Girl at the Rock Shows

There were a million shows happening on Friday night, and each one was one I wanted to be at. Honestly, the show I ended up at was not even on my radar until just a couple of days before, but when a best friend tells you they are bringing their newborn to his first concert, you drop everything, and you go with. I would have loved to be in a sweaty moshpit somewhere listening to angsty music that spoke to my soul, but instead, I found myself at Crooners Supper Club watching people play through “power ballads.” Don’t laugh, and please don’t judge (okay, you can judge a little). It wasn’t my standard setting nor my regular music but I am so glad that I spent my Friday night watching a performance full of cheese next to my best friends while watching baby Kieran enjoy his first live concert.

Before I get into this review, I need to admit something. I wasn’t going to write about the show at all and have Friday night be one of those nights out with some good friends rather than wearing my critic hat all night, but I just couldn’t resist. It’s pretty crazy how I can’t just go to a show nowadays. I am constantly thinking of things that I could write about and taking notes. Friday night was no different, and although I was there to enjoy the evening, I feel like this show deserves some press because, well, just keep reading.

Friday night’s show was a performance from Power Balladz. Power Balladz is a group of people that pay homage to the power ballads of the 80’s. The group not only plays the iconic songs of the 80s, but they do it with a whole performance that comes complete with comedy sketches, costumes, and games. It’s genuinely a cheese platter served with a side of cheese wiz, but that’s the point of this show. Power Balladz is one of those shows that wants to make you smile, laugh, and forget all your worries, and I have to give them props; they did all those things for me.

This is a show for people who want to relive their youth but in a more refined setting. Okay, maybe that’s a bit of a stretch, but hearing songs by Bon Jovi and Aerosmith at Crooners- a jazz club where I consistently feel like the youngest one there and where I am typically entirely out of my comfort zone- just felt a bit funny to me. Don’t get me wrong, I loved it. I loved watching people get classic dinner plates served to them while also singing along and headbanging to the iconic tracks being performed. It was a contrast in more ways than one, and it added a sense of quirkiness to an already quirky show.

From moments where one of the vocalists would add homemade reverb to some of the skits between tracks by just echoing the last word said by another member to the occasional appearance of the “freakin’ t-shirt cannon”, there was indeed cheese oozing out of every moment of this show. There were plenty of times when all I could think to do was to roll my eyes but then I realized that this cheese is what really makes this show fun. One of my favorite cheesy parts was when the guitarist (who is actually a buddy I went to college with) moved to the front of the stage to do a wicked guitar solo. I saw two other band members creeping through the seated audience with water bottles in their hands. I couldn’t quite figure out what they were doing but as they approached the guitarist, they started spraying the water into the fan below him giving the solo a very dramatic visual with wind and water and, well, you just had to be there but this definitely got a giant belly laugh out of me.

Beyond the shtick is the music of Power Balladz and, all jokes aside, the members of this band are talented beyond belief. From the powerful vocals to the dizzying guitar solos and the ripping keys, pounding drums, sure, Power Balladz’s performance will make you laugh but the talent in this group is no laughing matter. Although I loved laughing along to the jokes and quirkiness of this show, there were many moments where I found myself just completely captivated by the performers. The amount of talent didn’t surprise as I know a couple of members of this group from college and know just how good they are but I think just seeing so many people with so much talent on one stage be able to turn on and off the cheese and quirkiness in the blink of an eye to give a flawless performance of a timeless song was just truly amazing.

I could have been at a million different shows on Friday night, but I chose to go to one that was, in all respects, at the bottom of the totem pole for me. From the music to the venue, it just wasn’t my top choice, but I’m beyond glad I went. There’s something special about watching friends from college playing live while you’re splitting your time between taking notes on their performance (because you’ve made music reviewing into a bit of a career) and checking in on your best friend from college and her newborn. We all may have taken different paths in life after we split off from college, but there’s a reason why we were all in the same room on Friday night and, beyond the cheese of the show and the laughs it provided, that was my favorite part of Friday night.

Line Up:

Power Balladz

Venue: Crooners Supper Club

Smell-O-Meter: The delicious food of Crooners

Average Age of the Crowd: 55

Crowd Surfers- None

Stage Divers- None

Mosh-ability- 0 out of 10

Amount of Beer Spilled On Me While Walking Around- 0

Broken Bones- None Noticed

Spotted Flying Through The Air- T-shirts from the ‘freakin’ t-shirt cannon’

Fights- None Witnessed

Pukers- 0

Passed Out People- 0

Idiots Taken Out By Security – 0

How Irritated I Was With The Audience – 0 out of 10

How Many Times I’ve Seen These Bands Before (or at least how many times I can remember)-

Power Balladz – 0

Celebrity Sightings – None

Overall Score – 9 out of 10

Show on Deck —Briston Maroney / Phoebe Go // Wolves of Glendale / Tia Hannes

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