True Colors Tour 2008 Kicks Off in Boston and Really Shines
I was lucky to attend the opener to the True Colors Tour kick-off in Boston, MA on Saturday, May 31, 2008. It was at the beautiful Bank of America Pavilion in the historial waterfront section of Boston. Although the weather that day was rainy, the gods were on our side because the skies cleared up just in time for the 6pm start time. Read on for my full review and photo diary of the awesome event.
The show kicked off with Kat Deluna, although I was not personally familiar with her music, this bilingual pop diva gave a dazzling showcase for her unique talents, most notably her opera-trained voice, which bends and snaps with ease amid shiny club beats and tropical rhythms. You can sure bet that I was shakin' what my Momma gave me in the most bootilicious way possible. Teen pop-heads, Latin soulsters, anyone with a weakness for deliciously flirtatious beats will be sure to love this up-and-coming star.
After Kat, came The Cliks. I have recently become a Cliks fan, due in part to Lesbiatopia's own Sinnerviewer's intervew with Cliks drummer Morgan Doctor, which you can read here.
And what's not to love about Lucas Silveira? I love how there's just a touch of punked-out Elvis in Lucas, the trans female-to-male front man of this rockin' Toronto-based rock band. Silveira wears a studded belt, slung low on his hips—hips that glide along to the heavy-hitting guitar riffs and throbbing bass lines that The Cliks have become known for. You can see it (along with a smattering of Billy Idol) in Silveira's facial contortions when he sings. On stage, vulnerabilities are exposed through contagious chant-along choruses and bleeding verses that just make all the girls (and boys) go ga-ga for the edgy meets sexy rock group. They were both a pleasant and rockalicious experience for True Colors, continuing to prove that the line-up this year was fan-fucking-tastic.
Next to grace the stage, and one of my personal favorite female vocalists, was the indie singer/songwriter, Regina Spektor, who has an incredibly unique and whimsical vocal style that puts her in a class of her own. I was quite excited to see Regina perform live for the first time, and fully admit to swooning over this "sexy-ugly" talented Russian-American vocalist. There's a fearless, uninhibited confidence to Spektor's voice, and she delivered some of my favorites including Fidelity and Hotel Song from her latest album, Begin to Hope. She is sure to give artists like Tori Amos and Fiona Apple a run for their money.
Cyndi came out to introduce Rosie's stand-up act, with some inspirational words of her own about how the GLBT community needs to get out and VOTE! It is really, truly awesome to have someone like Cyndi Lauper in such strong support of gay, lesbians, transgendered and of basic human rights, in general. The of course there's Rosie, being, well Rosie. In all seriousness, she was fantastic; comedic, dramatic, and serious all at the same time. I just love the way Rosie tells a story, she may be out-spoken and over-the-top at times, but she is a really incredible person and a great performer and I am proud to have her batting for the all-girls team.
Then came Carson Kressley, the host and MC for the True Colors Tour. You probably remember Carson as the overly effiminate and hilarious famous diva from Bravo's Queer Eye for the Straight Guy and who currently hosts Lifetime's newest makeover show, How to Look Good Naked. Caron did a bit of stand-up, which was actually really hilarious, to my surprise. He was so interactive with the audience, reaching down into the front row to shake some woman's hand, and even pulling a badly dressed guy out of his seat and onto the stage so he could give him a quick makeover/wardrobe change. It was all pretty entertaining and a great way to pass the time between set-changes for the bands.
The second to last band to grace the stage was the B-52's, which I was psyched to see perform live and if you have a chance to get out to the True Colors Tour, make this one of your #1 reasons. The B-52's sure are a party band that knows how to party. If you grew up loving "Roam" and "Love Shack", dancing your ass off and all that comes with glorified wild youth, than you would love to see these guys live. The feminine harmonies of Wilson and Pierson, could not compliment the sprechgesang male vocal counterpoint of Fred Schneider any better. You can't help but feel the wacky euphoria when those crazy B-52's step on stage and you know in a matter of seconds, you'll be shakin' your groove thing with the rest of the audience.
