GLBT Pride 2010

This entry actually written July 20, 2010

On July 19, I headed to the "Summer Stage" in Central Park to check out this year's Pride Rally. I watched the performances of a couple musicians and comedians, but then grew bored because I didn't have a friend with me. Overall though, the Rally looked to be a much bigger deal than it was last year. Except that this year they didn't have Dustin Lance Black as a speaker. So, you know.

June 27 was the day of the biggest Pride Week event: the Pride March! This year, I decided to actually march in the parade instead of watching it, joining some of my friends in the Hunter College Queer Student Union group. There were only seven of us, despite that there are many more people that frequent the QSU and should have been there! Oh well. Quality over quantity, right? We gathered at around 11:30 AM in our groups assigned area, and a little after noon, it was our turn to join the procession on Fifth Avenue. Our march stretched from 39th Street down to 9th Street, where we turned and walked another several blocks, passing Sheridan Square and ending around Greenwich Street. Phew! That was a long walk for me! It was fun looking out at the people lined up who were watching the parade, and checking out all the cute guys amongst them. Must have been about fifty boys I wanted. GAH.

Anyways, after our march was over, the parade actually continued for a few more hours--it's quite long. But when our march was up, our group of friends sort of walked around aimlessly, and we couldn't agree on where to go next to party or whatever. I had about enough walking, and I was freaking exhausted from the march (and from waking up early), so I gave up and headed home. Too bad it took me forever to get to the 1 Train subway station because I had to go up to the 14th Street Station after finding out the one at Christopher Street was closed! That meant even more walking. Lordy, I was tired. But all in all, marching in the parade was a fun experience, and something very important to me. It's important for the gay community to come together and show our pride in the face of the homophobic world we live in that treats us like lower lifeforms. And it's very important to me. I want dignity, I want respect for my true self, I want equality, and I want the right to marry someone I truly love. And I want these things for everyone.

Adam Lambert's GlamNation Tour

Photos in this entry are not mine. Obviously.

This entry actually written July 19 & 20, 2010

After months of anticipation, the day of June 22, 2010 arrived: the day of Adam Lambert's GlamNation Tour concert in New York City. I bought my tickets on May 1, and the time since had actually flown by so quickly, that I almost felt it had come too soon. I didn't feel ready. I think that's because I knew that this--the most memorable concert experience of my life, the concert tour of my favorite singer in the entire world--would be over before I even knew what hit me. And then what?

But it's not like I was going to complain that the day had come so soon. It was a Tuesday, which meant I had my summer classes until about 3:00 PM, so I couldn't go to the Nokia Theater to line up early--since the show, unfortunately was General Admission, as in standing room only. But I had been communicating with my friend Liz, who I met at Adam's mini-concert that I won tickets for back in January, and she said she could show up early to save our spot in line. So she went to line up with a couple of her friends around lunchtime I think, and it turns out there were already tons of people lined up! This doesn't surprise me that much, even though it's insane, because Adam Lambert fans are particularly intense. We heard that in fact some seriously dedicated Glamberts had actually started lining up the night before at about 9:00, and had slept on the freaking sidewalk!

After I got out of class, I rushed home to grab something to eat and then get glammed-up. I did my make-up with some extra thick black eyeliner. I wore my tightest skinny jeans and one of my favorite black tees with a colorful graphic; some studded black leather fingerless gloves for that distinctive Glambert touch; a bunch of bracelets including my Planet Fierce wristbands to further reveal my fanboyness; and of course my black leather boots! I was glam-rock-on-a-budget and ready to make my appearance and Adam's concert.

I think it was around 5:40 PM or so when I found Liz and the other girls in line. It was nice to meet a few friends of hers and thus make new friends of my own. Our place in line was in front of some clothing stores on 7th avenue, all the way around the corner from the entrance side of the

Nokia Theater. The line was now extending down the block farther than I could even tell where it ended. It probably stretched across two blocks! So after a couple hours of waiting, the line started moving. We all readied our tickets and entered the Nokia Theater a little after 7:00 PM, making our way down the stairs and through the lower lobby of the building, where there was a bar outside the actual theater, and across from that was a booth thing with Adam Lambert merchandise for sale.

When we got inside the theater, we were happy to find that we could get quite close to the stage despite how many people were ahead of us. After some waiting, the concert began to uproarious applause with Allison Iraheta opening the show, performing songs from her album Just Like You. I adore Allison, her voice, and her music, so it was a delight that have here open the show. She sang with passion and moved with quirky energy, making faces, tossing her arms about, and strutting around the stage with an intensity surpassing that of her performances American Idol. Her band rocked; they made her songs rock harder than on her CD. Next up after Allison's set was rocker Orianthi. She did a longer set than Allison, performing songs from her album Believe. I'm not really familiar with her music, but I totally enjoyed her set of rock songs. Orianthi is a seriously fantastic guitarist above all else.

