Amy J. Bennett

Extraordinary Faith for Everyday Life

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Recap of Winter Jam 2009 – Charlotte

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We were able to figure out the kids being juggled between our parents (thanks, ya’ll!) and were happy to be off at 4 yesterday for the concert.  Toby Mac was the headline artist and I’ve been a fan of his since the early 90s during his DC Talk days.  I thought I’d never seen him but I remembered going to a concert at a church in Charlotte sometime when I was in high school I think.  I definitely hadn’t seen him since he went solo.

By the time we got there, the doors were already open although we heard a few of our college students had been there since 1:30 and had 4th row seats.  The youth group had to go to the upper deck to sit together.  Scott and I and another couple in the youth group moved to be more centered on the stage.  A few minutes in our seats, and the college students text us and say they have 4 open spots.  Yippee!

The only downside was that we only had our zoom lens assuming we’d be far away so all of our pictures are REALLY close up.  From 4th row, I couldn’t get any wide shots at all.  No complaining…just sayin.

So here’s the line-up.

Pure NRG.  These kiddos were helping to promote PreciousGirlsClub.com, a web site for girls…Emma was already signed up there.  Their performance was….well organized yet….peppy.  I didn’t even upload a picture of them I just realized.

Stephanie Smith.  She was cute as a button (see tutu) and definitely has a big voice.  She sang a prayer type song mid-way through the concert and it was amazing. We were still up in the upper deck at this point and I took a picture from the megatron thingy.

Francesca Battistelli. I didn’t get to hear her because I went and ate. Friggin’ $17 for chicken, small fries and a drink. Rip-off. I did hear a lot how pretty she was when I got back. Sorry, that’s all I got. LOL

NewSong sang some great worship songs. I’ve seen them several times in concert. I still love that Nate Sallie is singing with them. I love him! They also sang Arise, My Love and man, that song gets you every time.

Hawk Nelson came out and I have seen them a time or two before as well. Every Little Thing is still my favorite of theirs. They are really fun on stage.

Brandon Heath came out and WOW I was really impressed with him. If you listen to Christian music you might recognize a few of his songs..”I’m Not Who I Was” and “Give Me Your Eyes”. They played a video during that one and it was very thought-provoking.

Finally Toby Mac and his band Diverse City came out and WOW. They did not stop from beginning to end. I may as well and get this out of the way and say Toby looked OLD. And if not old, VERY tired. I wanted to tell him to drink some water and go to bed. See?

Turns out he’s 44. Man, does that make ME feel old?! But he’s still cute as a button when he smiles.

The show was a ton of fun.

And Toby ended it well by jumping it to the crowd at the end. Scott caught him mid air.

Overall a very good concert.  Toby Mac was definitely the star of the show and made the night.

I’ve uploaded all my videos although I haven’t labeled them all.

If you’d like to see all the (very upclose) pictures we took, have at it.

On Classical Music

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I can remember being in the back of my parents car when I was younger and my dad putting on classical music.  Seems like I remember some eye rolling and a “Daaaad!”  Classical music was not cool.  Even with my six years of piano lessons, I did not appreciate listening to it.  As I’ve gotten older, I’ve learned to appreciate non-Top 40 music more.  I think the road to classical music started with Kenny G back in high school.  I really can’t recall how that started but I do remember one of my dates pre-Scott, no less being a Kenny G concert.  Not classical I realize but you know, no one was singing.

Then there was Enya in my early twenties (looking back, I think I can blame that one on The Titanic).  Still not classical but intoxicating all the same.  Then I moved to Folk/Celtic with Loreena McKennitt a few years back on a recommendation from a coworker.  And then Twilight came along in the last few months and I fell head over heels in love with Clair de Lune, something I had heard a lot of times but it really made me want to melt every single time I heard it.

So…I went looking for some classical stuff in my iTunes library and found lots of songs from a friend’s music collection he had let me copy.  And now…I’m listening to Beethoven.  And while I’ve heard his stuff so many times, all the sudden, I think it’s sexy.  Which I’m very sure is a sure sign I’m getting old.  In any case, it turns out he wrote this as a love song.  Who knew?  Maybe everybody besides me. So if you’re into Classical stuff, what should I try out?

Grammy Awards Reaction

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I didn’t watch every single second but I thought there were a few moments worthy of mention.

  • First and foremost, Amy Winehouse can sing, but the girl did the potty dance her whole performance.  Watch it again with that in mind and it will provide several minutes of funny. *Update…I think she no longer had to pee when she won.  That was one awkward acceptance speech.  Wow.
  • Carrie Underwood rocks.  Her voice was amazing tonight, especially at the end.
  • Kanye West’s mama song moved me but boy, that man is whiny.  Anyone notice the complaint about the music coming on during his acceptance speech?
  • I have a new appreciation for Bebe Winans.  He is effortless wonderful.
  • Rihanna’s choreography and dancers were awesome.
  • Very sad Daughtry didn’t win 🙁

Winterjam 2008

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Up until about two hours before the concert, I wasn’t going to go last night.  I just had so much to do and I was going to be gone for at least 6 hours and I hadn’t seen the girls very much.  But then my nephew wanted to go and we figure out a way I could drop the kids off at choir and meet the youth group up there instead of spending time going on the church bus and then riding the light rail up there.  And I figured  Scott could pick the girls up and spend the last hour or two before bedtime with them since he had been working all weekend.

