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Archive for the 'Staples Center' Tag

Review: Red Hot Chili Peppers worth the wait at powerful Staples Center homecoming

August 12th, 2012, 1:48 pm by

To say the four Red Hot Chili Peppers were enthusiastic to finally perform not one but two sold-out shows in their hometown of Los Angeles this week would be a massive understatement. When longtime members Anthony Kiedis, Flea and Chad Smith, plus John Frusciante replacement Josh Klinghoffer on guitar, took to the stage with “Monarch of Roses” Saturday night at Staples Center, the audience reaction was explosive.

Click here for a photo slideshow of Red Hot Chili Peppers at Staples Center.

Most of these RHCP fans had purchased their tickets last year, since these dates on the group’s I’m With You World Tour were supposed to take place in late February. But Kiedis injured his right foot at the start of the year and the band had to postpone the North American leg of its outing, initially set to kick off in Florida in January. L.A. die-hards had patiently waited a long time for this night, and the Chili Peppers did not disappoint.

The band proved just how much it deserved its induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame this past April by not just just going through the motions but actually looking excited each time it burst into a new track.

Read more about Red Hot Chili Peppers’ performance at Staples Center on the Soundcheck Blog.

Photos by Kelly A. Swift, for the Orange County Register

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Review: LMFAO’s dull party at Staples Center

June 6th, 2012, 5:57 pm by

I had to see for myself, and now I know for sure: LMFAO’s headlining debut at Staples Center Tuesday night was indeed one of the lamest displays of pop nonsense ever staged in Southern California.

Click here for a photo slideshow of LMFAO’s performance.

Just as terrible and boring and underachieving as I feared it might be, no matter how much I went in hoping something would surprise me. Maybe I wouldn’t see a pyro-laden spectacle of epic proportions — though is a laser too much to ask? — but at least a highly memorable party that kept me bouncing as much as ROTFLing.

That’s not as ludicrous an expectation as you might think, you haters (I’m admittedly one). As dopey as LMFAO’s music is — often deliberately so  — the duo’s opening sets for better peers in recent years suggested potential for sheer escapist effed-up fun down the road, like Andrew W.K. with better wiener jokes.

Read more on LMFAO’s Staples Center performance on the Soundcheck Blog.

Photos by Armando Brown, for the Orange County Register.

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Review: Lady Antebellum comfy, convincing in first headlining Staples Center show

March 28th, 2012, 2:26 pm by

Lady Antebellum is arguably the most successful and certainly the most honored group from a trend I like to think of as the Happy Macs – that ongoing proliferation of co-ed, kinda-country acts who have all the appearances of Fleetwood Mac’s incestuous creativity, and plenty of their harmonic smoothness, but none of the actual inter-band heartbreak and drama.

There are a slew of ’em these days: Sugarland, family outfit the Band Perry, husband-and-wife duos Thompson Square (currently one of Lady A’s opening acts) and Steel Magnolia (though that pair has yet to get hitched), plus that double-dose of wedded bliss, the two couples who comprise Little Big Town. Heck, even the folkier Civil Wars, a male/female duo who are (gasp!) married to other people, still fits the bill.

But Lady Antebellum, which shined brightly Tuesday night at a sold-out Staples Center in its first headlining arena performance in Southern California, is positively the Mac-iest of the Happy Macs in both spirit and sound.

Click here for a photo slideshow of Lady A’s performance at Staples.

They barely sound country; you’d never know they were from Nashville if they didn’t mention. Were it not for Hillary Scott’s high, reedy flourishes, very much akin to Dolly Parton’s or Alison Krauss’ flutters, you’d be hard-pressed to detect the faintest hint of Southern hospitality in their music.

Read more on Lady Antebellum’s performance at Staples Center on the Orange County Register’s Soundcheck Blog.

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Music News: LMFAO bringing the party to Staples Center in June

February 27th, 2012, 5:24 pm by

How it is that LMFAO has risen to Staples Center headliner status so rapidly isn’t entirely hard to understand. When your latest assortment of gleefully vapid dance smashes boasts two chart-toppers, “Party Rock Anthem” and “Sexy and I Know It,” plus you’ve been spotted alongside Madonna during her Super Bowl halftime spectacular, well, you’ve earned an arena-sized blowout as much as the next pop tart.

