Anxiety said:

Oh now this shade is much better, it matches my Tangerine pvc pants.

Anxiety said:

They can get away with charging that inflated Price because they know that every crazed LA Prince fan will snap up the tickets in the hope that Prince will perform too.

at least they chose a semi-hip place to have the show, though the viper room probably hit its peak of coolness sometime around the early-to-mid '90s. does johnny depp still co-own it?

PurpleKnight said:

I'll never betray my Jedi ideals, you monster!

PurpleKnight said:

co-sign ( )

very interesting

shaomi said:

Good is a point of view, shaomi.

PurpleKnight said:

"Dentists r unable 2 ask a question which can b answered by yes or no"
Murphy'law.

hotwithyou said:

Yeah, it's on Sunset in Hollywood. I go there all the time. Went New Years Eve.

viper room only holds 250 people.. so its very limited in space also

so haven't we heard ANYTHING about the gig yet?!

softandwet said:

-----

Well, what can I say??

4 those few that were lucky to get in (Thanks 2 the Viper Room waiting 2 let Guest list people in 1st before Music Club members who had been waiting 5+ hours 2 get in) Tamar was everything you could ask for and more.

Wether it was new material like "Every Step of My Heart" or cover songs like Dawn Penn's "U don't Love Me (No No No)", Tamar, along with 2 twin back up singers whose names eascape me at the moment, the bassist named Josh, the funky female drummer throwing down wicked style, Cora, and a certain "old friend" Mr. Hayes in the tree house offstage playing the keys, and a certain guitar playing "partyman" from Minneapolis, lit the Viper Room on fire. (Tell me that was not a long sentence.)

Tamar in the front, each back up singer on the sides of her, the bassist Josh on top of an amp, the drummer Cora to the back and a man in a orange crush suit, black shirt and pimp rag ala Christopher Tracy in Under The Cherry Moon 2 the left.

For someone's 1st warm-up gig, it looked like nothing but a veteran act, who could sing, dance and have the crowd in the palm of her hand. Prince's guitar solo's were fierce. Yes, the Hohner was used along with the baby blue one.

They wore me out. I will write more tomorrow and I am sure the reviews will be overflowing soon and I will write a more indepth one tomorrow if need be.

Exit stage right...

P.S. All blame for those not getting in falls on the Viper Room, not Prince nor his staff. As soon they started noticing that guest list was getting in and the Music Club wasn't, they did get on them. The Viper Room was gonna have NPGMC members wait til all guest list people were admitted first, which was a list of over 200 for a place that holds 250.

Prince played? Shouldn't this move to the Prince forum?

jseven said:

thanks for the report -- I was gonna call u last night for status. wish i could have been there!

Just to add more about last night's show...

I got in line at 10pm. It was brutally cold (for LA anyway), with the wind whipping up something fierce. There was about 50 people in front of me. At about 10:30pm, the door man from the Viper Room came up, stopped about 10 people in front of me and said "I don't think the rest of you can get in." There were about 10 people behind me. They can't get a total of 70-80 people in? Ridiculous.

Anyway, I got on my cell phone and called a friend. She had a friend who had a friend who was on the guest list (he was a music exec for RCA, I think). She didn't know if she could get me in, but she would try. Meanwhile, the guest list people starting showing up after 11pm, walked to the front of line and got right in. Finally, at 11:40pm, with my head frozen solid, I saw my friend down at the guest list entrance. After a minute or two, she frantically waved me down. I walked in with the rest of the group and didn't even have to pay the $31.21 cover charge. I was thankful as hell, but I thought how unfair for all the real fans. But I guess if he made it available to the fans first, there would have been no room for the music execs, which was the whole reason for this gig.

My hope is that the Viper Room at least let the fans sit in the downstairs room and watch the concert on the in-house TV set and hear the music. Does anybody know this?

Anyway, they went on around 12:15am. Cora on drums, Joshua on bass, Mr Hayes on keys, Prince on guitar, Mya and Mandy(?) the twin backup singers and Tamar front and center. The first few songs were Tamar's original material. The music was good, but the lyrics felt a little teenybopperish. Then she started singing cover songs.

My memory is hazy, but here's what I can piece together. The "No, no, no" song, that song she sang on the NCAAP Image Awards, and some others. Then, to me, the show hit another level. The backup singers sat down, and Tamar wailed out a killer version of "When A Man Loves A Woman". She really showed her range on that one. Then they all got up for a rocking version of "Red Headed Step Child." The backup singers sang "What Have You Done For Me Lately?" which segued into a funky version of "Don't Stop Til You Get Enough" which then became an even funkier version of "Partyman" with the man finally taking over the mic.

Like I said, I'm missing some of the details, but it was a grat show. It felt like right when they started grooving, the show was over. They played for about an hour, and as Prince laid his guitar on the floor, he said "To be continued". Let's hope that it's continued at a bigger spot. Like say the House of Blues, so all the fans can get in.

JoeZeo said:

So it was a good performance -- that's what you're saying. I hope this is a sign of more to come. I understand Prince has grown and mellowed with age and all that. But I'm hoping he brings some serious jams with this next album. Sounds like taking Tamar under his wing is a step in the right direction.

Oh Come On.

There has 2 be more reviews.

I wannna know about the Bass Player's style, Prince's playing, the drummer's style...

Can we get a more, er... musical review?

Peace.

G.

Giovanni777 said:

Getwild's review posted 2 the quake.

