This Is Spinal Tap

What? You want more than that? Really, I think it pretty well sums up the evening.  You remember, that scene near the end where Spinal Tap is playing in the theme park that bears a striking resemblance to  Seven Flags Great Adventure? Right there you’ve captured it.

Sigh. But you want details, don’t you? The bloody, ugly details.

Olympic Stadium, all lit up! We've never seen it that way before! It was really lovely.

Here’s the Wiki background, for those of you who may need a little primer: The Backstreet Boys are a Grammy-nominated American vocal group. The group has charted 12 U.S. Top 40 hits on the Billboard Hot 100, and sold over 100 million albums worldwide, the best selling boy band of all time, and World's Biggest Money Makers (Concerts and Album Sales) 1997-2005: #1 ($533.1 million). After returning to the music scene in 2005, their sound changed dramatically, incorporating only live instruments (some of which they play themselves) and a more guitar and piano driven pop rock sound. (1)

And now, our impressions. We arrived about an hour early and passed by the (sole) vendor outside, who was selling glow sticks. In hind sight, I was kind of sorry that I didn’t buy one, as most other people seemed to have them. Luckily, I did have my cell phone, which, interestingly enough, functioned quite well as a quasi-glow stick. We stopped at the snack stand to pick up some munchies, and settled into our very expensive, far away from the stage seats. We were early, and watched the stadium slowly fill around us.

The guy who was going to be selling the CDs of the event outside the auditorium at the end of the evening was setting up his equipment a few seats over. You might wonder how I know this, but let me tell you, acts of piracy transcend language barriers. Such is life in China.

Food vendor #1!

Food vendor #2!

And he was so not alone. Forgive me, it has been a few years since I have been to a concert (think, Huey Lewis and the News and, um, Phil Collins, so, maybe like a few decades), but not only did every single person the auditorium have a camera and use it, but at least 75% of the people present were video taping! I am not sure who the CD burning pirate was planning to sell to, since basically everyone there was already leaving with their own personalized copy of the evening’s entertainment.

The venue was smallish, and it did not fill exactly to capacity. Believe it or not, the BSB’s as they are affectionately known here are really quite popular. The scarcity of folk we think was related more to the rather high ticket prices. Jeff and I had a hearty debate on this topic when we got home, over the actual cost of the band coming to Nanjing, and whether they would have done better to lower prices and fill the stadium or if they covered costs with the high individual seat prices. Or if maybe they should have hung it up about a dozen years ago and invested wisely, rather than touring into their senior years.

The venue. Filling slowly. You can just see me in the lower right corner. Hi, Mom!

Okay, totally not fair, as they are clearly way farther away from Social Security than my aged self, however, I do not try to stand on stage and sing and dance for a living. They were a highly successful band in their day. Fifteen years ago. Today, they were a little creaky. They are basically guys who did well because (a) they were cute (b) they could sing a little, but not actually play any musical instruments and (c) they were cute. Fifteen years later, they are less cute. And while we originally placed bets as to whether or not the whole thing would be lip synced, it clearly was not. Which, given the italicized clarity, you may well imagine it might have been better if they had lip synced, if you catch my drift there.

So, the lights went down, the music went UP (to the point where I could seriously feel my spleen vibrating) and the Boy’s Rocked On! The audience, a few jaded westerners like ourselves aside, really loved it. There were very few people who didn’t know every single word to every single song, and they belted 'em out like they were standing on the stage themselves. And given the proclivity of Karaoke as China’s National Past-time, it is likely that they had, maybe even the night before. And, I will confess, I really, really got a  kick out of the whole thing.

Not a great photo, but you get the idea with the glowsticks. And video cameras. About half of the dots are glowsticks. The other half are recording the event for posterity.

The good news for my children is that that moment when Nick, or AJ, or Brian, or whoever, yelled, “Put your hands together Nanjing!” and I leaped up and not only put my hands together but attempted to wriggle my bum in a manner quite unbecoming to both me and my bum, was that it seemed as though no video cameras were pointing in my general direction.  Although check out Youtube in about twenty minutes and let me know if you catch a glimpse of me. I’m the one waving the cell phone.