After Orianthi, they set the stage for Adam, and for some reason made us wait an excruciating length of time before he started. I didn't time the wait, but some said it was nearly 50 minutes! That's simply not okay for any kind of concert to leave fans standing there like that. The speakers played background music to kill time during the wait, and as the audience grew impatient, we started to boo every song that came on. We don't want this shit, we want Adam F***ing Lambert! My feet were seriously hurting, and I wondered if the pay-off would even make me forget this rather upsetting and painful waiting period. Well, it did.

I knew what to expect, frankly, because I had watched a few of his GlamNation concerts on YouTube. But I also knew that nothing could compare to the live experience. The lights dimmed, and there he emerged before a backdrop of a moonlit night sky. The first act consisted of songs about seduction and the flame of love and lust, with Adam's songs "Voodoo," "Down the Rabbit Hole," his [in]famous cover of "Ring of Fire" (which I adore), and then "Fever." This was probably my favorite portion of the concert, although I can't really decide. The visuals for "Voodoo" are fantastic, with crazy images projected on the backdrop, Adam donning a spooky "glam-hatter" costume, and his back-up dancers dressed like voodoo minions. Adam then strips of his hat and coat for "Fire" and "Fever." We got some memorable "Adommy" (Adam + Tommy, his bassist) action during "Fever" for just a tease of boy-on-boy action, getting us Glamberts riled up--one of the highlights of the concert. Hell yes!

The second act of the show is about sudden heartbreak, and pulling through the pain and picking yourself up. Adam wailed gloriously through the incredible "Sleepwalker," and brought the volume down for acoustic renditions of "Whataya Want From Me," "Soaked," and the triumphant "Aftermath," which was a singularly beautiful vocal.

Then the third act pumps it back up in a celebration of love and self, with electro-rock numbers "Sure Fire Winners," "Strut," "Music Again" and his current single "If I Had You." That marks the end of the official set, but as we all hoped, Adam treated us to an encore, with his killer renditions of "Mad World" and "Whole Lotta Love." The band played with a New Age-y acoustic rock vibe for these songs. His band, by the way, is fantastic and I love them! Monte Pittman, the lead guitarist, is especially impressive with his solos in "Sleepwalker" and "Music Again."

Adam was on fire that night. He performed with passion, emotional dynamism, and (as usual) vocal agility. His voice is a truly remarkable instrument, soaring across multiple octaves and shape shifting according to the tone of each song. He can sing with theatrical tenderness, with soulful embellishment, with pop flamboyance, or with a hard edge that rivals the glam rock gods of the past. He went through several costume changes, each complementing the mood of the songs as well as the overall arc of his concert. One of my favorite pieces is the striking studded and striped jacket with coattails he wears for "Strut" and "Music Again." "Strut" is definitely one of my favorites to watch him perform with his back-up dancers. And "Soaked" was almost operatic with the beauty of Adam's vibrato. For the whole concert, it was difficult to take everything in; besides Adam himself, there were his great back-up dancers in their sexy costumes, his band rockin' out, the colorful video projections as a backdrop, and the spectacular laser light show coming from two laser projectors (my favorite visual element, besides Adam himself of course). And...

Wait. Why am I bothering to try to describe all of this wonderfulness to you? You can watch almost the entire concert in the YouTube Playlist I've compiled and embedded below! Thanks to the great fans who recorded video and uploaded their clips on YouTube! Check it out! Click the gray arrows on either side of the frame to move to the next song or back to the previous song.

I was incredibly exhausted after the concert, so I didn't hang around much. I had an incredible time. My only complaints are that the wait for Adam was way too long, and his set was too short. But everything else was all I could hope for! Wow. Adam Lambert's first solo concert tour! I am so happy that I got to experience it for myself. This was one of the greatest nights ever!

One Year Anniversary! And Some Updates

Hello, my dear readers! (Who am I kidding? How many of you are there, like three tops?) It is now June 2010, which marks the one year anniversary since I started this blog, which means it also marks the one year anniversary since I moved to New York City! Wow. I cannot believe I've lived here for a whole year. The time has gone by so fast. In "celebration" of one year of my blog, I've changed the layout (as you might have noticed) using Blogger's new designing tools! Isn't it lovely? Thank goodness they updated those template options, because the old ones were so boring. My new cityscape background gives it a nice New York-y theme, don't you think?

