A letter, and apology.

Dear readers,
Sorry it’s been so long since I last reviewed a show. I’ve been so busy. If you follow me, you know that I was super stressed what with lock-in, IBET, and some super irritating people. But I found time to write this. I’ve been listening to shows a lot. Kind of. But I got behind on reviewing and then it seemed daunting to try to catch up. I’m like 13 days behind! (Thirteen! Every thing switches. Thirteen!) and so I decided that rather than write 2 line reviews that nobody cares about, I’d tell you what shows I’ve been listening to and then call it even and pick back up tomorrow. During lock in I listened to Hair, October 18th 2009 with Nicole Lewis as Dionne. Nicole was nowhere near as strong as Dionne should be. But as usual the rest of the show was good. I think I was watching Wall-E while listening, so, oops. Also during Lock-In I listened to In the Heights, January 18th, 2010. I fell asleep during it. I don’t know why but I always get bored and lose focus during Pacienca y Fe. Why is that? It’s a good song. What seems like forever ago I listened to American Idiot 4/3/10. And loved it. You know, it’s funny that the show has so little dialogue and I love that! More often than not dialogue is what I skip, but with American Idiot I’m skipping what? Johnny’s intro, the part before Boulevard of Broken Dreams and that’s like it. Also I listened to Legally Blonde 8/21/09. Whoever Elle was, I didn’t like her voice so much. And Hair 2/22/10 which I was impressed by the show in general. Also a long time ago I listened to Chase as Moritz (8/7/09) which was really good, but Song of Purple Summer was the true star with harmonies that could kill you. Rock of Ages 12/6/09 was all the way back when I first got strep! I liked the Sherrie and hated Tom. I finished Rock of Ages the Friday of my balcony scene before I even got to school (I missed the bus) and then I started with Marvelous Wonderettes 6/7/09 which was cute and fun. The week before that I listened to the Chicago OCR and Broadway Miscast to shake things up. Neither one really drew me in. All the way back on April 12th I spent the entire day searching for the next Elle Woods. Yep, I watched episodes 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8 in one day. I had a lot of fun and wanted to be Elle Woods by the time I was done. That left me on a Legally Blonde high, I snapping constantly and cheery and crazy. We even taught Saemi how to snap! She doesn’t have it yet. And with the rest of my time I’ve been listening to the American Idiot OBCR which I am sadly obsessed with. Oh my god, I love listening to it and rocking out. What’s not to love? The voices are amazing and so is the music. Rebecca Naomi Jones is a freaking god! Honestly, American Idiot is the 2010 Hair. Last year I had Hair to constantly listen to and obsess over. And I think I’ll be rooting for AI the same was I rooted for Hair last year. I’ve also made a lot of exercising playlists, because I have to go to the gym thrice a week. One playlist had Totally Fucked, Bitch of Living, So Much Better, Whipped Into Shape, Ohmigod You Guys, Hair, Black Boys and songs like that. Then I made a playlist that would be exactly 15 minutes (the amount of time I bike for) that had So Much Better, Totally Fucked, Three Five Zero Zero, I Don’t Care and maybe something else. But then I found the true key. Know Your Enemy. Seriously, all I need is Tony Vincent and I’m biking over 100 RPMs. So I calculated how long it was and how many times it went evenly into 15 minutes. According to my calculations, if I bike for 10 seconds and then press play I will listen to it exactly 7 times and be done right on time. I biked 4.32 miles in 15 minutes! That’s hella fast. The only downside of American Idiot is it makes me a little more hateful and angry, while Hair makes me love and Legally Blonde makes me perky and SNAPS!!! Did I mention Glee yet? Both of the last episodes suuuucked. Okay, with the Madonna one the only thing I liked was 4 Minutes. It’s a good song and it didn’t have Lea. Groff made me smile in that episode too. But then last night, no Groff to really speak of and it was so awfully preachy. I don’t like preachy. But you know why it’s preachy? To cover for the fact that they have no real plot to speak of. So hey, let’s make Mercedes have weight problems and Kurt have Daddy issues. I don’t care. Really, I have daddy issues and I don’t care. As Barney Stinson taught us, Daddy issues help you get laid.