The final performer was Cyndi Lauper, herself, and boy did she shine. Being a child of the 80's, I have always had a great appreciation for 80's artists that can still 
rock your socks off, and did Cyndi ever! Her setlist included the following:
Change Of Heart
Good Enough
Rocking Chair (with Rosie)
Set Your Heart
When You Were Mine
She Bop
Into The Nightlife
I Drove All Night
Girls Just Want To Have Fun (Rosie on drums)
Same Ol' Story (acapella)
Time After Time
Money Changes Everything (with Lucas Silveira from the Clicks)
Everyday People (entire cast)
True Colors (entire cast)
and to top that off, Cyndi even jumped out into the crowd during Set Your Heart and Into The Nightlife to rock out with the audience. Cyndi Lauper is an incredible performer, she has so much energy and exuberance that you can't help but love her, and damn, after almost 30 years she's STILL putting out kickass albums and rockin' the mic like no other. You go girl!!!
All in all, it was an incredible concert experience, which I was able to attend with one of my best friends (who I don't get to see nearly enough because I live in LA now). I had incredible seats and was able to access some great photos right at the front of the stage which I am very excited to share with you. Here is a collection of my favorite photos from the show, I hope you enjoy them, and if you get the chance to go to the True Colors Tour in your town, I HIGHLY recommend it!!!
My True Colors Tour Photo Blog
Call Now to Win 2 Tickest to the True Colors Tour!!
Call in with the correct answer to the following trivia question, and you could win 2 tickets to the True Colors Tour concert location of their choice (listed below):
There is a scene in "The Incredibly True Adventures of Two Girls in Love" when Evie's three friends are driving to the hotel near the end of the movie, what book, by Rita Mae Brown, is one of them reading outloud?
Leave your name, your answer, the concert location you would like to attend, and a phone number where you can be reached.
Callers can phone in their answers until Sunday, May 18th at 8pm PST.
Everyone with the correct answer will then be entered into a drawing and the the winners will be chosen during that drawing by our panel of impartial judges, (our Managing Editors 2 year old twin daughters, Halie and Kyma) "live" on camera, on Monday morning.
The winners will be announced and the answer posted on Monday May 19th at 12pm PST so stay tuned... Good luck!!
05.31.08 Boston MA US Bank of America Pavilion
06.01.08 Wantagh NY US Nikon at Jones Beach Theatre
06.03.08 New York NY US Radio City Music Hall
06.04.08 Toronto ON CA Molson Amphitheatre
06.06.08 Mashantucket CT US Foxwoods Casino
06.07.08 Washington DC US DAR Constitution Hall
06.09.08 Minneapolis MN US US Bank Theater at Target Center
06.10.08 Chicago IL US Chicago Theatre
06.11.08 Clarkston MI US DTE Energy Music Theatre
06.13.08 Atlantic City NJ US Borgata Hotel and Casino
06.14.08 Bethel NY US Bethel Woods Center for the Arts
06.16.08 Atlanta GA US Chastain Park Amphitheatre
06.17.08 Atlanta GA US Chastain Park Amphitheatre
06.18.08 Clearwater FL US Ruth Eckerd Hall
06.19.08 Fort Lauderdale FL US Sinatra Theatre at the Bank Atlantic Center
06.21.08 Houston TX US Cynthia Woods Mitchell Pavillion
06.22.08 Dallas TX US Superpages.com Center
06.23.08 Oklahoma City OK US Zoo Amphitheatre
06.25.08 Phoenix AZ US Dodge Theatre
06.27.08 Alpine CA US Viejas Casino - Concerts in the Park
06.28.08 Los Angeles CA US Greek Theatre
06.29.08 Berkeley CA US Greek Theatre
07.01.08 Seattle WA US WaMu Theater
07.02.08 Vancouver BC CA Deer Lake Park N/A
07.04.08 Salt Lake City UT US USANA Amphitheatre
07.05.08 Morrison CO US Red Rocks Amphitheatre
Read why we decided to change the video submission contest Read More......
“If there is a possibility of several things going wrong, the one that will cause the most damage will be the one to go wrong.”
Murphy's Law
Hello this is the management here at Lesbiatopia.
