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Christina Aguilera Shines
May 2, 2007

It isn’t often that a contemporary music artist comes to Raleigh, North Carolina. To be sure, we have our fair share of concerts but they are usually performed by old-timers like Chicago, Huey Lewis, Billy Joel and the like. Not that I’m knocking the old-timers. They all performed superbly. It would be nice though to see someone under the age of 50 shaking their badonkadonks on stage for a change.

That’s why I looked forward for months to the Christina Aguilera concert. Imagine; Christina coming to Raleigh. Miracles do happen. This miracle was all the more astounding because I suspected she was bringing along The Pussycat Dolls to open the show. Ticketmaster didn’t mention the Dolls, but I’d heard things.

Why my fascination with The Pussycat Dolls? Having (repeatedly) watched all of their music videos (including their live tour performance) I wasn’t convinced they really exist. Sorry, but who can believe five women singing that good, looking that good and moving that good could occupy the same space on the same stage at the same time? That would undoubtedly create a critical mass of estrogen that would explode with cataclysmic devastation surpassing a high-yield nuclear bomb.

The Pussycat Dolls have to be some kind of advanced CGI animation from Dreamworks or Pixar. I just wanted to see how they intended to fool us with a live performance. Disney doesn’t make animatronics “that” good.

After months of excited anticipation, Sondra and I ended up at the RBC Center in Raleigh. For once we even arrived early and beat most of the traffic. Armed with warm, fresh pretzels and drinks, we sat down in our cramped stadium seats to watch the concert.

A group called Danity Kane began the show with a talent contest. Apparently there was no winner. Five energetic young women ran all over the stage for what appeared to be their first day of cheerleading practice, all the while screeching several songs I never heard before (and hope I never hear again). I was thankful when they sang their last song “Showstopping,” which actually did stop the entire concert for about 15 minutes.

During the intermission I couldn’t suppress a horrible thought that the Pussycat Dolls had called in sick and Danity Kane was a last-minute replacement. Or maybe as originally suspected, The Pussycat Dolls aren’t real and the show producers had decided not to try fooling us with a contrived live performance. It seemed to take forever for the next part of the show to start. I was expecting Christina, but when the curtain went up, there they were.

Honest. Six very live, vivacious, beautiful and sexy Pussycat Dolls, just like in the videos. Singing and dancing for real. Ladies and gentlemen, The Pussycat Dolls are real. I’ve seen them. My CGI theory is down the drain. But there may be something to my explosive estrogen theory.

Sporadically during The Pussycat Dolls performance there were blinding flashes of white light from the stage whenever the Dolls got too close together and started throwing down moves. I’m not making this up. The flashes were so bright everyone on the stage would fade out momentarily. Luckily there wasn’t any permanent optic nerve damage although I did have trouble reading direction signs on the way back to the hotel after the concert.

We’re lucky they didn’t all come together for a group hug or something like that. It would have been the end of us all. How could anyone follow The Pussycat Dolls? I was beginning to think Christina had made a tactical mistake. You can’t watch Christina after you’ve been blinded by The Pussycat Dolls. At least, that’s what I thought.

After another agonizingly long intermission the music started up, the curtain rose, the background videos came on and Christina appeared at the center of a spectacular mosaic of light, dancers, musicians and costuming.

This was no concert. This was a two-hour extravaganza with Las Vegas, Broadway, Paris, and Hollywood seamlessly woven together with Christina’s incredible voice in a two-hour orgasm of audiovisual teasing, foreplay and fulfillment. I’ve been to the Moulon Rouge. I’ve seen the shows at Las Vegas, Tahoe, and Reno. I’ve attended a lot of concerts in my life and many of them have knocked my socks off. But this; this was . . . absolutely the best.

From the first time I saw a live performance video of Christina, I predicted she would eclipse any female performer before her. Christina sings so effortlessly with such unerring pitch and precision there is only one way she can possibly move for the forseeable future, and that is “up.” This is pure, raw talent and I suspect we’ve only witnessed the proverbial tip of the iceberg thus far. I think 30 years from know I’ll still be saying “I was right about Christina,” because she will still be there proving me right.

Thank you Jamie King, for choreographing and directing Christina’s concert. Thank you Roberto Cavalli, for the costume design. Kudos to the dancers, musicians and background singers. I have never seen such a successful collaboration of vision, talent and presentation. This one would be difficult for even Christina to top. But I hope I can be there for her next concert tour, when I’m sure she will.

To the girl who sat behind me at the concert and screamed “I love you Christina” several times in my ear, I only want to say; “She was 100 meters away you little groupie and she couldn’t hear you. I’m glad you lost your voice. The Pussycat Dolls took out my vision and you managed to take out my hearing.” But somehow it was all worth it, for Christina.

Thanks Christina, for coming to Raleigh. You outshine them all.