Written by Jamie Ortega
Photos by Ed Clinton Go
Right before Avril hit the stage, heartthrob Rez Toledo, more popularly known as Somedaydream, delighted the audience with his songs including the hit tune Hey Daydreamer.
Making sure no time was lost, Avril kicked off the show by performing the song Black Star- the tune which her tour was named after. The punk rock princess followed up her opening salvo with one of her recent hits, the cheeky What The Hell, which set the tone for the entire, incredibly pumped up evening.
Clad in a loose black sleeveless top and black boots with her signature long blond hair, pink streak and gobs of eyeliner, Lavigne looked like she stepped out of one of her music videos and right into the hearts of her fans. The rock goddess’ first words of the night to her Pinoy fans were “Whats Up Manila!” and “We're so happy to be bringing the Black Star Tour here in Manila. Are you ready to go crazy?" As expected her greeting was met with wild cheers, screams and whistles.
Other concerts often make the mistake of having too many old songs or too many new ones -disorienting the audience who may want to hear a good balance of both- fortunately, that wasn’t the case in this concert. Avril sung some of her old songs like Sk8r Boi, He Wasn’t, and I Always Get What I Want from her second album, Let Go. Even if it was Avril’s third trip to the Philippines, there’s no denying how popular Avril is among her Filipino fans. A crowd completely filled to the rafters is proof of this. Compared to other arists Avril had minimal connection with the audience, which could be disappointing to some of her fans who wanted to communicate with her live. Although it could be argued that people come to see their musicians perform their favorite songs live in a concert and not see them jabber on.
The crowd banging heard throughout the evening dissipated a bit when Avril performed some of her more sentimental pieces like “Alice," "When You're Gone," and "I Wish You Were Here.” The screams and applause was replaced by another sound, that of the audience happily singing along. It’s a huge compliment when the audience chimes in with the artist’s songs and that’s what happened when Avril performed the gut wrenching Wish You Were Here. The crowd merrily sung along uttering the line - Damn, damn, damn, I wish you were, here, here, here! (nearly pitch perfect, I might add. Well, this is Manila and almost everyone can sing well).
After a medley of mellow tunes, Avril ended the evening with her breakthrough hit Complicated. Introducing her last song she said, “"This song is a very special song from my first single. It's called,'Complicated.” As the final note ended she waved goodbye, blew kisses to the audience and bowed to the crowd. Before anyone could comment that Avril gave a very common final greeting, in true Avril fashion the rakista performed a cartwheel before running off the stage.
Congratulations to Wilbros Live, Glen Llamas and Winston Llamas for a very successful concert.
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