The place was absolutely packed.  Bobcats arena can hold 20K or so I suppose and it was full all the way to the parts where you couldn’t see the stage up at the top.  Thankfully two of our youth had gotten there FOUR hours early and had seats saved for us on the floor.   

When we walked in I heard Group 1 Crew playing and I was certain they must have been playing their CD while everyone waited. NO!  The one group I was intent on seeing went on before 6 when I was told the concert started so we completely missed them.  We DID see Mandisa, Skillet, NewSong, BarlowGirl, Connersvine and MercyMe.

Just a short recap of each:

Mandisa – She is every ounce of wonderful she was on American Idol and ten times more.  That girl can SANG.  Honestly, I wasn’t that impressed with her songs on the radio but hearing some of them live just gave them a whole new meaning.  She sings with heart and meaning and it was wonderful.

Skillet – I don’t consider myself a rocker by any means but Skillet was AWESOME.  I was jumping, head banging (ok, only for a few seconds) and singing with the rest of them.  Yes, I was acting like a teenybopper last night.  But they were really good.  I’m figuring out rock bands are so much better live than they ever could be recorded.  It just doesn’t do it justice.

NewSong – They started out with Little Drummerboy and although the drums at the end were really, really cool I just thought it was weird they played a Christmas song.  We stepped out to eat at this point since I saw NewSong twice last year but they are a fabulous group and I love Nate Sallie.

BarlowGirl – Honestly, I’ve never been a huge fan of BarlowGirl and while they are very talented, I wasn’t jumping for joy over them.  They were ok.  It’s just after you see Skillet, it’s hard to compare the live show.

Connersvine – This is a duo and a guy from The Colts are in this group.  He wasn’t there yesterday because they were playing a sort-of important game.  Only one of them sang and I’ll just say I’d like to say I’d like to see them singing together before I make any judgment.

MercyMe – OK, honestly I was going to leave during MercyMe.  I know, I know they are a fabulous band but they are just so less exciting in person than some of the others and really, haven’t we all heard MercyMe played to death on the radio?  But after each song, I’d say, let me just see what they’re playing next and every time, it was a great song I didn’t want to miss.  I thought I couldn’t hear I Can Only Imagine one more time but it turned into the best praise song of the night.  And the lead singer was totally soaking it in.  He sat there with a smile and the microphone out to the audience obviously loving it 20,000 people were singing the words.  And I don’t mean to say he was being prideful, he seemed humbled by it.  They put on a great show and really, they have had a TON of radio hits that were great to sing along with since we HAVE heard them a hundred times over.

Without further ado, here are some pictures.  I stupidly left my dad’s lens at his house Saturday night instead of keeping it so the quality of the pictures are not nearly what they could have been.

Skillet:

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MercyMe:

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Mandisa:

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BarlowGirl:

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Julian Drive Concert

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The concert turned out great last night.  We had about 300 people turn out.  There were several that responded at the end, one that I personally got to lead to Christ.  A great night indeed.

If you’ve never heard of the band, they sing Hoobastank’s song The Reason so that should give you an idea.  Check them out on myspace.

They were all very nice as we ate lunch with them, help them set up (well, many of us watched them set up), perform and then meet and greet with the people afterwards.   

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I Heart Chris Daughtry!

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If you haven’t been reading long you may not know my addiction to love of Chris Daughtry.  It literally started when I first saw him on American Idol.  Read this post and see.  Don’t you love how I picked the top 5 from the very beginning?  I digress.  I saw him in concert back in the spring and loved it.

But tonight was awesome.

Heather and I dropped the girls off at MIL’s since Scott is working tonight. We stopped in at Ruby Tuesday’s and split their New Orleans fish and Sirloin.  Yum.  Started the night right.  I was really worried about parking and lines on nearby roads because their known to back up.  Apparently this wasn’t causing too much of a raucous because there were no lines and when we got in the parking lot, we were literally a few parking spots away from being right at the building.  We walked right in and found our seats 30 minutes early.  The place was almost packed.  Heather had heard it was not sold out and indeed no one sat in the two seats at the end of our row to our right.

The concert opened with two acts.  One was You Are, I Am.  They were ok.  Next up was an AWESOME Canadian band called The Midway State.  I think they may be better in person but they were so cool to listen to.  Very sweet lyrics to their rock songs.  The lead singer/piano player Nathan has this huge afro but the boy can play and sing.  I highly recommend you check them out.

So on to my camera story.  The tickets said no cameras but come on.  Most places let you get away with it.  There were these ladies standing in the aisles helping people to their seats.  The one near us looked like a mean school teacher according to Heather.  I agreed.  I was scared to take my camera out.  So I waited until the lights went out.  I took a few (Heather’s says lots) pictures with my flash and this woman almost comes running at me with her flashlight and says, "You can not take any more pictures or you will be thrown out!"  Yikes, yes, ma’am.  And then I see the same woman actually go tell a girl to put her cell phone up and she can not take any pictures.  It was awful.  As you can see below though, I eventually snuck the camera out with no flash and took some pictures.

