Just to be sure…

Having missed seeing Adam when he came to Singapore in March due to poor judgment/planning (I already planned a trip way back sometime late last year to go Hong Kong during my birthday with a friend), I didn’t put much thought about going to the F1 this year even though I knew long ago that Adam was 1 of the main lineups. Partly because I had just gone through a big ordeal over the past 3 months, I was just glad for some sanity for now. But luckily my friend, Terra, kinda pushed me to go for it together with her so I thought what the hell and didn’t think twice about forking out the money for it.

I wasn’t even particularly excited about it due to trying to settle my own issues these past few weeks until she called me 2 days before saying that she won tickets to the meet and greet for Daughtry and Adam and asked me along that got me really pumped up about the whole day. So anyway, we got to Swissotel and met up with the Sony person who presented us with the VIP wrist tags and prizes.

The meeting with Daughtry was really rushed, it was like 2 seconds for each member where we shook their hands and took a group photo. I was wearing my killer queen T-shirt which I thought was cool but it only struck me as being kinda brilliant when I heard Chris starting to sing Killer Queen when I walked into the room. So some free tunes from Chris. It was a little awkward for our group since most of us weren’t fans and didn’t know the band well. I guess I’m possibly the only 1 who knew Daughtry well since I really loved Chris since his AI days and went for their showcase at St James when they first came to Singapore a few years back, but I’m embarrassed to say that I haven’t gotten any of their albums before even though I know all their songs.

Meeting with Adam was however a different story. I really could feel so excited and nervous at the same time while waiting for the Sony person to bring us in. When he did finally arrive, I was just astounded. Since I was first in line, he told me that he liked my shirt and asked me what my name was. I was really shocked by how friendly and nice he was. And how gorgeous his eyes were The session was still quick but we had more time with him since he made a point to talk to everyone there and get to know each of us a little better. And of course we all got a hug from him

Since Terra wasn’t able to find any buyers for the 2 extra F1 passes she had won and was willing to sell off at a huge discount, I called up Yihua, who became 1 of my good friends that I still keep in touch with from secondary school due to all the idol discussions that we had for so many years. I knew that he wanted to go but couldn’t because the tickets were a little too steep for him. So he popped by, all decked up in his Adam T-shirt that he got when he went for the finale show last year in LA.

Anyway we rushed to see Daughtry after having some food and were running like mad once we heard the music starting when we reached the F1 grounds. Their set was amazing, covering all my favourite songs like It’s not over, Over you, No surprises, Ghost of me, September (I think they also did Crash but I can’t remember =X ) and ending off with Home. I really enjoyed singing along and my voice was really hoarse after the short 45 minute set. My only complaint was that they did not do What about now. And I finally knew who was who in the band since I met them earlier in the morning haha.

After that we sat around with the group of girls that Terra knew from Twitter, just chatting around with each other. Yihua was game enough to get some eye makeover from Pam and many girls took photos of the whole process.

Just absolute fun hanging around with like minded people, few of us were just sitting there and talking about our musical interests and what our first concerts were. At about 10pm the gates to the fan area opened and it was a crazy rush! I really never expected things to be so crazy, I just remembered hearing some commotion in front and people started standing up. 1 guy in our group started calling his friends, saying, ‘Come back NOWWWWWWW!!!!!’ And the queue started moving in quite fast, all of us were raising up our hands with the wristbands so that security could easily check and let people through and once we got through, we ran like mad to the nearest spot to the stage. Space around me started filling up with people and it got uncomfortable. Like really uncomfortable. It was really warm and squeezy, I was sure that I would faint or wet my pants since there was no way I could go to the toilet now. I remember whining really badly to Terra, I’m so grateful that she didn’t slap me silly for being such a whiny ass bitch. She even helped to fan me when a lady started squeezing in front of me leaving me no space to fan myself. I kept thinking to myself that I’m never going to get through the next 1.5hours of waiting for him to start and even contemplated on leaving halfway of his concert if I felt like fainting from all the stuffiness. I also kept thinking maybe I was just too old for all this fandom.