The past few months have been busy and somewhat distressing because of school stuff, so I didn't get around to write about more April and May stuff until just last night. But I placed the entries neatly under their proper dates to keep everything in order. That's the way I like to do things. So be sure to catch up on the entries for May 31, May 8, and April 11! Oh, and if you haven't watched those few Vlogs I recorded, do that too. I had previously thought I'd be doing more videos, but to make a long story short, I've just been having too much trouble working out the technical stuff. Plus, I think text entries are easier for me (or my three readers) to refer to than video ones--like if I happen to be looking for the record of such-and-such event, it's easier to just look for it in text rather than watching a video. So, I think I best stick to mostly text. And photos, of course! Pretty pictures are always a good thing.

Anyways, I survived my second semester of college at Hunter, but only barely. I've now started two classes in the summer session, either because I'm freaking insane or because my mother basically ordered me to. I'm taking two Gen Ed courses, Literature and US History, but they're okay so far. In my free time, I've been watching anime and movies that I check out from the public library, which serves as a nice expense-free substitute for Blockbuster. On the weekends, I've also spent mucho time video chatting with Nick on Skype. That's been fun!

The upcoming week has some excitement in store. I've got my ticket for Adam Lambert's GlamNation Tour concert on Tuesday, June 22! I've been looking forward to this for months, so that's been keeping me going. The YouTube videos I've seen of his show are glamtastic! For me, this man is the greatest thing since sliced bread. He is the incredibly talented and sparkly gay performing artist that I've been needing all my life. It's important for us gays to have our icons. I'm so excited about his official concert tour! Oh, and coincidentally enough, this upcoming week is also Gay Pride Week here in New York! So I'll tell you all about that stuff maybe next week or sometime after! In the meantime, enjoy Adam's music video for his latest single "If I Had You":

David Archuleta Book-signing at Borders

Photo above courtesy of somebody who's not me

This entry actually written July 18, 2010

So there I was just checking my Twitter feed on the afternoon of June 2, and I saw that David Archuleta said he was doing a book-signing to promote his book Chords of Strength here in New York at Borders in Columbus Circle! Believe it or not, I wasn't positive at first that I was going to go. I was worried about homework. After some debating in my mind, I realized that I was being stupid. How could I pass up an opportunity to meet David Archuleta just because I had some worthless homework to do? I mean, that's just kind of laughable.

The book-signing was supposed to start at 7:00, and of course there would be a ridiculously long line waiting for him, so I went a bit early. I bought a copy of Chords of Strength, and got in line. It didn't matter that I was way far back in the line, which went from one end of the store to the other, blocking the aisles along the back wall. The officiators said David was going to get to everybody. They also said he was going to sing one song for us. Aw, how sweet to his fans! Ha. And they asked for our names, wrote it on a sticky note, and stuck it by the title page of the book, so that David could easily write out everybody's names along with his autograph in a timely manner. I guess there were probably a few hundred people--mostly girl fans, some of the younger ones were with their parents, but there were also a fair number of male fans of various ages. Oddly enough, three of this current year's American Idol contestants showed up at this event too, for some reason: Casey James, Andrew Garcia, and Didi Benami. I could see Andrew and Didi when I was standing in line. I was like, "Huh. Okay."

From where I was standing, I couldn't actually see the area of the store where David came out and the signing table was set up. David came out a little after 7:00 and you could here the screams coming from that part of the store, and then David started singing "Lean On Me," which could only be faintly heard where I was even though he used a microphone. Once the autograph session started, it took like 40 minutes or something for the line to really get moving, because there was a roped-off section with seats in the front that got special priority or whatever. But overall, it didn't actually feel like too long. Soon enough I was up front, and there he was sitting behind a table smiling kindly to everyone in that special David "Archie" way. I couldn't get a decent photo with my camera, as per usual. But here's a video clip I took of him signing books for fans:

But anyway, once it was my turn to approach the slightly elevated platform on which he and the table sat, I kept my cool quite easily, just smiled and said "Hi David." I think he asked me how my "evening" was going, and I also asked "How are you?" and he said something or other, I don't really remember because David Archie was sitting right there in front me and I was probably staring creepily at him. He signed my copy of his book (including my name of course--how awesome is that, right?) then I congratulated him and thanked him, and then it was somebody else's turn in probably less than sixty seconds. That was pretty much it. I got to see Archie face-to-face and get his autograph in his new book. Living in Manhattan really does have it perks. I mean, do you think he would do a booksigning back in freaking Tucson, Arizona? Now, I've had face-to-face encounters with two of my favorite American Idols! How lucky am I? Here's a snapshot of my signed book: