KE$HA Get Sleazy Show; A Faustian Bargain For Boner Dollar Babies

Kesha - Blow

Back door cracked. This review about to BLOW...

It's not entirely my fault. I, actually, have Hayley Williams (of Paramore), Van's Warped Tour founder Kevin Lyman, Dave Gahan (of Depeche Mode) and Perry Farrell & Dave Navarro (of Jane's Addiction) to blame. But mostly Hayley and her boys. Ok, sort of, but not really...but maybe.

Being a big Paramore fan, I bought tickets (earlier this year) to attend the annual MusiCares MAP Benefit at Club Nokia in downtown L.A. It was the first time Ms. Williams and the remaining boys were going to perform live since the departure of the Farro Brothers at the end of last year. Hayley (aka Paramore) was showing support to Mr. Lyman whom was instrumental in helping to break the band with slots on multiple Warped tours.

What's this have to do with getting $leazy?!?

Well, on that very same night (May 6), Ke$ha was playing a sold-out show at the Palladium in Hollywood. In fact, during his speech to the MusiCares audience, Lyman mentioned that if it wasn't for Hayley being present, his teenage daughter would have much rather been at the Ke$ha show across town. My point exactly!

The Palladium show was (at the time) the 2nd to last show of her Sleazy tour with a final sold-out BLOW-out the next night at the Palms Casino in Las Vegas. Being highly susceptible to impulsive behavior, I woke up the next morning and decided...I'm going to drive to Vegas today and hope to scavenge a ticket for the sold-out show at the Pearl Theater.

I had been driving in excess of triple digits for a few consecutive hours...I hope one of my tires doesn't Blow...

4 hours and 5 minutes later, I find myself in a bathroom stall at the Palms Casino where I'm more than likely not doing Blow...

But I am in need of a ticket. Yes, it's still sold out. I go up to the box office and, for grins, I ask if they will be releasing any tickets. "No" is the answer but the girl said she would sell me her comp ticket since she would be stuck working the box office all night...she also said she'd throw in a bracelet to go into the VIP section on the floor. All for face value.

That's a deal that does not totally Blow...

But this review still does.

The energy from the stage that night reached another level but, as is often the case with transient travelers and often partied-out vacationers, the energy from the crowd was average. When Ke$ha finished up with a raucous rendition of Beastie Boys "Fight For Your Right" with her entire road crew dressed in drag and outlandish costumes, it was one of the greatest encores I had ever seen.

Having to be back in LA, I immediately turned around and drove back. I had been in Vegas a total of 180 minutes.

9 hours and 600 miles for a 75-minute show punctuated by a styrofoam plate of lukewarm orange chicken from Panda Express.

I have to say it...

My impulsive behavior can Blow me!

So, of course, the wily managers and promoters that play on our collective worry with advance promotion that an artist is not going to tour again for awhile so "you better get your tickets now" were busy all along maneuvering the next cog in the pinwheel.

It wasn't a month later and here comes more chances to get Sleazy, this time with LMFAO and Spank Rock in tow. I was reticent. Whateva. Already been there and done that.

Impulses.

Three days (purposeful Jane's Addiction nod) before the Ke$ha Gibson Amphitheatre show and my curiosity kicks in. I think I'll check Ticketmaster. And I do a double take. A front row ticket for, ostensibly, a sold-out show?!?! Here I go again (a begrudging Whitesnake nod).

Ticketmaster, some times, does not Blow...ditto por blanca serpiente.

So, it's Saturday night in Los Angeles, much like it was Saturday night in Las Vegas the first go round. Ascending the long walkway to get to Gibson, the mood was festive with girls decked out as if they were going to a nightclub in Vegas; Glitter in their hair, Glitter everywhere.

Upon entering the venue, it was electric like I've never encountered before. Was it Carnaval? Mardi Gras? Prom night?

Bob Sinclar "Rock This Party" was blasting and the entire middle walkway that stretches the length of the theatre was packed with revelers that had their hands in the air and their bootys on a tear.

Lady Sovereign's "Love Me Or Hate Me" closed out the party rock interlude and now it was time to Get $leazy.