So as for Chris’s performance, the Greensboro concert paled in comparison.  Obviously the sound and lighting was better because we were inside.  But it was extra good because the place he played at was pretty small.  And we were on row V so it wasn’t too far back.  He basically sang his entire album plus did some Motley Crue, John Lennon and other covers.  They were really cool.  He also sang a song he just wrote in Australia.  It was a ballad. We had a hard time understanding what he was saying but he sounded good. 

I just love that Chris’s voice is so real.  What you hear on the album is what you get in person.  If not better.  He also tries to switch up a few places and make it sound a little better and it sounds cool.  The crowd was screaming the whole time. We were on our feet the whole time.  And then at the end Heather says, "I think he just said to come down front."  I basically threw my camera on my purse, left everything and pushed Heather out the aisle to run down.  I was then within four feet or so of the stage.  At the end he shook the crowd’s hands.  I tried so hard to get close enough but I was about a foot short of getting to him.  Heather apparently was a bit sneakier because she kept moving down the stage with him, threw herself over the crowd and got to shake his hand!!  Lucky girl.

But that was basically it.  He went off-stage after that never to return.  My throat hurts from screaming and our choir cantata is in the morning.  Tonight was awesome.  Now enjoy the few pictures I got.  Also check my flickr account soon.  I’ll put some I took out there too.

Oh, and be sure to scope out the drummer in the pictures :).

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Blake Lewis Audio Day Dream

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image OK, here’s a for some reason very detailed yet spastic review of Blake Lewis’s Audio Day Dream.

Break Anotha – I wasn’t overly impressed with Break Anotha when I heard the sneak peek of his album.  I think he picked the wrong first single.
Gots to Get Her – This is taken from the melody of Puttin on the Ritz.  Very, very catchy.  Totally see it on the radio.  Would be awesome live.  Perfect for working out.  Makes you want to dance.  Might be one of my favorites on the CD.
Know my Name – great beat, sounds like he stole some Justin Timberlake moves in this song.  it’s decent but i don’t see any big  hits out of this one.  
How many words – don’t like so much beatboxing in the beginning but i like the rest of the song
Surrender – Pretty piano in here.  OK, not memorable
Hate 2 Love Her -  could see Maroon 5 or even maybe JT doing this one.  nice falsetto in the chorus.  i like the lyrics.
Without You – nice love song reminded me of the love songs in the late 80s.  one of the better ones i could hear on radio, maybe even on  adult contemporary stations
Here’s My Hello -  lyrics are weak ( "how can i get you and swallow you whole")  except for the hook line "here’s my hello, don’t say goodbye" and it’s pretty repetitive.  the bridge is the best part of it.  i like that raw, less techno sound of him
What’cha Got 2 Lose – I think this song must have been a song Prince or Michael Jackson turned away.  sounds a lot like them but not overly impressed.  it sounds TOO techno/80ish or something
She’s Makin’ Me Lose It – Again, there’s that Prince sound (WOW, i just read on his site it was inspired by Prince, aren’t I smart?). lots of synthesizer sounds.  too much for me again.
Bshorty Grabs Mic! – could have left this off.  Maybe cool to hear in person but just unimpressive on a track.
End of the World – love this song.  felt like he was actually singing.  good beat.  great lyrics.  good backup vocals.  one of my favorites.
1000 miles – another Maroon 5 type sound i think.  the vocals are good and the lyrics are sweet but there’s something missing from this one.  the hook isn’t strong enough or something.  i’m afraid this one is not memorable enough.
I Got U – pretty good, very melodic.  not enough excitement i guess.
I Choose Noise (Outro) – cool i guess but he could have left that off, usually skip it
Human – sounds like a boy band song, didn’t really like it.  i keep expecting 5 boys dressed in white suits to come out and do a dance.  surely not what blake intended for his album.

Complaints

  1. Vocals were a little choppy in some parts.
  2. Felt like some parts were overly done as far as synthesized/beatboxing
  3. Repetitive, especially at the end of songs.
  4. The beatboxing transitions between songs are kind of cool in between songs the first time through then it’s just a little annoying and I skip them.
  5. I really wish he would have channeled more rock music.  "You give love a bad name" was such a hit I thought it would lean towards that a little more.

General Comments

  1. Very 80-ish, techno inspired.  I think of George Michael, Prince, Michael Jackson, Maroon 5 and Justin Timberlake
  2. I’m surprised I liked his ballads so much but they were some of my favorites.
  3. Blake is definitely unique.  You can tell he knows what he wants and went for it.  I’m not sure how much it will stick with a general pop radio audience.
  4. For American Idol fans, it’s going to be worth your time to listen to it all the way through to see what the real Blake sound is like but I doubt the general population will want to buy the entire album.  I expect some singles to do well though.

My favorites:

Gots to Get Her
End of the World
Without You