Lunedì 15 Lug 2013, 20:06

Thu 11 Jul – The Moonshine Jungle Tour

Finally. After weeks of watching performances from the Moonshine Jungle tour on Youtube, I finally got to see Bruno Mars and his band perform live and in person on July 11. Let me say, there is no comparing watching the performances on Youtube and seeing it live in person. Absolutely no comparison. The show lives up to all the hype and then some and Bruno is even more electrifying and amazing live in person. And although I pretty much knew how the show would go from watching the performances on Youtube, it didn’t spoil the concert for me—it was just as fresh and exciting as watching the whole show for the first time.

I really don’t know more I can say that’s already been said in other reviews posted here of the show. Bottom line, Bruno and the band put on an amazing and incredible show. The showmanship that he and the band displayed is top-notch, and there isnt anybody out there right now doing what they do. As other reviews have stated, there are a mixture of ages, from the very young to the very old, and it was no different at the show here in Michigan. I saw young kids, tweens, teens, young adults, middle-agers and elderly folks. And from the sounds that I heard in the arena, EVERYONE had the time of their lives at the show! Even my 60 year old dad, who I dragged along and who isn’t a fan, really enjoyed himself and had to agree that Bruno and his band put on an “Excellent and amazing show” (his words).

Even though he isn’t a fan of Bruno, he really likes and appreciates good music—and he thoroughly enjoyed the music that Bruno and band performed. My dad said he was very impressed with the tightness of the band, how well choreographed and on point they all were. He especially liked the drummer (Bruno’s brother Eric) and the piano player (John Fossit).

Speaking of John, he performed this beautiful, elaborate piano solo as an intro to a very dramatic version of Grenade, which was one of the highlight performances of the evening imo. The horns really got showcased on that one and Bruno showed off his guitar playing skills. Another highlight of the evening was Bruno’s sizzling drum solo, which I always enjoyed watching on the Youtube clips but was 10x better seeing it live. He is fire on those drums! And my pops was really impressed and was like “Wow! He really played the mess outta those drums!”

Another standout performance of the night was the final song, Gorilla. Again, seeing it live is way more incredible than seeing in on Youtube. There is a certain palpable electrified energy that infiltrates the atmosphere and affects the entire arena from this performance. From the well timed explosions to Bruno’s gritty vocals and sweaty, passionate performance—he really feels this song and you can tell its his favorite song to perform and a lot of thought and planning went into making sure he closed out the night with a bang. And boy did he ever! Despite the song’s raunchy lyrics my dad really liked the Gorilla performance too-he enjoyed the explosions and pyrotechnics.

All in all, the show was fantastic, incredible, excellent, super polished & professional—REAL entertainment. A REAL live show put on by a super-talented REAL live performer and band. I dare anyone to go to this show and NOT have a good time, its impossible! My legs are still sore from all the jumping, dancing and going up and down the stairs from that night lol. We had really good seats—floor seats in the 6th row. We were seated in that last two chairs in the row that extended into the aisle which was cool. Other highlights for me personally was seeing Phredley, Bruno’s guitar player walk right past me and head backstage, and Bruno’s personal assistant Ryan Keomaka (sp?) standing about a couple feet away from me snapping pictures.

Speaking of pictures, unfortunately I have a pretty crappy camera phone so the pics I took do not do it any justice. I don’t have a smartphone with an amazing camera. :-(

I’m definitely glad I got the chance to go see his concert, and I highly recommend that people go see this concert if they have a chance. As a matter of fact I would love to go again and if I had the money, I would have gone to his show in Chicago.

Some comments I heard from the people around me during the concert:

This guy is the next Michael Jackson!
He’s the next Prince!
He’s so short but so powerful!
He’s so dreamy!
I want that trombone player! lol

Oh yeah, another cute moment that happened during the concert but not up on stage. When Bruno began singing Treasure, the guy sitting next to me got down on his knees and proposed to his girlfriend. He actually told me he was going to do that before the concert started and asked if I would take their picture, but he ended up having someone in the row behind us do it. It was a really sweet moment and I’m sure Bruno would’ve been delighted to know that a couple got engaged during one of his songs at his concert.

-review by Buelah P. Bathwater