I feel like I just got out of a bad relationship...

My uncle had tickets for a NAS and Lauryn Hill concert in a VIP section that he suddenly could not attend. He messaged my sister and she gladly accepted the tickets on our behalf. She called me from work and told me that we were having a date night Thursday and I was beyond excited.

Let me make this clear, I love Lauryn Hill. She was in Sister Act 2, one of my all time favourite musical movies. I get chills watching that video above. All over my body. My mom always listened to her when we were growing up. I also have a friend who often tweets quotes from her music and it always amazes me how intricate her lyrics are. I love her music! But her concert last night did not leave me with that "YES! I LOVE THIS ARTIST!" feeling that I usually have after concerts. And now I'm going to tell you why...

The concert was held at the Molson Amphitheatre, which I liked when I saw The Killers there, but I just need to say, there is no parking even remotely close. We payed 20 dollars for parking at Ontario Place (the home of the amphitheatre). Elise and I were pulling up to the pay station and we were thinking it would be 5-15 dollars. Which we had! Not 20... We shrugged it off though, we were excited for Lauryn Hill. We even discussed which songs we'd like to hear on our way to the amphitheatre.

When we got there, NAS was on stage... Until last night, I had never even heard of him. He was... interesting. Elise and I bobbed along for a little bit and then gave up and sat down. This was probably at 9:30pm. NAS rapped up his act and left the stage. (Ha, excuse the pun.) He left at approximately 9:45pm... Now, my understanding of concerts is that the point of having an opening act is so that your audience is pumped and ready for your show. This being said... I don't understand why Lauryn Hill would even HAVE an opening act if she was only going to show up to the building itself at 10:55pm. That's right. Elise and I waited over an hour in silence, twiddling our thumbs, waiting for Lauryn Hill. It was 11pm, Elise had work in the morning and we didn't want to leave without seeing the person we had come for...

Finally, at about 11:10pm, Lauryn Hill walked out onto the stage. The crowd went wild. We were all excited for her to finally be there. Elise and I had agreed that if it was good, we would stay for the whole show. If not, we would leave at 11:30pm. I have never even thought about leaving a concert early... And I honestly didn't want to leave. I had been hyping up this concert in my mind for days. I knew that if we had just waited over an hour to see her show, Lauryn Hill knowing this, would perform her absolute best.

Oh my gosh. Was I ever wrong.

Her music was more than double the recorded speed. (Recorded at roughly 95bpm, performed at roughly 175bpm.) Her rapping was difficult to understand and the beats got lost in the acoustics of the amphitheatre. I had a really hard time connecting with her. She just seemed so... off. She kept making big arm motions at her band to start and stop at different places. Didn't you go over this in rehearsals? Or did you show up and hour and a half late to those too? Then she kept yelling at tech to turn the lights down. I can sort of understand that, the lights at my high school were hot and we all know, those are not the cream of the crop.

I couldn't help but think the whole time that she was just another celebrity who does not care about anyone but herself. The snobby, snooty artists who know that the entire evening revolves around them. The ones who go into stores and say things like "Do you know who I am? I am Lauryn Hill. BOW BEFORE ME, MERE MORTALS!" Then I tried to make excuses for her. Maybe the lights were really hot. Maybe she was having a really rough day and she just didn't want to go to work. Maybe she left the stage to go get a glass of water because she was so hot. Maybe she'll come back in like 30 seconds.

That's right. She left the stage. After performing 4 songs. FOUR. SONGS. Elise and I looked at each other and left. I felt like I had been used and cheated. I wanted a refund and I didn't even pay for my tickets! This is when I started feeling like I just got out of a bad relationship. I started saying things to Elise like I could never do that to someone, as a human being. I don't know why I stayed for so long. I feel so used and dirty. I still tried to understand why she did this to me. Made me wait an hour and a half to see her and then left after 30 minutes. I decided in my mind that she had really had a bad day and that normally, her concerts were not like this.

I got home, listened to some country music and went to bed. (Had this been a good concert, I would have listened to Lauryn Hill...)

This morning, Lauryn Hill was a trending topic on twitter... I read some of the tweets. I read some articles. And I am so glad we left when we did. Elise told me that apparently she did the same thing at her Detroit concert. Except that they had to wait THREE HOURS before she came on stage. Her friends at work told her that apparently it's normal for an R&B concert to be left waiting... While rock artists know better than to disappoint their fan base. *cough*

The article that stood out to me most today was the one that said this:

Anyone who was unlucky enough to be in the audience on Thursday didn’t just see a bad concert. They watched one of the most influential female artists of her generation vomit all over her legacy.

That she did....

Have you ever had a bad experience at a concert?

My Favourite Painter

Last night when I got home from work, I laid in bed. Like I always do, and went on stumble upon. This is one of my favourite websites. Why? A) Because it's freaking hilarious and the source of MANY funny friday posts. B) Because I find beautiful photography that is so inspiring - I am a closet photography nerd. C) Because I am bored easily. 

I found this last night and I think I have watched it approximately 20 trillion times. Ball park.

Since I've moved to Ottawa, I have noticed the sky so much more. Maybe it's because it's not in the city and there's really nothing to look at on the ground. Maybe it's because I'm working at the top of towers where I can actually look as far as the eye can see. Usually, it'll be trees, trees and more trees and then this beautiful sky. It amazes me every day. I wish I had a camera everywhere I went because the sky is just so beautiful.

Without further adieu, the video that amazes me.

God must be a painter, because he uses so many colours. - Quoted from A Beautiful Mind.

35. Sing a solo

Completed: April 8, 2010
Unlike all of my other goals, this one actually went as I imagined. Although, it was much less planned out than I expected. I thought I would have weeks and weeks of practicing and rehearsing to get the song perfected. My accompanist would put time aside to practice with me before the big performance. But instead, my young women's leader messaged me a few weeks prior and asked me to sing at the Relief Society dinner the day after I got home from my week long trip to Utah with my dad... With my list in mind, I agreed. She asked me to sing the song Be Strong. 


I love this song. We sang it as a group at youth conference one year and I've loved it ever since. It also helped that one of my friends sang the song too, that ended up in the video in the link posted above. The talented Miss Noelle, now attending BYU. I almost exploded into tears when I watched the video for the first time and saw her in it. 

I was obviously very excited to sing this song, a song that I love, to people I love, about a gospel I love! Perfect. I went to Utah with my dad for the week, and didn't practice the song once. I got home, and probably sang the song at every possible moment. I did not want to have my voice fail me in front of all of these women in my ward. 


I got to the dinner and suddenly felt extremely nervous. My palms were sweaty, my heart was racing and whenever I stood up too quickly, I felt really dizzy. I hadn't practiced the song yet with the accompanist, but luckily she pulled me aside for a few minutes and we got to run through it once. I was still nervous. Before I knew it, it was time.

It wasn't even on a stage, it was a podium. I had the sheet music and words sitting in front of me. I sang the song and it went really well, until I thought of how much this song means to me... And I started crying. Needless to say, my singing was not as good as I had intended. But I managed to pull myself together in 5 seconds, and finish the song. I felt extremely embarrassed by the fact that I couldn't sing a 3 minute song without crying and that I had pretty much 100% messed up my solo. But the next week at church, I got a note from the Relief Society Presidency.

I felt so much better about my performance after reading this card. I really feel like this was one of my smoother tasks, even though I pulled a "Bee" and cried... Sigh, I am such a daddy's girl.