This was the crowd I had wanted in Vegas...they were here on this September eve.

YOUR LOVE (for Kesha) IS MY DRUG
It makes my heart beat like an 808 drum

Go insane, Go insane
Throw some glitter, make it rain on 'em
Let me see them hands, let me, let me see them hands

This place about to BLOW...

While keeping to a fairly regimented set list to allow for a full-BLOWn production, the thing I like about Ke$ha and the reason I recommend to naysayers to go see her show, is it's a really loose script with having nothin' but a good time (look what the cat dragged in) at it's core...much like an episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm, go with the FLOW.

At any moment, you feel like the calculated train wreck could veer off the track into the sleazy abyss and you're secretly hoping it does...if only to punctuate the "moment" with an unencumbered exclamation point...like the one I experienced at the end of "Cannibal".

During the song, a guy is strapped to a giant "X" before a simulation ensues whereby Ke$ha rips his heart out and drinks its blood as it runs down her chin.

After slurping the last drops from the ventricle vestibule, Ke$ha threw the "heart" towards the side of the stage though it hit one of the PA monitors and fell at my feet. Surreal. Before I could pick it up to behold its faux wonder and snap a picture, a young girl came racing over and heisted it. A stage hand soon retrieved the prop to stow within its proper owner.

It was a moment etched in time...and, curiously, one that made me instantly consider that Ash Costello and her merry band of boyz that inhabit the rock band New Years Day should augment their Warped Tour appearances with an opening slot on the next Ke$ha tour.

Having written a song called "Grow A Pear" about one of her previous man toys that wanted to talk rather than enter her "Bone Zone," a willing 19-year old named Edward was pulled up on stage, wrapped in plastic and serenaded by Ke$ha to grow a "pair".

Enter stage right, a guy dressed as a giant penis with big floppy testicles who proceeds to start hitting Team Edward in the face with 'em.



Might have looked a little out of place on the U2 360 tour or at the Taylor Swift arena shows but it was a perfect condiment to the evening's sassy solicitation. As the opening act acronym would suggest, I was LMFAO!

And how might one top a public flogging by a six-foot dick...well...with Ms. Ke$ha proclaiming she needs more "glitter on her titties" which was then copiously applied to the strains of her band riffing AC/DC's "TNT" before a AC/DC style set of cannons jizzed a giant load of BONER dollars.

Tick, tick, tiK, ToK, this place is gonna Blow...

And with that, hundreds of IN KE$HA WE TRUST dollars got BLOWn all over the first ten rows. There was a mad scramble for mad money (hey Jim Cramer) and even one of the security guards picked one up before realizing he had been played. Sucka.

It's Bona Dolla bill y'all!

After the roof-raisin' encore of "We Are Who We R," I was hoping for an appearance by Alice Cooper during the final song of the night, another detonation of the Beastie Boys classic Party track.

Alice had played a rare club show at The Whisley a few nights prior with Ms. Cannibal making a special appearance whereby she poured Jack Daniels upon the thirsty close to the stage before donning an "Alice Cooper" mask and joining Mr. "Billion Dollar Baby" for a rousing version of their duet "What Baby Wants" from his new Welcome 2 My Nightmares album.

But not only was there no rendition of Boner Dollar Babies or Alice impersonating Ad-Rock but the cover was ditched all together (it is shown on the set list pic below).

However, Ke$ha did say that the show was one of the best of her nearly 400 shows over the past two years and concluded the thrill ride with the credo, "It's Saturday night. go get Laid". A fitting salute that embodied the evening's full frontal fun!

And unlike this review, looking a-head to yet another future night of getting $leazy does not BLOW!

KESHA
GET SLEAZY
Los Angeles, CA
Sept 17, 2011
Set List

1. Sleazy
2. Take iT Off
3. Fuck Him He's A DJ
4. Blow
5. Blah Blah Blah
6. Party At A Rich Dude's House
7. Backstabber
8. Cannibal
9. The Harold Song
10. Animal
11. Your Love Is My Drug
12. D.I.N.O.S.A.U.R.
13. Grow A Pear
14. TiK ToK
15. We R Who We R

I need some rehab, Or maybe just need some sleep...