But all was worth it once he came blasting out with Voodoo and Down the Rabbit Hole in his purple jacket and top hat. I still have DTRH ringing in my ears: it’s basically imprinted in my mind now. I did give out an urgh face to Terra when he started singing Ring of Fire as it was my least favourite song from his AI run. The image of the fiery screensaver background when he sang it during AI comes to my mind whenever I hear him sing it. Sorry! Fever was great. I really loved how well Adam could move/dance, never compromising on his vocals and I thought his kiss with Tommy was really sweet Sleepwalker was probably my favourite song out of the entire set as he really did some cool improvisations on the melody which I thought sounded so good. Next he moved on to the acoustic part of the concert with Whataya Want From Me, Soaked and Aftermath. I remembered very clearly that the people around me were really stunned by Soaked. Everyone just stood rooted to their positions and staring at him. I don’t particularly remember a lot of people taking videos or pictures but just hanging on to every word that he sang and being in awe. That was a great moment of the concert for me as well because the silence in the audience was just deafening and you just get to listen to his flawless voice. Then Adam went for a change of costumes while the band entertained us with the Erotica Interlude. He then continued on with Sure Fire Winners, Strut and Music Again. Everyone was feeling very high already but then he got on to what he called the entire message he wanted to bring across, which was LOVE with If I Had You. I really started to relate to the lyrics very well:

But if I had you, that would be the only thing I’d ever need
Yeah if I had you, then money fame and fortune never could compete
If I had you, life would be a party it’d be ecstasy

It all made sense to me that you just need to be with your loved ones and nothing else would match up to that. It brought the song to a whole new level to me. He took the time also during the song to introduce his band and dancers. The crowd was going wild shouting for more after he left the stage and I guess after about 5 minutes of our chanting he came out again with an encore of Mad World, an arrangement which I have not heard before so I couldn’t say that I really liked it very much as compared the chilling version he did on AI. But I guess it was suitable since it’d be so weird if he really did the chilling version as an encore. Anyway he said his goodbyes and that was it. Everyone was feeling great after the show. I was so glad that I survived the entire concert without fainting or leaving halfway. I had really forgotten about all the uncomfy-ness before the concert and it was all worth it. Yihua was feeling really crazy, singing along to the songs. He even asked me, ‘Are you thinking what I’m thinking B1?’ To which I replied, ‘I think I am, B2! I think you’re CRAZY!’ hahaha. We got ourselves some drinks after that before parting to go home or, in Yihua’s case, clubbing. I was going through the photos I took with Terra on the way home and also checking out Twitter, realising that I had so many new followers.

I finally got home at 3am but only got to sleep like 1 hour later as I was just feeling so high about the concert and my photos, I felt like I finally took some decent concert photos as compared to my other attempts in previous concerts. I woke up giddy at around 7+am and scanned through my photos but most were still quite blur or maybe I’m just super critical considering the super clear ones that I’ve seen online. But it was great fun trying to capture the moment myself Here are some of the best ones. The bearable ones are on my facebook.

I absolutely adore this photo that Yihua’s friend, Wei Long took.

It’s the defining photo that got me all fan girly about Tommy. I felt like a total n00b from all the related stuff that people have been tweeting for me to see. I finally understood what all this twitter craziness was all about when I started following more people who gave constant updates on photos/videos of Adam and Tommy. Had I caught on the craze last year I think I would have made full use of the time when they came to Singapore and maybe go to the other legs of the international tour with other friends. But well, I guess I was too caught up with my own issues and it’s not possible to actually go for any of them now since I just started on my new job and am not a spontaneous last minute kinda person.

The last few days got me wanting more out of this entire experience by looking up all the related media and following up on the upcoming concerts. I’ve also kind of decided that I’d probably make my vacations more worthwhile by planning them properly such that I get to go to concerts as well. I don’t know how feasible it is for me to make a resolution to go to an Adam concert every year but I’m really trying to work towards that.