As the management we strive to make Lesbiatopia one of the most authoritative go-to resources for lesbians we can make it and we like to make Lesbiatopia not only an informative place for you to visit daily but a fun one as well.
But being human, occasionally the management here at Lesbiatopia gets things wrong and to quote the the great Scottish Poet Robert Burns (sort of) "The best laid plans o'mice an' dykes sometimes go astray"….
Not often, but it does happen….
Occasionally….
As you see, Lesbiatopia teamed up with our good friend Cyndi Lauper and the True Colors Tour. We are giving away five pairs of tickets to the biggest lesbian party of the summer, the True Colors Tour, at the venue of your choice….
The True Colors Tour going to be in 24 cities across North America and will be featuring Cyndi, The B-52s, Carson Kressley and Rosie O’Donnell as well as other special guests in select cities like Tegan and Sara, Joan Jett and The Blackhearts, Joan Armatrading, Wanda Sykes, Regina Spektor, Indigo Girls, The Cliks, Deborah Cox and many others.
We just know this is going to be a great show.
Anyway, back to these tickets….
See our freind Cyndi Lauper gave us five pairs of True Colors Tour Tickets ….
Now we really wanted to keep these tickets for ourselves and maybe scalp the ones we didn't use for some extra cash. We figured all these shows are sure to be sold out so we could be able to get some big bucks for them and then we would have some money for beer, True Colors Tour T-Shirts and maybe even a True Colors Tour Jacket while we were at the show ourselves.
Cyndi Lauper on the other hand, wanted us to give them out to you, our Lesbiatopia Readers, because Cyndi is a devoted advocate for the gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender community and has been for over 25 years. She told us if we wanted these tickets for our site then we had to give them out to the community as a token of her appreciation and not to scalp them before the shows for beer money.
We said "awww come on Cyndi, you know girls just wanna have fun".
Anyway Cyndi Lauper is the star around here and these are her tickets, so we came up with an idea for a video contest as a way to choose the lucky recipients of these tickets. That plan turned out not to be one of our better ones...
Keep in mind this is our first try at this sort of thing, but we sort of forgot that Lesbiatopia is a site primarily for lesbians. Now we are not sure how we did that, as our name is pretty much a dead give away, but in any case we failed to take into consideration a couple of things when we came up with this idea.
First there was this....
Q: How many lesbians does it take to make a video?
A: Six. One to make it, two to organize the potluck, one to write a folk song about the empowering experience and two to set up the support group….
Yes, we forgot about this penchant for us dykes to do thing's in groups, but as we said, we only have five pairs of True Colors Tour tickets and if we have to give them away like Cyndi Lauper wants, we kind of wanted to spread them around the country a bit. But in forgetting this fact about lesbians and group activities we seem to have caused a few problems out there with this video contest idea....
From what we heard of one incident, there was a very ugly dykey dust up and a lot of drama among one group of video producers in Detroit when we told them they could only have one pair of True Colors Tour tickets, irregardless of how many of them it took to produce the video. Seems they could not decide just who would get the tickets.
Not pretty… Not pretty at all….
Then we also did not take into consideration that a lot of folks out there face some pretty substantial challenges when it comes to technology and have no freaking idea how to work that video capture feature on their cell phones, let alone send it by the E mail to us. We got quite a few videos that looked like this one made by a reader in Florida….
Ok nice attempt there Florida, not really what we were hoping for, but we do thank you for trying anyway.
Bless her heart, at least she got her video to us. Only God knows how many videos are out there, just lost in a virtual purgatory as we have had a lot other readers tell us "But we sent it to you". Nevertheless after seeing what we have gotten so far, we feel that is probably for the best most of these videos just stay out there in Ethernet Limbo anyway....
In light of all these developments though, the management of Lesbiatopia had some discussions and determined we need to simplify things here a bit.
So because Cyndi still wants to give these ticket away and she still says we can’t just keep them ourselves here is what we are going to do. In 20 minutes, a short list of instructions will follow in the form of another post, and it has something to do with TRIVIA. Stay tuned, shortly....
