Tuesday, August 21, 2007

I'll be forever yours love always, Mandy

It is official, I can cross something off of my grand life "To-Do List." Last night I was able to see Mandy Moore in concert. It was something that I did not think would ever happen in my lifetime. She had been concentrating on her film career, the last album that she released was a covers album that was four years ago. Who would have thought that she would have felt like writing a whole album and then go on tour with it? Not I that's for sure.

I had been anticipating this concert for over a month now, listening to her album Wild Hope on repeat for the past week, falling in love all over again with her music. But seeing her live was just amazing.

Getting to The Showbox (soon-to-be The Showbox Market) I was reminded of the last time I had been to a show there, back in February to see Ben Kweller. Not only was I mistaken in thinking the artist I was there to see would be the headliner, but also the crowd was very similar. There were many older people there, especially older couples. Then there were the 20-somethings like myself, a lone kid running around and of course the token black couple. It as an interesting mix, and most of whom were there to see Mandy.

Upon taking the stage you saw that Mandy really is as beautiful in person as she is on the screen. She is also down to earth and is like any other 23 year old girl. She is someone who is dorky, fun, the type of person you would want to be friends with. All of which added to the great atmosphere at her show.

She played a majority of her new album, a few songs off of "Coverage," but perhaps my favorite (as well as the crowd's) was her slowed down, soul, version of not only Rhianna's "Umbrella," but of her very first hit from almost a decade ago "Candy."

Though all know by now Mandy has renounced all albums before "Coverage" time and time again, but was nice to see her embrace her past. No one is happy with all the choices that they made when they were 14. But luckily for us our names are not synonymous with those choices, but rather we can keep them hidden, buried in a diary in a box, stuffed in the back of a closet. So for Mandy to own the songs that she sang all those years ago and make them something, new and different for herself, well that is just pretty cool.

But the show did not end there, no my friend, the headliner of the night was none other than Paula Cole, who to answer the question of the night: yes she does have a new album. And she does have a powerful voice. But she was INTENSE. A little too intense for my taste, but her fans sure do love her. And she did sing "I Don't Wanna Wait" as an encore, so that was pretty awesome.

1 comment:

robyn grace said...

If she hadn't played Candy I would have asked for a refund.

I saw that she was touring with Paula Cole. I thought Paula Cole was dead until I saw that her sing America the Beautiful at the 7th inning stretch of some baseball game dad was watching. I was never a huge fan of hers.

Oh, and I got your package- Amazing as usual. I can't decide when to consume my coke light. I'll be emailing you soon.