Going ahead with my decision, on Saturday I headed up to the IndigO2 in Greenwich to enjoy an evening of quality music provided by Kelly Price & Donell Jones, primarily because I was impressed with them at last November's 'The Show' concert and was left a little irked that they didn't get to finish their respect sets properly.
Before they took to the stage this time around, the DJ's got the crowd warmed up with some classic 90's cuts (as expected), sprinkled with a few post 2000 hits for good measure, although the lowest point was having to witness folks shamelessly jamming to 'She's Got That Vibe' and 'Bump & Grind' as if there is something normal about the writer and his inspiration behind those songs....
That aside however, the first artist to take to the stage looking very dapper in a dark suit, was Jahmene Douglas, who gained notoriety when he finished as runner-up on the 2012 season of 'The X Factor'. Now, I haven't watched that show in years so I really didn't know what to expect but, with just four songs he managed to blow me away! Exercising one of the best vocal ranges I have heard in a long time, he treated the audience to cover version's of Etta James' 'At Last', The Shirelles 'Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow' (in tribute to writer Gerry Goffin who recently passed away), Amy Winehouse's 'Back To Black' (though I don't have a clue what the original sounds like because I was never a fan), and an original song entitled 'Happy Tears' from his forthcoming album. With that short set, the one thing Douglas proved for sure, is that he has a very bright future ahead.
Next up (leaving the Vaseline and Timbs at home) was Miss Kelly Price, who looked casually elegant in a Black sequined top, blue jeans and some fierce multi-coloured sequinned heeled shoes. Starting off with 'It's My Time', Kelly effortlessly glided through 'You Should've Told Me', 'As We Lay', a Medley consisting of her contributions to 'Bad Boy'/'Mo Money, Mo Problems' & 'Heartbreak Hotel' (the latter of course also sung in tribute to Whitney whom we had a moment of silence for) and, the 90's R&B classic 'Friend Of Mine' as the finale, where the audience lent their vocals to cover for the absence of Uncle Ron Isely. For her overall performance I can't fault Kelly because that VOICE is something serious but my only wish would've' been for her to add 'It's Gonna Rain', 'Good Love' and 'Love Sets Your Free' to her set list.
Last up taking on the role of Headliner was Mr. Donell Jones, who looked pretty chill in his all white ensemble with an MJ'esque Fedora style hat to match. If I recall correctly, he started off with the title track of his most recent album 'Forever' and straight cruised through jam after jam (in no particular order); 'You Know That I Love You', 'Shorty (Got Her Eye's On Me)', 'Where I Wanna Be', 'Love Like This', 'Special Girl', 'My Apology', 'Have You Seen Her', 'This Luv', 'I'm Gonna Be', 'Yearning', 'Knocks Me Off My Feet', 'Players In The Hood' and obviously 'U Know What's Up'. My only critique of Donell, is that he did hit a few bum notes, left 'I'll Go' off of his set list and offended a few audience members when he abruptly left the stage, while previewing a new track at the very end of his performance. Personally I won't hold any of it against him considering he has a solid catalogue but some folks were not happy with the latter...
Overall it was definitely a good show as each artist gave their best, were humble and gracious...plus the organisers pulled off the event smoothly, without kicking anybody off of the stage due to dodgy time management!
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