CLICK FOR THE QUESTION AND THE INSTRUCTIONS ON HOW TO WIN YOUR TICKETS TO SEE THE TRUE COLORS TOUR
The Cliks, a 4 member band from Toronto, Canada is making some big damn waves in musical pools. Besides churning out the hits from their latest CD, Snakehouse, (the videos for “Oh Yeah” and “Complicated” were both at #1 on Logo), The Cliks were also hand-picked by Ian Astbury of The Cult to support them on their recent American and Canadian tours.
Another music icon, Cyndi Lauper, also took notice of them and added them last year as well as this year to the True Colors tour lineup. True Colors is produced in conjunction with HRC and presented by Logo. HRC and this year’s other non-profit partners – CenterLink (the nation’s LGBT community centers) and Parents, Families, Friends of Lesbians and Gays (PFLAG) National - are joining with the tour to bring together Americans across the country to voice their solidarity for LGBT equality and raise public awareness about the issues that face the LGBT community. The tour kicks off in Boston, MA on May 31. “Part of my mission with the True Colors tour was to provide a platform for some new and exciting acts. A band like The Cliks are all that and more. They are a force to be reckoned with and I am really excited to be sharing the stage with them.” said tour producer and creator, Cyndi Lauper. Lesbiatopia’s special projects editor, Sinnerviewer, recently spoke with Morgan Doctor, drummer for The Cliks:
Shannon: You just finished doing the long Jaegermeister tour opening for one of my favorite bands, The Cult. I read that they hand-picked you to open for them because they loved your sound. I’d love to hear your thoughts about that tour and share any good stories that you have.
Morgan: We sort of did 2 tours with them. One in the states and then, we just got finished doing a Canadian tour. We started in Portland and went all the way across Canada. We went into some really remote places like Grand Prairie. There were some really off the chart places in Canada. It was nice to do the tour with them and then, we went off to do our own thing, and then came back to tour with them again. They are really great guys. We had an amazing time with them. I think what we loved the most was being able to tour with just another rock band whose audience is , well, most of them hadn’t seen us. They didn’t know who we were. To just get up on stage and be received well every night just for our music and our live show - it was really rewarding.
A story? Let’s see… this last tour, there was one. We were in Calgary. We were there for 3 or 4 days because of the Juno’s (awards). We played 2 shows there. The next stop was Edmonton, an 8 hour drive. We were fartin’ around Calgary trying to leave and we were a little bit lost. I got this text from the bass player from The Cult and it said, “Hey, How’s it going? Where are you guys? I’m still in Calgary.” And I was thinking, “Oh, it’s a really nice day to stay in Calgary.” So he calls me up and says, “I missed the bus. I need to get to Edmonton. Can you guys give me a ride?” So he drove with us in the van. The difference between a bus and a van is enormous. It was sort of funny to have this rock star in our van, crashed out and then hanging out with us for the whole day. It was totally fun.
Shannon: You probably won his respect and reminded him of what it used to be like.
Morgan: Yeah, absolutely. I think they all really admired us as players and they really loved the music. We each kind of bonded with one of them. I really got along with the other drummer, Johnny. He played with Helmet and all kinds of incredible bands and people. It was a real honor for me to hear him say “I love your playing”. It was a great experience overall.
Shannon: Cyndi Lauper, she also hand-picked you for her True Colors Tour this year. I thought that was interesting because it shows an obvious pattern here. How does it make you feel to know that you’ve won the respect of all these accomplished musicians?
Morgan: It feels great. It’s really rewarding and it feels like things are happening at the right time. We’re ready for it. What seemed to happen was that Cyndi’s management got a hold of our stuff and really liked it. They played it for her and she really liked it. We were only scheduled to play something like 4 dates on last year’s tour. She had this press time meet-n-greet during the time that we were supposed to play. She moved it to another time so that she could watch us play. She saw us play and that was it! They started changing their schedules and started to move people so that they could add us to more dates on the tour. We seem to really win people over with our live show.
Shannon: That’s pretty impressive to do that. And not just with one person, but with so many people. The True Colors Tour – it’s a special tour. I really see the value of this tour very clearly right now.
