Wonder World Tour

On Monday, November 16, 2009, Miley Cyrus' Wonder World Tour made a stop at Indianapolis' Conseco Fieldhouse.

As Miley's #3 fan, I bought tickets the moment they went on sale this past summer.
The tickets were listed in three price ranges, and we bought the mid-grade ones.
Sadly, they were more towards the low end of that range...

This was a paperless ticket concert.
In order to gain entry, one had to provide photo ID along with the card used to make the purchase.
It apparently worked as a scalper deterent, as there were still tickets availiable the day of the show.

Doors opened at 5, amd the show started at 7.
Not sure when we left for the show, but traffic was crazy once we hit downtown Indy.
And in my opinion, $10 for parking is insane.

It was a crisp night, and we made our way to the venue.
You could feel the excitment in the air.

There were several side enterances, which I'm sure helped with crowd control and lines.
We may have received an odd look upon admission due to our lack of children. Whatever.

Amazingly, we were given directions to our seats from the door.
I'm not sure how complicated of floor plan a fieldhouse has, but giving everyone directions seems like a tough job.

First thing I noticed was an arrow pointing towards Hardee's.
Yes, there was a Hardee's inside the building. Sweet!

But we wanted to find our seats first, so the Happy Star would have to wait.

Normally, I would buy a T-shirt, but at $35 I would have to do without.


In the halls:

While I went to find a certain Happy Star, Dalyn stood in line to try and win better seats.
Not sure who planned this, but they had had big screens that everyone could see while you typed in your personal information: Name, address, etc...
And a very bored photographer waiting for a winner.
They also had a few manaquins modeling Miley's latest fashions.
Since little kids kept tugging on the clothes, one of the manaquins was showing off a breast. (No, I don't have a picture for you.)

Between there and the Hardees was a photo shoot.
You could get your picture taken and have a digital image of Miley added into the shot.
And then of course printed out for you to keep. Oddly free. (No picture here, either.)

Our seats:

We sat stage right up in the balcony.
Despite the height of our seets, they were pretty good since we were right next to the stage.
I started off taking pictures and soon gave up. I don't have a zoom.

The opening act:

Metro Station. I'd actually heard of them before the concert. I'd even heard one of their songs.
Normally that would be saying a lot for the random band that you're forced to sit through to get to the real act, but the lead singer of Metro Station is Trace Cyrus, Miley's older brother.
So everyone already knew who he was.

Now I'm not quite sure what type of audience Metro Station is used to, but Trace is covered with tatooes.
Covered.
And while I'm pretty sure the band itself is all male, they had these two female dancers that went a little overboard.
Towards the end of their show, Trace had managed to become topless. The girls were going wild.
I think he shaves his pits.


Miley time!:


The roadies eventually got everything torn down and set up.

There were big screens set up around the stage.
I knew that Miley had a habit of rising up out of the stage, and so I was watching the various trapdoors.

***

The crowd:

I'm going to take a break and talk about the crowd.

Over all, the crowd was great.
They sang, they screamed, they provided camera flashes.
But the people next to us, and behind us, were kinda lame.

When I saw Green Day, we stood the entire time. We jumped, we swayed, we didn't sit.

Despite attempts from Trace and Mily to get people out of their seats, our section remained seated.
Oh, I tried to stand. But standing while the people behind you are sitting is rude. Standing while the people next to are sitting is akward.

So I sat through most of the show.
(Oh, and the people on our row got up and down way too many times.)
***

Back to Miss Miley:

The openin song was "Breakout", the title track from her first non-Hannah Montana album.
The big screens featured Earth's temperature dropping and an ice age coming about.

A big glacier rose out of the floor and Miley appeared.
On the word "breakout", she heated up the room and melted the ice.

The roller coaster had begun.


Songs:

As this was a Miley show, and not a Hannah show, there weren't many songs to choose from compared to a more established performer.
She only has two albumbs out, and this last one wasn't a full album, just an EP.
So she sang almost every one of her songs.
The big displays did a good job of showing relevant images.
And of course, I sang along to them all.

Theatrics:

I've been to a number of concerts: Green Day, Transsiberian Orchestra, Ozzfest, The Monkeys, The Go-Go's, Belinda Carlisle, and Savvy & Mandy to name a few.

I've never seen a show like this.

There were lights, and flames, confetti, the afore mentioned screens.

Miley flew over the audience not once, but twice. The second time was in a motorcycle!
She flew over the crowd on a motorcycle!


She asended through trap doors more times than I could count.
She even drove a car.


There was a lot going on.
Plus the dancing and the backup dancers.

She even brought some local cheerleaders up at one point to say thank you for whatever charitable things they had been doing.

It was non-stop.

Until it ended.
9:00 and the show was over.

Or not.

Encore.

The show went on for another 45 minutes or so.
And it somehow managed to get bigger.

