Tuesday night was an incredible night, a night with Justin Timberlake at The O2. Of course, having paid no less than £70 for a ticket (way up at the top), I knew it would be amazing and it wasn't a drop short of what I expected. An absolute masterclass in musicality and showmanship, the man was on stage for over two hours drawing tune after tune from his unbelievably high quality archive. He didn't miss a single song that I could have wished to see.
But as I say, none of this was a surprise. In fact, I've watched countless times his recent live sets, from the epic medley on Jimmy Fallon's show to the iTunes Festival in London to, of course, that VMA performance. I've seen all that and I knew what JT and The Tennessee Kids can do. But over the course of Tuesday's concert — incidentally the final leg of the European tour — I was just blown away by the whole crew's production. Yes, Justin's vocals were good, the instrumentalists, the chemistry, the dance moves, they were all superbly on point, obviously, but it was their musical ability and nous to arrange the whole thing, I think, that stood out most. To know exactly what role each song, each segment, each note of the song plays, as cogs of the bigger machine (for want of a better metaphor), and to be able to identify them and enhance them how they did was just amazing. I'm talking about the breakdowns, the timings, the shifts and the story. Utterly perfect. And I genuinely believe he is unrivalled as an artist today to have such sense, as well as talent. Which, for me, made every penny worth spending.
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