewis came on the video screen and announced that we were on "Total *NSYNC Live" and that the guys were now our personal slaves! We were to choose which song the guys were to perform next from a bunch of weird choices: "Yankee Doodle Dandy", "Three Blind Mice", "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star", "The Star Spangled Banner" or "Tearin Up My Heart". Of course, it was meant that we'd cheer the loudest for "Tearin Up My Heart", so a bunch of us tried to make it "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" just to see what would happen, but it didn't work. So they came out in different outfits and tore up the stage in an awsome performance of a classic *NSYNC song, which featured their now famous "When I say *N, you say SYNC" audience interactor.
Justin came onstage alone for the next number, which consisted of him doing an awsome "human beat box" that became a battle between him and the drummer. At one point, Justin ran up to the drummer and he was like "Are you callin me out? Are you gonna try to show me up at my own show, in front of all these people and in front of HBO?? I don't think so" and I think Justin won the battle :)It was really cool. Chris, Joey, Lance and JC then joined Justin onstage again, now dressed in cargos, fatigues and t-shirtsto do a fiery rendition of "It's Gonna Be Me". Toward the middle the song, the guys all went down on one knee and then raised their heads one by one as each sang his part during the "It's gonna gonna gonna gonna gonna" line,and Justin then leaned over the others and pointed out at us as he growled, "It's gonna be me." At the end JT did that same pose again on that line and put both hands out to either side, and the other guys fell down as a spotlight illuminated JT from above.
More on the concert next time I update... sorry for the delay :)