So I think I’ve gotten all caught up in my life of musicals and shows. What next? I miss Next to Normal so I think after Bio is over (In 12 minutes) I will listen to the OBCR.

And I’ll leave you all off with a thought. Can you imagine that in 15 years Next to Normal, Spring Awakening and American Idiot will be old and possibly be considered classic? Can you imagine what shows will be around in 20 years. And don’t you tell me that Broadway will be gone, because that’s not going to happen.

Much Love,
ATUGIRL.

Day 42-12/31/09

Show: Rock of Ages
Date: 9/25/09
Cast: Kerry Butler (Sherrie), Constantine Maroulis (Drew), Mitchell Jarvis (Lonny), Adam Dannheisser (Dennis), Michele Mais (Justice), Don Stephenson (Hertz), Tom (Franz), James Carpinello (Stacee Jaxx), Lauren Molina (Regina), Ericka Hunter, Angel Reed, Katherine Tokarz, Andre Ward, Jeremy Woodard
Type: Audio

DISCLAIMER: YOU MAY NOT LIKE WHAT I SAY, YOU MAY NOT AGREE WITH ME. JUST DON'T CALL ME OUT ON TWITTER. I AM MERELY REVIEWING AN AUDIO JUST FOR FUN. THANK YOU

So a lot of the show was same as usual, so I'm just going to talk about the new stuff for me.
I really liked Kerry as Sherrie. Her voice seemed a lot more natural than Amy and a little more so than Savannah. What bothered me about Amy was not her singing, but her regular speaking. It sounded like she was forcing young, naive, and ditzy. With Kerry it sounded like she was speaking more normally and all that Amy forced came with it.
I didn't like Don Stephenson as Hertz as much as I liked Paul Schoeffler.
Tom ...well, to be honest I'm a little nervous to say anything at all. But at the same time I just wouldn't be right to not say what I'm thinking. Okay, deep breath, I can do this.
I didn't like it. Now of course, I absolutely adored Wesley both as Franz and as a person, but that doesn't automatically slant my opinion. The first line that Franz has was a shock to my ears, as it usually is when somebody new is on for someone I'm familiar with. It's not necessarily a bad thing; when I heard Danny as Hugo instead of Matt there was a shock, when I hear someone as Melchior or Hanschen other than Matt there's a little of a shock. But neither time is it really bad. This time the shock wasn't the best thing. It didn't sound right. At all. I find Wesley's voice just generally more right for the role, it's one of those conditions that it was the perfect casting when they got someone with a voice like his for a character like that. But maybe there is an imperfection in it all; that now it's hard to hear anyone else. That almost sounds like I'm sugar coating it, but once you find that perfection doesn't everything pale in comparison? Maybe in this case it just pales much more than in others. With Tom, it sounded a little bit unnatural and certainly not German. To me it just sounds like a whiny child, or a drag queen, or both. Also rather than craving the scenes he was in, I just wasn't excited. Hit Me With Your Best Shot wasn't too bad. He holds notes oh so much longer than Wesley did. But I can't say I 100% liked it. He did seem to have a good voice but for instance he said "let's get down to iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiit" when I had absolutely loved the way that Wesley said "let's get down to it, aaah." That's just personal preference maybe. Franz has a really small bit in "Here I Go Again" but I always listened for it because I really loved Wesley in it, I listened for it this time as I always do and I think I heard it, but if I did that was certainly different but, you know...personal preferences are what it's all about. I also listened for him in Don't Stop Believin', and I gotta say it again; it wasn't Wesley. And I guess really just comes down to the fact that I loved Wesley, but not in a way that would make me biased against others but I loved the acting choices that he made and everything.

So really hope that Google alerts don't get results from blogs...if they do I might need to dig myself a hole.

Edit: Rather than saying his full name, I'm just changing every instance of it to "Tom"