HOLLYWOOD BOWL
This past Saturday I went to the Hollywood Bowl to enjoy a country concert with my sister and mom (for my mom's birthday!) and little did I know, I was walking right into my next blog post. It was a Brad Paisley concert, opened by Scotty McCreery and The Band Perry.
The Hollywood Bowl is this fantastic niche in Los Angeles that removes you from Los Angeles as it transforms for its audiences; whether the LA Philharmonic is preforming or Coldplay. On the particular evening I went to the Hollywood Bowl, it was transformed into a flannel wearing, cowboy hats and boots stomping drenched environment. The best part about the environment were the blurred lines between social differences; everyone was there to have a good time!
The LA Times actually wrote about the social differences present at this concert and how Paisley acknowledged them. There were gender differences, racial differences, political differences, age differences, and class differences (perhaps more but this is what I noticed). The LA Times criticized Paisley for having flip-flop perspectives regarding some of these topics. His song, "I'm Still a Guy" embodies masculinity, yet the LA Times points out Paisley is know to do the very things he teases about in his song for his beloved wife, like hold her purse while shopping at the mall. His song, "Welcome to the Future," inspired in part by President Obama's elections in 2008, addresses racial differences in a positive light because we have come so far in improving equality in America. He had a great line after a small tangent/rant, "I'm Brad Paisley and I approve this message" bringing all political parties together in this moment. In another great moment, when Paisley was preforming "Letter to Me," he crossed all age differences because of the nature of the song, and even crossed class differences. He disappeared as this song was about to start and reappeared in the Promenade 3 seating area which is towards the far back. He preformed this song here because he stated, going to concerts growing up in West Virginia, he had never gotten any closer than these seats.
http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/music/posts/la-et-ms-review-brad-paisley-hollywood-bowl-20121021,0,6855400.story
The concert was wrapped up with the irony of his song, "Celebrity," bringing everyone back to Los Angeles-- in particular, Hollywood, where appearances are everything and being famous is as deep as you get, leaving it with "Adios Reality!" where differences don't matter as long as you're on TV!
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