Not that it’s any less a sign that maybe the Mayans were right about 2012.

In any case, the homecoming celebration is sure to be massive when the L.A. duo of Redfoo and SkyBlu bring their Sorry for Party Rocking Tour to Staples on June 5.

They’ll be supported by their own Party Rock Crew, along with a slew of opening acts, including breakout electro-pop act Far East Movement and dance team the Quest Crew (Season 3 champs of MTV’s America’s Best Dance Crew) as well as DJ Sidney Samson and two newcomers, Eva Simons and Natalia Kills.

Tickets, $29.50-$69.50, go on sale Saturday, March 3, at 10 a.m. Pre-sales for American Express card-holders runs from Wednesday at 10 a.m. until Friday at 10 p.m. Live Nation pre-sales start Thursday at 10 a.m.

The full outing kicks off May 22 in Columbus, Ohio. Also catch it June 9 at Valley View Casino Center (formerly San Diego Sports Arena) as well as June 6 at Sacramento’s Power Balance Pavilion and June 8 at Oakland’s Oracle Arena. All of those dates also are on sale Saturday.

Read more entertainment news and reviews on the Orange County Register’s Soundcheck Blog.

Photo by Rob Carr, Getty Images.

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Madonna plans world tour, heads to Staples Center

February 7th, 2012, 12:12 pm by

Not surprisingly, less than 48 hours after her ballyhooed, seemingly love-it-or-hate-it halftime extravaganza at Sunday’s Super Bowl, Madonna has announced her 2012 world tour itinerary, launching May 29 from Tel Aviv.

She treks across Europe first, not arriving in North America until the end of August, when her stateside shows kick off in Philadelphia. She takes over NYC’s Yankee Stadium on Sept. 6, but once she reaches Southern California, not only will her production be back inside arenas, it also will make just one stop (at least as of now).

Oct. 10 at Staples Center will mark her first major concert appearance in L.A. in nearly four years, since her Dodger Stadium blast in November 2008. It also will be her first show at Staples Center since her Drowned World Tour found her playing the Lakers’ home court shortly before and after the 9/11 attacks.

Madge’s next nearest dates on this outing behind her 12th album MDNA, due March 12, are Oct. 6 at San Jose’s HP Pavilion and Oct. 13 at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas. So obviously there’s room for additional dates or locations. Or maybe not — it’ s Madonna, you never can tell.

Tickets for nearly all of the U.S. dates, including L.A. and San Jose, go on sale Feb. 13. The Vegas stop becomes available Feb. 27. Pre-sales will be open to Legacy Lifetime members of Madonna’s Icon fan club (starting today) and Citi card-holders (starting Feb. 8).

The tour is also expected to touch down in South America and Australia, the Material Mom’s first dates Down Under in 20 years.

Find more music news and reviews on the Orange County Register’s Soundcheck Blog.

By Ben Wener, the Orange County Register. Photo by Christopher Polk, Getty Images.

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Red Hot Chili Peppers postpone Staples shows

January 11th, 2012, 12:01 pm by

You’ll have to wait a little longer to see the Chili Peppers‘ first hometown arena shows in five years.

The band has announced it will push back dates on its winter tour until summer, allowing Anthony Kiedis (pictured) time to recover from multiple foot injuries. The vocalist, 49, recently underwent surgery to remove a crushed sesamoid bone (that word deserves a place in a Kiedis rhyme) and correct a detached a flexor tendon.

He is expected to make a full recovery, but the delay has prompted a massive re-routing of the quartet’s tour behind last August’s I’m with You, their first album with guitarist Josh Klinghoffer filling in for once-again departed John Frusciante.

Instead of kicking off next weekend in Florida (the city of Sunrise, to be exact), the outing now begins at the tail-end of March — in St. Petersburg. New Orleans has the longest wait for a rescheduled date, as a Feb. 4 gig in the Big Easy won’t occur until Oct. 4.

Find more concert updates on the Orange County Register’s Soundcheck blog.

Photo, from a December show in Madrid, by Juan Naharro Gimenez, Getty Images.

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