Well, when I originally got the flyer in the email from NPGMC about the Tamar concert (pronounced TAYE-MEER), I knew that Prince had produced her new album and how that, with his production, the album should be funky. I also know that with him involved in the project, every show that she plays could be the last one, noting his history of getting disinterested with a protege and then scrapping their careers (a la Millennia, and countless others). It was because of this that I decided to see the show, and I'm glad I made the decision...

I got down to the Viper Room around 7:30, since the NPGMC flyer said doors were to open at 8. After standing in line for about 4 hours, they finally let us into the club (this was because the Viper Room wanted to honor their guest list, and had nothing to do with the NPGMC). In my 4 hour line wait (and there were about 50 people in front of me who had been waiting in line even longer, in the freezing Southern California cold ), people around me mentioned that they saw Prince earlier at the soundcheck and even heard Musicology through the doors and several other songs, which was a pretty good indicator that Prince would play at the show.

Once we got into the club, which was around midnight, the club was nearly full of people on the guestlist, and they cleared a space in front of the stage so that Prince's VIP list could come through (notably, Uncle Larry Graham and his wife, plus several people from the NPG Music Club). At 12:15, drummer Cora and bass player Josh (I think that's his name) took the stage, with Josh sitting on a speaker box playing the whole show sitting down due to the small size of the stage. Keyboard player (and former NPG member) Mr. Hayes played keys from the opposite corner of the club, since the stage was small and Tamar's 2 dancers/backup singers would need most of the stage for their act. Next on stage was 2 beautiful twin dancers (Prince mentioned their names but I didn't catch them), and Prince, wearing a suit similar to the one he wore on the Tonight Show, hair wrapped in a bandana a la the Diamonds and Pearls tour. And then came Tamar, whose voice was comparable to Chaka Khan
with an act similar to a funky version of Destiny's Child.

I didn't know much about Tamar before going to the show, other than she used to be known as Ashley Davis and had worked with Prince on some as-of-yet unreleased songs around 1996, but now I can say that this show rocked hard in a funky place! She was amazing, and the show was very enjoyable. Prince stood in the corner throughout most of the show, playing one of 2 rhythm guitars (the white one and the brown one), funking up the place. I didn't write down the setlist (particularly since I didn't know what the correct title names were), but her original songs were all funky, varying from funky-face-playing funk to oh-my-god funk! And judging by watching Prince's face through most of the show, I don't know if anyone in the club was enjoying themselves more than he was.

The first half hour of the set was her new stuff, with Prince playing guitar and singing background vocals. I looked around the club and some of the people were singing along to her songs, while most of the people who were probably from the VIP list sat still and didn't move at all. This didn't deter Prince, though, as he was making funky faces throughout the whole show, smiling and laughing, much more than I've seen him do lately, even leaning on the wall (showing off) making funky faces playing guitar.

During the show, they called some guy up from the audience and performed some song about a cheating guy a la Janet Jackson's "Rope Burn", where the dancers and Tamar circled the guy and got cat-calls from the audience. What made me laugh during this song was that Prince was singing the chorus, which went something like "I don't love that man no more"...

J7 from the Bump Squad mentioned the new song title "Every Step of My Heart" which was pretty funky, and another song which might have been called "Red-headed stepchild", one of the funkiest songs I've ever heard. That song began with Prince's guitar intro which reminded me of the intro to Sly Stone's "Sing a Simple Song" concluded with a 2 or 3-minute screaming guitar solo by Prince, at which time he threw his guitar down on the stage and I saw small pieces of the guitar break off.

What I do remember was that she played a couple of covers during the set: Dawn Penn's "You don't Love Me (No No No)" (as reported by J7), a redefined bluesy cover of Percy Sledge's "When a Man Loves a Woman," before going into the finale of the show...uber funky, completely different sounding versions of Michael Jackson's "Don't Stop till you get enough" with Prince singing the chorus, and a stripped-down, ultra-funky version of Janet Jackson's What Have You Done For Me Lately (sung by the two backup singers and Prince). And to end the show on a really high note (or a really funky one at least), Prince broke into an extremely funky version of Party Man. The song looked like it was dedicated to Larry Graham, who was directly in front of Prince, and Prince looked at him the whole time he sang it. The music to the song was completely different than the version of Partyman that
we all know, and he only sang the first verse. Prince also threw in the line "If the Music Makes you feel like dancin, say it's alright" from Graham's "It's Alright". After an extended jam on the song, the show was over. At the end of the jam, Prince and Tamar walked offstage to a club exit door and was gone.

Clocking in at just over 60 minutes, the show was one of the funkiest I've ever heard. When this album drops later this year, if this concert was any indication, pick it up!

Talking about the band, the drummer was really good. Though I am partial to John Blackwell, she was doing some mini-Blackwell drumstick twirls and she played the hell out of the drums. Plus she's better looking than Blackwell.

Spotted in the audience was the lead singer of the Pussycat Dolls (with the president of Universal Music).

Anyway, funky show...if she comes to your town, don't miss it!

Tune in next hit...

-Alan

jseven said:

Thank u so much jseven 4 your great review on the show. I had a chance 2 go at the last minute but was still recovering from the flu. Your indepth review had me excited so again thank u and all those who gave input on this topic. My only regret is not being there 2 see the man perform.

I guess there's another chance 2 see Tamar, per e-mail from NPGMC, Jan. 24th at the Roxy in L.A. Midnite, $31.21.

VERY COOL! I love the reviews and I can't wait to hear some stuff
from her. Anybody know when her single and album are due to be released?