I went to see Bon Jovi last week in Atlanta. The thing that struck me was how the band adjusted their pricing structure to their fan base growing older. None of us are 16 year old kids anymore. Most of the audience was suburbian soccer mom-types. Everything from ticket prices to shirts to programs was out of the ballpark when it came to cost. It was disgusting to me how they went from being a Jersey-boy rock band to this huge, corporate entity… a machine. I have to confess, it rubbed me the wrong way.
When I was reading the press release about The True Colors Tour and it’s affiliation with HRC, I learned that the proceeds from the shows will get into the hands of the organizations that work for the rights of all GLBT people. It made me wonder if, besides just promoting your music and expanding your fan base, was there anything that you all hope to accomplish as an act on this tour in that regard?
Morgan: Yeah. Well, I think it’s an honor to be asked to do a tour with such great acts that are on the bill like Cyndi Lauper, the B-52’s, Tegan & Sarah, Joan Jett. To be in that kind of company alone is an honor. I think it makes it even more special to be doing it for such a great cause. The last time we did the tour, it was a really powerful experience at the end of the show during the encore, everyone comes out and we sang “True Colors” together. It was just a very emotional moment when the song would stop and everyone would raise their fists on stage and then they’d shine the light on thousands of people in the audience. It was just this moment of, like, “Oh my God. We’re in this together. You guys are here and we are here on stage. We’re together in all of this.” It was so empowering. It makes it that much more rewarding and takes it out of the realm of being a job… to have a purpose that’s bigger than you.
Shannon: That’s a perfect way to phrase it. One thing that I do know about The Cliks and that is your reputation of having a huge rapport with your fans. You are known for, when your shows are over, to go out there and hang out with your fans. You guys also take an active role in maintaining your MySpace page. You always put up cute little home videos and sending out blog posts and bulletins. It got me wondering: why do you think so many other bands don’t bother to try to make and keep those connections with their fans?
Morgan: Hmmm… it is a lot of work, for one. It can be… when you’re out on the road. That’s pretty exhausting as it is. You’re with all of these other people in the band, you’re traveling all day and you haven’t eaten well. And then to put yourself out there where you have to be social and engaging with people – it can sometimes be a little too much. I don’t know why people don’t do it except for maybe it’s just a lot to manage. I think we’re lucky enough right now where we can sort of manage it. I can see maybe if things continue to grow, we might get to a place where we won’t really get to be out there with our fans as much as we’d like to. It just wouldn’t be possible, you know?
The MySpace is really the best tool to get out and connect to our fans as much as we can. To put up videos and stuff like that…that’s kind of what MySpace is all about – connecting with people. So I don’t know why other bands don’t do those things that help them connect (on a personal level) with their fans. Other than they just might be tired.
(Laughs)
Shannon: You all definitely use that tool well. I am fascinated by the fact that pretty much everybody I know who is a Cliks fan has at least one photo of them with the band.
Morgan: I think we’re also pretty humble people. We’re just down to earth. Maybe it’s just a Canadian thing. It’s just who we are as people. We’re not in it to boost our egos or to be some sort of stars or whatever and I think that when you get off stage and you walk down there and you’re selling your own merchandise, it’s just like, “Here we are. We’re just normal people, too.” I think that it’s just natural for us to engage with people that way.
Shannon: I gotta ask about the song.
Morgan: Okay.
Shannon: Nobody can stop talking about it: the SUV song.
Morgan: Right.
Shannon: I keep hearing about this song and it’s just creating a huge buzz. Can you tell me what’s going on with that?
Morgan: Well, this is a song that Lucas (Silveira, the lead vocalist for The Cliks) wrote for an album of a different incarnation of The Cliks years ago. It was self-titled and put out independently. That song was on there. We decided to just try to play the song again but we totally changed it. It’s a whole other song, basically. Lyrically, it’s the same. Musically, it’s totally new. I think that he wrote that in response to seeing a high-profile band that had done really well and they stopped playing for a while and then they came back to playing and they were riding around in L.A. with their big SUV’s . This is a “socially conscious” band. And he was like, "What's going on here?" - that's how it came about.
Shannon: That one is going to be on the next CD, you think?
Morgan: Yeah, hopefully.