And then, a truly golden moment. AJ or Nick or Brian, whoever, started rattling off the list of BSB CDs, asking the audience if they had them. Jeff and I listened wide-eyed. Did the Boys seriously have no idea that, YES, every single member of the audience owned 100% of all BSB CDs ever released? Plus some that had never been released? And every single copy was pirated?? Was it possible that the Boys truly did not realize that they have made not one penny from any human in China, ever, until this very night? (3) Which was a little shocking. But maybe not quite as shocking as the moment when Nick, or AJ, or maybe Brian, or, whoever, shouted out to the crowd, “We love you, China! God bless you Nanjing!” Really, I wonder if he, whichever one it was, meant it ironically? Or maybe hopefully? Or, maybe he didn’t realize that most of the audience, while they can sing the songs in English, don’t actually speak any English? Whatever, it was a surreal nadir in an overall quite surreal evening.

The show slowly ground on to its inevitable conclusion, which if you know anything about the Backstreet Boys (and I truly, sincerely hope you do not), means their penultimate hit, “Everybody!” (aka “Backstreet's Back!”)  Which in some ways, is kind of poignant, and meaningful and maybe even prescient. I mean, all the way back in 1997 when the song came out, they were talking about coming back. It’s more than ten years later, and, dang it, here they are! Kind of. In a backwater back kind of way.  Just to generate the earworm you have been waiting for, here are the lyrics:

Everybody, Rock your body
Everybody, Rock your body right
Backstreet's Back alright

Oh my god we’re back again
Brothers, sisters, everybody sing
Gonna bring the flava, Gonna show you how
Gotta qustion for ya, Better answer now

Am I original?  Yeah
Am I the only one? Yeah
Am I sexual? Yeah
Am I everything ya need?
You better rock your body now

Now throw your hands up in the air
Wave them around like you just don't care
If you wanna party let me hear you yell
Cuz we got it goin' on again

So everybody everywhere
Don't be afraid, Don't have no fear
I'm gonna tell the world, Make you understand
As long as there be music, We'll be comin' back again (3)

It was a heady moment, with the entire crowd rocking their bodies and their glow sticks, and the Boys giving it everything they could sweatily muster. It was impressive.  I rocked along as well as my aging self could muster, waving my cell phone glowstick stand-in wildly. Amazing what those little gizmos can do when pushed to the wall. But, all good things must come to an end, and with Backstreet’s Back already behind us, the Boys left the stage and the inevitable chants of “Encore, encore!” (accompanied by more cell phones waving in the air – there did not appear to be a single lighter present) began. What on earth could they possibly do for an encore after that rousing rendition of their best known song??

After an appropriate amount of time, with the momentum building, they did indeed return. The crowd went wild with the trilling of the first notes, although truthfully, I’m not exactly sure what it was. Whatever, we got one more song out of them before they split for parts unknown. They left the stage, the lights went on, and the CD pirates bolted out the door first. However, they were met by none other than the photo pirates, who had already been to Kodak and printed out photos of the Boys and the audience that were taken just before the show started and had a table set up for selling! You have got to hand it to the ingenuity of people for whom there are no copyright laws.

We walked home, bathed in the glow of Olympic Stadium all lit up at night. It was beautiful. For a few moments, anyway. Seconds after we crossed through the gate to the street, the lights in the entire stadium went out. It was a little weird, but, hey, energy costs money, right?

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(1) Which I find totally fascinating – there was some playing going on, including one really loud drum solo and something that really looked like Air Guitar with a Real Guitar. But I can state unequivocally that the Boys should not be quitting their day jobs.

(2) I think technically they have played in China before, so you may have me on that one.

(3) Please note, do these lyrics make any sense to you? Me neither. It has been like that all week as we listen to BSB 24/7 in Jackie’s car. I can’t make head or tails of most of what they are singing. It’s not that I can’t understand what words they are singing, it’s just that the words I am hearing all strung together don’t make much sense in my head. Exhibit A would be the lyrics above.

Comments

[Jennifer]

You and your aged self, and your doddering husband, and your undoubtedly senile friends, rock! Hey, live music is live music! Party on with your bad ol' self.

[Debbie]

Hmmmmm....just curious Ellen, is that you in the jeans and black jacket at BOTH food vendors??? I'm just taking a guess here, but I think the reason you did not buy a glow stick was because it was not edible!

Glad you and Jeff 'rocked on' at the BSB concert. Remind me to tell you about how much fun I had when I saw N'Sync!! :)

[Rodneyssaga.wordpress.com]

The last time I went to Rocky Horror, everyone held up their cell phone during "There's a light." Not a candle in the place. I felt old.