‘I Kissed a Girl,’ brownies & Katy Perry

Katy Perry

The cheapest general admission ticket to American pop superstar Katy Perry’s concert Sunday night at the SM Mall of Asia (MOA) open grounds was pegged at P888. For a family of three that would be P2,664—a bit steep if you’re on a tight budget, but then we wanted to catch the first major foreign gig of the year to hit Manila.

The concert was the last date on Perry’s hectic California Dreams world tour that opened in February last year, and which took a break only last month. It came at a time Perry is savoring the sweet taste of success as a performer—the tour reportedly having grossed nearly $50 million—and is ending on the sour note of her ongoing divorce from British comedian and actor Russell Brand.

The concert might also be the one of the last to be held in the uncomfortable MOA parking lot, before SM inaugurates a 20,000-capacity indoor Arena sometime in May.

The breezy weather helped us cope with our sore feet which ached from standing since there were no chairs—which would not have been a problem had the venue been a grassy field. Except that this was a parking lot and sitting on the cold concrete would have been more uncomfortable.

A number of families sat on flattened carton boxes, while some lucky ones were able to grab a few plastic chairs not being used by the food concessionaires, medical emergency teams and concert production crew.

Otherwise, everyone seemed resigned to the fact that the farthest reaches of the venue was not the best place from which to watch the concert. Peering at the stage, we imagined Perry would be the size of Thumbelina.

In addition, scaffolding several meters high that held the audio mixing board and four trees served as the ultimate visual obstruction. There were two large video screens to compensate for this, but they were not as clear as the ones near the stage. This doesn’t look like fun at all, we thought.

Getting near the stage

Just after 9 p.m. we received some good news—a friend called to say she had extra tickets nearer the stage.

All the seats turned out to be occupied though. But then ex-Eraserheads drummer Raimund Marasigan spotted us and called out, “My daughter and her friends are out there standing near the rails, so you can have their seats.”

Our luck had changed.

It was after 10 when Perry finally appeared onstage singing “Teenage Dream,” sending the kids scampering to get a better view of her. Others stood on their chairs, giving us no choice but to turn our heads to watch the action on the video screens.

Perry’s act exploded with creativity and imagination. It began with a videotaped story line that introduced her character who, stuck in a dead-end job, escapes her miserable existence to enter an Alice-in-Wonderland world filled with candy and other delights.

The pop-rock music wasn’t pumped to ear-splitting volume—it was the crowd’s shrieks that shook the place.

Perry’s songs are catchy for their controversial content, like “Ur So Gay” which could be mistaken for a homophobic song, but it is said to be a flippant dig at wimpy ex-boyfriends.

“Waking Up in Vegas” came on backed by a colorful team of dancers, including an Elvis impersonator.

Matching concepts

The concert’s “story” progressed with Perry meeting two mimes who offer her a brownie that gets her “stoned”—setting the stage for songs that matched the concept. “Peacock” showed her in a colorful bird costume.

“Whatever is in that brownie, it sure is making me feel sexy,” Perry purred. She went on to invite any guy onstage who would take his clothes off. Ivan Dorschner, an ABS-CBN talent, volunteered.

Perry asked him, “Have you ever kissed a pop star?” and then she planted her lips on his cheek.

That was the cue for another controversial song, “I Kissed a Girl,” which started off with a jazzy intro. The irony of her just having kissed Dorschner was lost on the audience though.

The “effects” of the brownie then transform Perry into a cat-woman, and at that point it became apparent that the 27-year-old singer-songwriter was sending a message to her audience—nothing beats freeing the mind to enjoy her music.

We left it to the parents in the crowd to explain to their young kids how a brownie could make one feel giddy and sexy.