Shannon: Speaking of that next CD (even though I know you all are currently promoting your latest CD, (Snakehouse), when can your fans expect that?
Morgan: Well, if all goes as planned, which often it doesn’t, I can tentatively say that we’re going to try to record it in the fall, which means that it would probably be out in the early spring like February or March.
Shannon: What’s in your iPod, Morgan?
Morgan: What’s in my iPod?
Shannon: Yeah. I always have to know because I’m so interested in what everybody is listening to.
Morgan: I’ve been listening a lot to the new Stars album. A band from Canada. I’m a big Death Cab for Cutie fan. I have some Dave Brubeck stuff… some jazz. The Cocteau Twins, The Pretenders. The Cure.
Shannon: I like The Cure but they’re kind of depressing. Not something you can listen to in the winter.
Morgan: (laughs) Yeah, you don’t want to. It’s dangerous.
Shannon: Tell me about how you got involved with The Canadian Council of Jury for Grants and what kind of work you did there?
Morgan: I was asked to be on the Jury for granting musicians who are professional musicians in the non-classical category. It’s a peer-assessment committee. I’ve gotten a few grants on my own when I went to study in California with my guru and I got another grant to compose my own work. I have a solo album out and it was to compose music for my second album which I am finishing up right now.
They ask people who have gotten grants to be the peers on the assessment committee. They flew me out to Ottawa and it was a great experience. There were just 3 of us and we juried a bunch of applicants who were trying to get some music either to compose or to do travel grants. A lot of them want to go to far away places like India or Mumbai to study more their art form. Usually, it’s in the World Music category so people are studying all kinds of instruments and things that are non-traditional and harder to learn about. You can’t just go to a university for it. I found it really rewarding. I’m also just amazed at the talent that there is in Canada. It’s just really incredible.
Shannon: So was that a one-time deal or do you get invited back later?
Morgan: It was a one-time deal so far but they may ask me to come back. But they try to pick different people for different juries.
Shannon: What a great way to handle that – to leave those decisions in the hands of other professionals who’ve received grants and not in the hands of bureaucrats. (Nice system, Canada.)
You are working on your solo album. What projects are the other members of The Cliks working on right now?
Morgan: I don’t think much, actually. We’ve been really busy focusing mainly on this band. We don’t have time to do much else. Jen plays in a folk band called “August”. Nina, the band that she was playing with, she basically had to drop that so she could play in The Cliks. We haven’t really been home for really a month or two at the longest period of time so it makes it really hard to get into something and then have to leave it. Sometimes, I’ll pick up gigs when I’m in town, but it’s tough to do much else.
Shannon: My girlfriend really wants to know if you and Jen are an item…
Morgan: (Laughs) No.
Shannon: She said, “Well, when I saw them, Jen was playing with Morgan’s hair.
Morgan: (laughs) Jen does that to everybody.
Shannon: Since our readers are mostly lesbians, I’ve got to ask… is there anybody who is single among you Cliks?
Morgan: Nina is single. The rest of us are in pretty long-term relationships.
(Hear that, ladies? Nina is single! Go buy your True Colors tour tickets and introduce yourself!)
Shannon: Who are the chicks that you find smokin’ hot?
Morgan: PJ Harvey & Jennifer Garner.
Shannon: I could not agree more with Jennifer Garner…very nice. The last burning, pressing question that I have for you is what is your favorite junk food?
Morgan: I’m a really healthy eater so even my junk food is sort of healthy.
Shannon: I watched the video on your MySpace page of you all going through your groceries and saw all of that healthy stuff. It is important for everyone who reads this to know what you consider junk food.
Morgan: I’m really into these wheat-free, dairy-free Oreo-type cookies by Newman’s Own. Those are great. I’d have to say that right now, those are my favorite.
Shannon: I shall have to try them. Thanks for your time, Morgan.
The Cliks have been nominated for Logo's New, Now, Next Awards in the "Brink of Fame: Music Artist" category. You can click HERE to cast your vote.
Enjoy Sinnerviewer's favorite Cliks video, Complicated:
A Personal Message to Lesbiatiopia Readers About The True Colors Tour From Cyndi Lauper
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