Electronic Dance Music Discussion Thread - Page 91

Overall, I would probably rate the whole show around a 7 or 8 out of 10. It was very enjoyable, but for me personally there were things that I feel stopped it from being a 9 or 10.

It seems odd to me to critic something as inconsequential as the graphics/display, but you have to remember that in this sort of production/show, they're actually a large part of the whole overall package. As a whole, they were pretty good, adding a little to the experience, but not much.

Until Armin played 'This Light between Us', where a video of the vocalist, Christian Burns appeared and sang, ok, whatever. But it got weird (to me at least) when Armin left the turntables, walked up to the massive LED screen behind him and proceeded to 'hug' the video of Burns. Strange, but whatever again. But it got worse when a statue-like 3d visage of Armin's head was made. It just didn't look quite right. It pivoted from side to side, sending its vacant gaze and unnerving smile across the entire audience. Intensely disturbing. And they kept the same visual going for like 45 minutes, and then they got bored of the 'statue' effect and just had the 3d wire mesh for another 10.

Second critic: I didn't really get into the two acrobats on the trampolines, or the four dancers. They would come on, do their thing for 3-4~ minutes and then just disappear, rinse and repeat multiple times throughout the show. They didn't feel engaging and I don't think they added much for my own enjoyment.

Final, and perhaps the most important critic: Music & Track selection.
I think I set myself up for disappointment here. I went expecting (and hoping for) something more like an ASOT set, where Armin builds a set and plays his fav. tracks of the moment this a few good oldie throwbacks that just end up destroying the dance floor. I suppose it can really be expected when you think of the show format, hell, even the name. It's called Armin Only - Intense, and is more-or-less a showcase of the Intense album, and album world tour. He even has the 6 vocalists with him, its pretty damn obvious what tracks he is going to playing.

And this for me was a let down, if you're an Armin fan, you will have no doubt heard them many many times before, let alone this whole period it felt like he just played most of his 2006-2010 discography.

It sort of goes to some of my criticisms of the Intense album, which while has a lot of great tracks, I feel they're not really outstanding tracks to play back to back in a set.
Also: Very little 138/uplifting.

The parts I most enjoyed were when he launched the show after the warm-up, where he obviously had a little bit more freedom to play newer stuff like New Horizons, Visons, Bigfoot, D#Fat etc before he had to move onto the prepared & scripted stuff with the vocalists & the other performers. I also loved when all 6 vocalists came out towards the end for their final performance and did These Broken Hearts together, was pretty special. Can't go without mentioning Ping Pong, the sit-down and when the balloons drop that happens towards the end, funny thing though, right at the start of the show three balloons got unstuck from the sails they were suspended in and were bouncing around for awhile.

So yea, had a good time, but I think I hyped myself up a bit too much and had some false expectations.