Now we're in New York!

We saw Alicia Keys on Saturday night and if you don't wish to continue reading, you know in case you're pruning your hydrangeas or making blueberry pie or changing the filter in your Brita jug, we fucking LOVED it. Full unabridged review henceforth.

We've had an interesting - well it's not that interesting actually - history of sorts with Ms. Keys. She was one of the first artists we were introduced to when we were of the age where you start beginning to actually appreciate music; the lyrics, the melodies, all the shit that gets left out when it's either a good song or a rubbish song. We were fourteen when we pranced into our local Tesco and picked up The Diary of Alicia Keys - her second EP and in our opinion her joint finest, if not sole finest. To our impressionable ears, the music was in parts genuinely moving ("Diary" and "If I Ain't Got You"), exciting and unlike much we'd heard before ("Karma", "Heartburn") and part of a fully, fleshed out cohesive album. We went through our various phases; indie, electro, we're not overly proud, but we always stuck with Alicia. We're not going to pretend she was ever a ground breaking, territory conquering artist, but she was different. She wasn't a cookie cutter artist and we appreciated that.

And so we'd always put her pretty high on our list of artists to see live. We weren't overly impressed with her third venture As I Am but it's grown on us with time, yet we really felt she'd reached something special with her most recent EP The Element of Freedom. For the first time since The Diary of... she seemed to be breaking new personal ground in production techniques and various influences were making themselves more known. "Try Sleeping with a Broken Heart" converted one of our number from a so-so observer into a moderate fan - always a start, "Un-thinkable (I'm Ready)" covered provocative lyrical subjects with a sparse yet simultaneously lush soundscape behind it while "Love is Blind" and "This Bed" were blatant, unashamed Prince-at-his-best homages. Even Swiss Beatz-backed "Put It in a Love Song" took Keys and song-mate Beyoncé into new territory. Maybe we should start reviewing the concert now. So yeah, we definitely went out of our way to catch her touring for a very impressive album.

Forgive our naivety but we were under the impression we would be treated to an hour and a half of Alicia at her Keys (lol lol lol). We were happy with that. We didn't expect anything more than ninety minutes of her banging out the classics on the piano - instead we got two hours of a healthy mix of Freedom songs and all the hits with the majority of the show seeing Keys on her feet parading her way through some hot-under-the-collar choreography with a dancer. Bonus! The show was themed around - wow you're quick on the ball - freedom, and so the video screens were heavy on the militant, breaking through repression, red/blue imagery but she worked it. She really carried it off. The opening saw her pushed onto the stage in a giant cage singing nothing else but the fabulously underrated "Caged Bird" from her debut album, a little heard but beautiful composition she created when she was 13. It took on a brand new meaning when transformed into an angry, defiant anthem - if you'd heard the original before seeing it life, you would have struggled to the reconcile the two. It was fabulous to see her breathe new life into old songs you'd forgive her for having forgotten about this far into her career. Slamming straight through a stream of Freedom/old songs, the show was pretty much excellent song after excellent song. The brilliant but verging on tired sounding "You Don't Know Me" was the next dramatic re-invention, utilising a Kanye "Flashing Lights" sample to again alter the mood from a swooning love song to an empowered, hostile command.

The excellence of her Bond track with Jack White "Another Way to Die" was demonstrated as she performed the song solo - it really is an amazing pop song that should have done better. There isn't really an awful lot else to say. She just surpassed all of our expectations. She was just amazing, and we really didn't think we'd get more than a voice and piano - she did the full works. She really went all out and gave us hell of a lot more than value for money. We came away thoroughly impressed, brimming with praise and ready to recommend her in an instant - so you heard it from us. Go see her!

The Freedom Tour, Manchester MEN Arena, 29th May 2010

• "Caged Bird"
• "Love is Blind"
• "You Don't Know My Name"
• "Fallin'"
• "Another Way to Die"
• "Karma"
• "Pray for Forgiveness"
• "Diary"
• "Like You'll Never See Me Again"
• "Wait Til You See My Smile"
• "Go Ahead"
• "Un-thinkable (I'm Ready)"
• "Try Sleeping With a Broken Heart"
• "Superwoman"
• "If I Ain't Got You"
• "Doesn't Mean Anything"
• "No One"
• "Empire State of Mind"
  

(Thank you to Alicia-Keys.net for the fabulous Manchester photos - we weren't remotely close enough to get snaps like that!)