Trey Day

Last Monday night, I attended Trey Songz' concert featuring Laura Izibor at the House of Bllues and was pleasantly surprised to say the least.

Unlike the fuckery that was Drake's concert a few weeks back, the Laura Izibor/Trey Songz combo was a complete difference, in only the most positive of ways. The concert started on time with Izibor opening the show and giving the crowd something to be excited about. I love her voice and compare her whole style to that of Alicia Keys. She plays the piano and has a very soulful/jazz-esque sound that I can appreciate. I was definitely pleased with the performance.

Towards the end of her number, she performed Mary J. Blige's, "Real Love", which drove the crowd INSANE! She is really talented and should NOT be slept on, people! Download her album which just dropped in May here.

The curtain closed for about 30 minutes and Trey Songz appeared on the scene. His promptness won cool points with me instantly and I wished I could just sit back and enjoy the show versus standing shoulder to shoulder with the other concertgoers. However, I wasn't complaining.

Onstage, Songz sang songs from his latest album, "Ready" which drops in August as well as select songs from his last work, "Trey Day". While singing, I was hoping against hope that he'd sing, "Role Play", which is by and large one of my favorite songs on the album. It just does hard to me. However...he never sang it. Instead, he sang other bangers like, "Missing You", "Sex For Yo Stereo", "Can't Help But Wait", and one of my favorites....."Last Time".

He even took it back and sang a hit song from his very first album, "Gotta Go" to which case he belted it out as if it was his first performance while the concertgoers crooned along with him. It was an awesome night.

What made it even more awesome was his stage presence. One thing that he did that blew me away (besides him making eye contact with me on more than one occasion-I think it was cuz height-wise I stood out from most of the girls) was his ummm "oral-sex face". He did an oral impersonation that left me stunned. I almost had to slap myself to get back on track with the concert...cuz my mind had definitely drifted lol. He also got offstage and performed in the crowd. This was short-lived, however as he was nearly raped by the females within reach and had to be pulled back onstage. Some of the women were so thirsty you could see the sand fall out of their mouths. It was ridiculous.

I will say that I completely underestimated Trey before this concert. I considered him a mildly talented singer with way too much physical appeal, which landed him "passes" in the industry. After last night's show though, my mind has changed. The kid* is an entertainer. And not only that...he's a really talented entertainer. I'm glad I was wrong, otherwise I'd have been upset that I paid for the ticket to see him.**

Other points of the night:

- A downfall of the concert was undoubtedly the "all ages welcome" for admission into the concert. With this, there were kids (literally) of all ages (literally), including a newborn child wrapped in a blanket with its mother enjoying the concert. Couldn't find a babysitter? Smh

- The attire of the concertgoers seemingly everywhere. Monday marked the first day of summer and it was HOT in Chicago (like 88 degrees outside). With that said, there were people everywhere in theee skimpiest of clothing and also the most out of date of styles. I hate trend followers and "trend-only" styles because well...they die fast. I prefer a timeless style. However, that wasn't the worst of it though. Three girls who came to the concert together were dressed from head to toe like Rihanna's clone. (By "head to toe", I mean from the hair to the makeup to the clothing to the shoes and even to the tattoos and "swag". It was weird as Hell, not to mention Rih Rih's current hair is just NOT hot. Ugh!) But anyway...

- Women fighting (literally) over things that Trey threw out to the audience. One incident was near me. He threw his sweaty towel. The towel touched my hand and some girl jumped all over my poor arm. I was rocking my specs and those few off, almost to the ground. I immediately tried to keep my distance and said girl as well as two others proceeded to fight over the towel. Security came to briefly break it up. It wasn't that serious. They can keep his sweaty towel! lol

- Women literally throwing their pantiies on the stage. Seriously. I swear I thought that the whole panty-throwing was a myth until last night. Damn, Trey...smh.

All in all though, I really enjoyed the concert. And I will be getting "Ready" when it drops (pause). Next concert is Lupe Fiasco's (yall know that's one of my FAVORITE artists, hands down!!!) at the Chicago Theatre.....but *sigh* I may not go. I've got broke friends :(. We'll see though, so stay tuned!

I've got videos and pics from Monday night stored into my phone but...they aren't the best so I won't be posting those up.

*- Trey is a year older than me. I just like to say "kid" here and there.
**- I wasn't going to go, but my homegirl is a Stan so I obliged and went. And loved the show. I'm glad I went.

Drake- Not the Best I Ever Had

So last Friday, Drake came to Chicago's House of Blues and performed a few tracks from his So Far Gone mixtape. Six words to sum up the concert:

What a Friday night that was....

The concert was scheduled to start at 11:30pm/midnight*. However, the lengthy line of fans and concert goers that circled around the perimeter of the House of Blues did not budge until well after 12:15. Luckily, my buzz was still quite intact and the ultra-comfy heels I wore were still supporting my feet and providing comfort. Once inside, I met up with some other friends, chatted a bit while the 900 fans collaborated in the standing room and collectively awaited a what then seemed to be a "oh there's just a few technical difficulties/Drake will be out really soon, so no need to worry" ordeal.

But then....time marched on.

And on.

I noticed my buzz dying down and my feet hurting just a tad, so I helped myself to a drink to get back into my groove. At around 1:30am, I took a seat, sipped my vodka/cranberry juice mixture, and a random girl came up to the group of us and said, "Drake ain't comin; I'm leaving". We shrugged. I looked at my phone and noticed the time and said, "Dang, he really might not show up".