Wow.

Wardrobe:

Miley apparently enjoys wardrobe changes.

I tried to watch as much of the stage as I could, which meant I wasn't really watching those big screens.
Plus we weren't right up on the stage.
While the choice in clothes seemed slightly off for such a young audience, I wasn't too bothered.

...until I saw some pics.

O_O

I had no idea what she had been wearing. Or not wearing.
Not cool, Miley. Not cool.
I've been defending Miley for a while now.
I'm not sure what type of audience she's aiming for, but the audience she has started with Hannah Montana.
The little girls that watch Disney Channel were probably expecting a wholesome Hannah concert.
Hannah's clothes are modest.
She wears pants.
I don't think that Miley wore many outfits that went past her knee (and when they did, they were split way up the side).

No wonder my wife was so offended.

The shock comes mostly from the fact that she's a role model to so many girls.
I hope the parents that were there had a talk with their daughters.

Miley seems to be rebelling against her Disney image. Her first album was "Breakout" afterall.
But she's dragging her fans with her.


While I'm still a fan, still love the music, I'm going to have to keep an eye on who she's turning into, what I'm supporting.

Can someone support two different fan bases? Can Miley the actress appeal to little kids while Miley the singer appeals to older generations?

I guess we'll see.

Images courtesty of here, here, here, and here (and of course, my Prē)

Typed on my Palm Prē

Y'all've been asking for my opinion, so here it is.

So all y'all watched the Teen Choice Awards the other day, right?

Don't worry, I didn't either. But boy did I hear about them!

Mostly, I heard that Miley Cyrus performed a pole dance and stripped. I also heard people calling her not-so-nice names.

I was slowly exposed to everyone's opinions.

The people I follow on Twitter were defending Miley (in fact, #WeLoveYouMiley was one of the most popular topics on Twitter for TWO DAYS STRAIGHT!).

My wife said something about needing to wear more clothes.

A Nurse I talk to said her 30+ year-old husband enjoyed it. She thought it was alright.

I happened to come across a recording on YouTube. By "happen to come across", I mean that a friend tweet™ed a link.

And?

Sweet niblets like to complain!

Really? Isn't that what one expects from a female performer at an awards show?

She sang, she danced, she performed. I think dancing and performing are actually the same thing in this case.

Now, before anyone starts panicking (like my wife...), let me move on.

While that's the type of dance I would expect from say... Brittany Spears, that doesn't make it right.

This isn't just any awards ceremony, it the Teen Choice Awards. For teens. People 13-19 or so. Probably younger. Not so much the 19 year-olds.

And it's someone else's show. When invited to perform at an event, you should try to err on the side of caution. You're representing them too.

If it's your concert, you can do whatever you want. It's YOURS. An awards show, or a Super Bowl half-time show, is not the place to try something new.

• Stripping

She stripped? Okay, at the very beginning she took off a boa? a scarf? a something. She removed one article of superfluous clothing. I wouldn't call that stripping.

It's like taking off a jacket.

Although, I will admit that she was more modest before that thing came off.

• The pole.

Even if she just touched the pole with her finger, people would have freaked.

In our society, if you're dancing, and you have a pole, you're pole dancing and a stripper. Period.

The pole is considered a sex symbol of sorts. It comes with its own luggage.

There is no way to tastefully pull off a dance with a pole.

That being said, she wasn't pole dancing. Besides that one little dip, she basically just stood there. But that one little dip is why mothers across America are in an uproar.

But don't just blame her. You don't manage to get on national TV and perform on stage on your own.

This would have taken months of practice and planning and approval. Tons of people would have been involved in selecting, creating, training, and approving the dance.

Not only that, but it had a TWENTY-FOUR HOUR delay. After the half-time show problem years ago, NBC has added a five second delay to all live broadcasts. This show had an entire day.

If the show's producers had a problem with it, they had plenty of time to just cut it out.

Miley's dad didn't have a problem with it either:

“You know what? I just think that Miley loves entertaining people. She loves singing [and] songwriting. I always tell her to love what you’re doing and stay focused for the love of the art and not worry so much about opinion. I give my kids a lot of freedom to make the art they wanna make, and make it in their own voice. I think it’s important.”

The Disney Channel however, said this:

“Disney Channel won’t be commenting on that performance, although parents can rest assured that all content presented on the Disney Channel is age-appropriate for our audience — kids 6-14 — and consistent with what our brand values are.”

Well then.

So no, I don't think that a pole should have been anywhere near that stage. And yes, I feel like that skirt should've been longer, and yes, I feel like she shouldn't be showing off her bra straps.

But if you're going to yell at someone, yell at a bunch of someones. A whole lot of people (I'm going to assume that they're adults. Maybe even "corporate males") would have had several opportunities to keep the dance we saw go out on national TV. Yell at them.