Fabulous frenzy at The Fort

Concert review: Fire and Ice

Publicized as the double bill to end all double bills, the Rihanna/Chris Brown MTV-produced concert proved that recording stars as young these two (Chris is 19, and Rihanna is a year older), could still pack them in, making some 60,000 of the most devoted R&B and pop fans troop to a dusty field and wait patiently, with nary a Monobloc or wooden chair in sight. And before you scoff at that last sentence, realize that with the crowd already assembled in the main middle portion of the field by as early as 7 p.m., and the concert ending a little after 11 p.m., that would mean a good number of people gamely stood for over four hours. An earlier conversation with producer Francis Lumen revealed that cognizant of the youth of these performers and their audience, it was imperative that he find a way to keep the ticket prices down and this would best be managed by eliminating the seats and max-ing on the people who could watch the show. A dicey gamble for me when it would come to those forking out the highest prices for the front section, but as it turned out, the gamble worked and the crowd was united in having a great time under the stars — although leaving The Fort after the concert was another matter.

“Under the stars” and with the stars as well, as quite a number of our showbiz personalities made it to this concert — Bea Alonzo with Shaina Magdayao, Vhong Navarro and Desiree del Valle, John Estrada and Priscilla Meirelles, Karylle with Chynna Ortaleza (who even got up on the stage with others in the audience to dance for a few minutes with Chris), Tim Yap, Anne Curtis, Raymond Gutierrez, Paolo Contis, John Lloyd Cruz, Diana Zubiri, Rachel Alejandro, JM Rodriguez, Rachelle Ann Go and Gab Valenciano, these were just some of the faces one could pick out in the crowd.

Rihanna is more the established star, with an enviable and impressive string of hits for someone so young; and so it was no surprise that Chris opened. It’s been said that outside the studio, when on the stage, Chris’ singing becomes a little suspect but that he more than makes up for that with his dancing. This certainly turned out to be true, and if nimble footwork and what seemed like a warm and open personality are things to get you across to a live crowd, Chris certainly had these in spades and charmed everyone. With two CDs under his belt, I have to confess that the songs I really know him by are With You, Kiss Kiss and Forever — and these three songs won’t make for an hour’s worth of live performing. But true to form, Chris found a way to leave those songs for the end of his set and yet, have us in the palm of his hand throughout the hour. There was a cracking medley of Michael Jackson songs to make us older ones not feel completely like fish out of water; and to my surprise, he even brought out his duet with Jordin Sparks, No Air. There definitely was a fiery quality to this first half of the night, and I know that my son, Matteo, was sad to see him go, entranced as he was by some of the steps and moves.

After a good 20 minutes of rearranging the stage set-up, Rihanna dramatically announced her presence with her most current hit, Disturbia. As with Chris, there was some heady interplay between the live performer and the images flashed on the split screen stretched across the stage’s backdrop. One after another, all her dance hits, whether straight out pop or reggae/dancehall influenced, (like SOS, Pon de Replay and Shut Up and Drive) bounced off the speakers, and clad in sexy decolletage, Rihanna was constantly on the move. Acknowledging that some of her best hits are mid-tempo songs and ballads, the middle of her set, had her sitting on the steps with two acoustic guitarists and her two back up singers — cue in Hate That I Love You, Unfaithful and Take A Bow.

And of course, we just had to bring her back to finally hear Umbrella — the twist being that Chris joined her for her encore, neatly improvising on the chorus, with his plaintive request that she be his Cinderella, ella, ella. While she would try and egg the crowd every so often, Rihanna was more of the “Ice Maiden,” and it was good to have Chris come back and add that little spark for the night’s end.