At around 2am, I excused myself to make my way back to my original group, who were positioned perfectly in the front row/center of the standing room. On the way to them, I run into an ex-boo's roommate (we'll call this ex-boo "Big" and the roommate "Ck"). Ck and I chat very briefly and for a millisecond Big is mentioned.** Immediately, the curtain finally opens. "Drake is coming on!!!" shouts fans everywhere.

But alas........no Drake.

Instead came flooding random act after random act of Chicago's Wackest Artists (henceforth known as the CWA crew). One of the performers was a Latino rapper who's entire theme was, "the game needs to change". He came onstage complete with a three-piece suit and was determined to set his message.

Then....the unthinkable erupted. Out popped four women dressed in midrifts and thongs. They did a choreographed number which included a series of spins (professional turns), leaps, and.........booty drops and splits. *sigh* I thought he said the game needed a CHANGE!

Everyone in the audience was agape. Stunned, shocked, and quite annoyed. When the Latino artists' dancers appeared, I instantly let out a very loud, "SERIOUSLY, FAM?!?!" for all those around me (including those onstage as I was pretty close to the stage) to hear. I was irritable and all that I kept wondering was, "Where the Hell is Drake?!"

Finally, at around 2:45am, one of the hosts closes the curtain and says, "Y'all ready for Drake?" I understand that this was a method of amping the crowd, but at almost 3am, it was no longer necessary. Of course we were ready for Drake...especially after seeing and having to listen to those extremely subpar artists!

The curtain stayed closed until about 3:15am. Suddenly, the music came on and Drake had FINALLY made an appearance. I wasn't able to do a video myself because right before he came onstage, my phone's battery had died out completely *sad face*. When he came, he carried on as if we hadn't been waiting for him for the past 4 hours. He gave a really good show and I was really into it (especially when he performed, "Best I Ever Had" and "Say What's Real") until.....

...a fight broke out right in the middle of Best I Ever Had. And the performance was briefly aborted.

Here is the clip:




[sidebar]
Looking at the clip at around the 4:00 mark, you'll see one of my homies that came to the concert with us--Mikey. He has on all black and when the commotion erupted with the fight, he acted as if he was one of the members of Drake's entourage to make sure everything was copacetic. LOL How he got onstage is completely beyond me. We were wondering where he was all night! Also-you see Lupe Fiasco onstage holding Drake? Man I wish he had performed. He is one of my favorite artists HANDS DOWN!!!
[end sidebar]



The concert ended shortly afterwards. A disappointed Drake said he only had one more song left to perform but in my eyes, he couldn't have been finished performing, for it was only 4am. Now 4am is a late time...however, considering he had just gotten onstage at 3:15, I trusted he wouldn't be finished until around 5am. I was a little bummed about the ending of the concert, but glad nonetheless. I was tired/sleepy as Hell*** and my buzz had completely worn off, never to be seen again. So I was bittersweet.

Once we exited the House of Blues, there were cops and ambulances all over, someone had been shot, and it was just an all-around mess dressed in true Chicago fashion. I can't say that I was disappoined at the overall turnout, but as I said in the beginning of this blog:

What a Friday night that was...

*- It was scheduled so late (most likely) because Keyshia Cole had a concert at the Chicago Theatre (about ten minutes away) that same night that started at 8. Since Keyshia is a bit more 'official' than Drake, guess who wins?
**- The "Big" fiasco may possibly may be a more developed story for you readers. I know, I know...shocker, right? lol
***-I did not get home until after 6am on Saturday morning, not to mention I had not been sleeping whatsoever since the beginning of the week. My Insomnia had DEFINITELY kicked into a very high gear last week. It was insane!

Temporary Insanity

Temporary insanity

I'm kinda goin insane today. Kinda. Definitely more than usually though.

Soooo……it's pretty well-known how much I love me some Usher and Common, right? They're everything a woman can ask for physically. Usher with his milk chocolate tint and Common with the strength to bring the popularity of the light-skinned brothas back? Lawd! Anyway, as luck would have it, Usher is playing at the House of Blues tonight and I'm broke as hell.

(I swear...I'm in love with a man with a good pork-chop)

(See? Because of him....the light-skinned men have a better shot. Thanks, Common, lol)

It was bad enough that Common had a concert on my birthday weekend and his tickets STARTED at 100 dollars because it was a fund-raiser for his organization. But there was Talib Kweli with him, Floetry, and Bilal (who I saw early this summer but still...)

What the hell?

I've never seen my Usher in concert. And now he's here in Chicago? Not Atlanta? Not Los Angeles? Not even NYC? But HERE? Here, like ten minutes away from my office? Here? In Chicago?

And I have no money? Like broke as hell? Broke like I need a second job? Broke like I can't wait til I get paid tomorrow JUST so I can pay down some of these bills and just HOPE that I can make it through after all the bills are paid?

This can't be life. It just can't be.

You gotta love Facebook. You just gotta love that website. Because of facebook.com, I found out about the concert that my cousin is going to, thought it was at her school and figured that if he was just playing for students at the University of Illinois @ Urbana-Champaign that I could just drop in for the night or something. (The school is only about an hour and a half away). I ended up being informed that he's actually ten minutes away from the office, talked to my cousin who has been encouraging me to put up the eighty-five dollars to go with her.

Eight-five dollars.

I wanna go, y'all.

But I'm broke.

Some would say "it isn't meant to be" but DAMN THAT! I can't remember the last time that Usher was in CHICAGO. I need to see my "man".

I'm going insane. And I'm mad that I'm broke. Damn economy. Being broke does not pay.....

Can anyone help? Hit my inbox...please...