So last night, I was at the Beyoncé Concert down at the Staples Center in Los Angeles. Don't act so shocked. There were a lot of people there. The place holds 18,000 and it was packed to capacity. I can testify to that: All 18,000 people were ahead of me in the parking lanes trying to leave…and they all came in individual cars. I thought by the time I got off the property, the Sparks would have clinched the 2014 season.
Not only were there 18,000 people there but I'd be very surprised if fewer than around 17,900 of them didn't have the time of their lives — a remarkable achievement given what the tickets cost. I was in a real good seat with a face value of $260 on it…but a lot of those get snatched up by scalper-type resellers. I just looked at one of those sites and as of yesterday afternoon, asking price in my section was over $1000. That's for one ticket.
Now, obviously, some tickets don't sell at that price but if there are folks out there asking a grand, you've got to figure a lot of tix are getting snatched up for $500 or $600. For those amounts — even for $260 which, by the way, I didn't pay — you've gotta be one hell of an entertainer. Beyoncé is sure good at pleasing Beyoncé fans. One of the most enjoyable things about the evening was being among so many people who were so deliriously happy. (I was not among the theoretical 100 who might not have loved every minute of it. Honestly, I didn't see anyone who wasn't thrilled to be there. I'm just assuming that in a crowd of that size, there must have been someone.)
How I came to attend a Beyoncé Concert is a long, boring tale that I'll spare you. Just know that it wasn't my idea…but then a lot of things I wind up enjoying aren't my idea.
For some inexplicable reason, the ticket said the show started at 8 PM. It didn't. Depending on your definition, it either started some time before 7:45 PM or it started at 9:12.
At 7:45 when we made our way to our seats, a singer named Luke James was on stage performing to a hall of people making their ways to their seats or standing room locations. I felt a bit sorry for Mr. James up there. He's obviously a man of great talent and while about a third of the audience loved the hell out of what he was doing up there, most audiences have minimal interest these days in opening acts. Doesn't matter who they are or what they do. If it had been the other way around — if Beyoncé had been opening for him — people would have been ignoring her and eagerly discussing what Luke James might be singing — or, more importantly, wearing.
Anyway, Mr. James called to mind the description of Spinal Tap as "one of England's loudest bands." If your window was open last night and you reside in the Pacific or Mountain time zones, perhaps you heard him.
For a brief moment there, I was worried I was in for a rather painful evening. He was so loud and the seats, though pricey, were designed on the assumption that everyone who came to see a Lakers game in this building would be about the height and width of Billy Crystal. Narrow seats…no leg room…and just to make sure anyone over about 5'8" was uncomfortable, they welded large plastic cup holders to the back of the seats ahead of me, precisely where my kneecaps could otherwise have been. Fortunately, the decibels were a bit more tolerable for Beyoncé…and the official, arena-wide position to watch her section of the evening turned out to be standing. And screaming.
James left the stage around 8:20 and we then had nearly an hour of…waiting, I guess you'd call it but in a way, it was part of the show. They ran commercials and videos on the big screens…and every time Beyoncé popped up in one, everyone in the building who wasn't me would scream as loud as they could. Behind me there was a girl who was maybe fifteen who screamed and screamed and screamed and who's probably going to sound like Harvey Fierstein for the rest of her life. Looked a little like him, too. I had the feeling her mother had said to her, "Okay — you can go to the Beyoncé Concert but don't let me catch you coming home with any voice left!" People also screamed any time there was any evidence of the show being set up…like when we saw technicians climbing up long rope ladders to the rafters or when a huge curtain with the Beyoncé insignia was unfurled.
I kept thinking: These people are having a great time just Waiting for Beyoncé. They could leave now and feel they got their money's worth. Folks were up and dancing to the recorded music that was being played — mostly but not exclusively Beyoncé — and cheering and singing. I enjoyed it though I felt I was in a kind of sound cocoon. From the moment we entered the Staples Center to the moment we left, I literally could not make out one word being said to me by anyone who was not on the stage. (And not even all of them. I read today that she dedicated a couple of songs to Paul Walker. I'm sure she did but I was right there straining to make out what she said and I missed it.)
But I'm getting ahead of myself. At 9:11, lights dimmed and everyone cheered and shrieked as loudly as humanly possible. Then a minute later, the Beyoncé part of the evening commenced and they somehow got louder. Videos played. Lights strobed. Her dancers danced. And when it looked like she was about to make her entrance, 18,000 cameraphones were whipped out and trained on that stage. At first, it was only 17,999 but I realized it was expected so I pulled mine out. Because I hit the wrong button, I got a nice selfie of my eye.
And then…she performed: Beyoncé and her back-up dancers and her all-female band. If you grade a performer on how well he or she pleases the people who paid admission, you have to give her an A-triple-plus. I couldn't see if they were up and dancing and rocking in the cheaper seats — nor could I imagine how the people in them could see much of anything — but where we were, audience members were in ecstasy. And me? I liked it a lot. I was distracted by the noise and by the need to stand in order to see anything — my right knee is still healing from surgery and now my left knee's making sounds like it'll be needing it — and right in the middle of it all, I received a text message with some sad news about a long-ago acquaintance. But I still loved being there.
Here's a brief video someone in the audience shot from stage left. If this person had moved their camera up about two inches, you could have seen where we were sitting stage right. And you could have spotted me because I was the only one there not dancing. (It's not that I wasn't moved by the music. It's just that, you know, I figure I look dumb enough not dancing…)
No, it's not a show for everyone…and no, I was not the oldest person there. Not even close. But the crowd got exactly what it expected and what it wanted…and boy, the show was well-produced with ultra-rehearsed choreography, expertly-timed special effects…and somewhere in there, she even sang about sixteen bars of the theme song from The Jeffersons.
What I'm writing here will shock one friend of mine. When I mentioned on Facebook and Twitter that I was at a Beyoncé Concert, he e-mailed me to say, "Can't wait to read how you tear it apart." Sorry, Roger. I'll knock the chairs and the amplification and if I'd paid the admission fee, I might have more to say about that. But Beyoncé has not become the kind of superstar who can pack the Staples Center at those prices by being a hyped-up fraud. She's the real deal. It takes talent to make that many people that happy.