Eternal Sunshine World Tour Review
The show began with a silhouette of Ariana and other dancers in various positions, with a curtain drawn around the stage. As the tune of "yes, and?" began, the crowd began to grow more excited. Finally, when the curtain fell (revealing a large house built to look run-down), I felt a rush of excitement as Ms. Grande stepped onto the stage in all her 5ft2 glory.
I wish I could say that excitement had lasted for the entire show.
Since this is my very first review (yay!) it will probably be a bit of a mess. I'm going to slowly learn how I want to review concerts. Do I want to give it a rating based purely on vibes? Write up my blogs when I should be working with off-the-cuff thinking and feelings? Or should I make it more formal? As in: create a "score sheet" that I bring to every show and use that sheet to score the concert itself, a la "Pitchfork". For this first review, I think I'm going to keep it simple: break down the pros and cons of the show, give my final remarks, and then reveal my score at the bottom of the review. I'll also include the set list to which I bore witness (some concerts have unique setlists that differ from every show). I think I'm going to stick with scoring my shows out of 5, but maybe I'll bump it up to 10. If the Oscars can go from having 5 Best Picture nominees to 10 solely out of greed, why can't I change my own rigorous standards down the line?
Show Strengths
It seems fairly obvious, but Ariana Grande has a voice unlike any other female pop star on the planet. The way she effortlessly hits whistle notes, holds tunes, and belts out the high parts of her biggest hits is a talent that cannot be taught. She could have sat on that stage and burped into the microphone for 2 hours and it would have sounded better than many of these new artists emerging onto the scene. The runs that she hit for "Break Free", "Dangerous Woman", and "Into You" were nothing short of mesmerizing. I feel blessed to have witnessed her live on stage, even if I needed binoculars to see her from my seat.
Another strong point of the show was the pacing. I debated on whether or not I wanted to include this as a strength or weakness, since the show felt VERY fast-paced, but ultimately, I have decided that the speed at which Ariana was able to move through the show is a "pro". I couldn't believe how quickly time seemed to have passed while she was on stage: it seemed impossible that I spent 160 minutes breathing the same air as her (it felt more like 20!). Ms. Grande effortlessly flowed from one song to the next, and the breaks between the concert acts were (thankfully) quite short. Never once did she break her stride on stage or seem to lose her composure: she smoothly flowed from one song to the next until suddenly, she was getting lifted up into the air to vanish into the night without so much as a "thank you for coming!" (complimentary) (quite the Irish goodbye!).
The last strength I want to point out was the design of the set itself (the "run-down" house). Unfortunately, I was way too far back and high up to appreciate the beauty and attention to detail the tour designers brought to the stage, but I was able to take some time to look through photos and videos of the stage. The set up is quite magnificent. I loved how the house was adorned with garland, wisteria, and general shrubbery at the end of the show while she sang "we can't be friends (wait for your love)" and "supernatural". It's these types of small changes during a concert that make the experience more immersive and impressive.
The... "could have been better" portions?
I'm not quite sure what to name this section. I don't want to call it "the cons" because that sounds so negative. The work that goes into putting on a show of this magnitude is immeasurable, so it seems unfair (despite the whole point of this website being a REVIEW BLOG) that I critique shows using highly negative language. I'll consider the name of this section a work-in-progress for now!
The biggest gripe I had about the show is the entire production felt underwhelming. In particular, the lighting design, which I have seen consistently used to enhance a show, seemed like an afterthought. Light design can make a show feel so much more grand in scale, but in this case, hardly any interesting or creative lighting choices were presented during the show. This may seem harsh or nitpicky but I consider Ariana a mega-star who would go for spectacle over intimacy, in the same vein as Lady Gaga, Beyonce, and Taylor Swift (but unlike Adele, whose shows typically lean more intimate; just her, a piano, a microphone, and her voice). These artists know how to command a stadium with unique set designs, deliberate lighting choices, and an overall consideration of the "mise en scene" presentation for everyone attending the show. For this concert, it seemed as though the show was only geared towards individuals sitting close to the stage; many times, the stage seemed to be dwarfed by the massive TD Garden arena, which is a huge problem when an artist is trying to create a spectacle (I realize I'm repeating myself now, but this show seemed to want to lean more towards spectacle, yet couldn't quite achieve it).
Another issue I took with the show were the blocking choices. I sat in the nosebleed seats for 2 of the 3 aforementioned female artists, and never once did I have an issue seeing or understanding the story these women were trying to tell on stage. Every angle of these shows (The MAYHEM Ball, Cowboy Carter tour, and the Eras Tour (in full transparency, I was not in the nosebleeds for Eras)) was carefully constructed and considered to ensure maximum enjoyment for every single concertgoer. That did not seem to be the case here. The house set, for example, seemed too far pushed back and too far away from the audience, as if Ari wanted to come off as unreachable and unrelatable (maybe this was a deliberate choice that I didn't comprehend though!). In other cases throughout the show, Ari seemed to be obscured by other dancers (not intentionally) and stood in strange places on the stage that didn't quite make sense with where her dancers were located. It was distracting & a bit overwhelming. For example, why was Ariana at the very end of the stage while the entire rest of her dancing crew remained on the house set during "yes, and?"?.
Third: it seemed as though Ariana herself didn't really want to be there. The energy was lacking slightly, and she did not interact with the audience or arena as much as I wish she had. Some shows, such as Lily Allen's West End Girl Tour, works better when the artist is not interacting with the audience, creating an immersive storytelling experience. That show specifically gave me the following ideology: an artist during a concert should either never interact with the audience at all during a show or, if they do, take the time to really talk to the audience (throw in a few fun quips, maybe talk to a specific audience member. Don't just shout out the city you are performing in with some lazy statement like "Love you Boston!" or "Thank you for having me you guys are great!". Those types of quick shout outs, I think, come off as incredibly disingenuous). The few times Ari did break the fourth wall came off as slightly awkward and stiff; I wish she had spent more time chatting with the audience during the a cappella portion of the show, or maybe even talking to a few concertgoers. One of my favorite concert memories involves Dua Lipa getting off stage and walking down the barricade, taking pictures with a handful of attendees. Despite me being about 400 feet away, it was so wonderful to watch Ms. Lipa break the fourth wall in such a strong way.
Final Thoughts
In no way was this a bad show - Ariana Grande has an incredible voice, and the discography to back that talent. There were moments of brilliance and innovative creativity throughout the show, it's just unfortunate that an artist as big as Ms. Grande didn't seem to match that scale of grandeur at an Arena show. The vocals and ideas were there, but the too-simple execution and lack of inventive stage blocking & lighting design made for an underwhelming spectacle.
