I am so ashamed. I went to a Hanson concert Saturday night at the House of Blues and did not hate it.
It was not my choice to go to this concert. My roommates are “Hansonites” and they forced me to go on pain of listening to them sing “MmmBop” everyday leading up to the concert.
Imagine a standing room only area with hundreds of squealing girls who all seemed to regress in age as soon as they entered the building. Welcome to my nightmare.
The show was an 18 and over admission, which still boggles my mind because Hanson’s fan base has an average age of 14. The place still was packed, just with college age girls wearing the same t-shirts they bought when they were 13.
I am a cynic by nature and have never really been a fan of Hanson. But, I must concede they are rather talented under their annoying teen idol façade. I guess I’ll have to wait for Britney’s new album to do some heavy criticizing.
They started the show half an hour late, and I honestly do not know what the first couple of songs were because the screaming was so loud.
The set consisted of acoustic renditions from their past three albums and new ones from their upcoming CD to be released in February. The brothers (Isaac, Taylor and Zac) have become more Kingston Trio than Backstreet Boys to their credit, but to many fans’ dismay.
While fans screamed for “Mmmbop,” the band played a cover of the Motown classic, “Money (That’s What I Want). Their version was as good as any midwestern white boys could have done and I doubt the majority of the crowd had ever heard the original.
The brothers seem to be attempting to change their image individually as well.
Isaac cut his hair and seems to be in the John Mayer musical following, but is the most talented in the band. Taylor, everyone’s junior high heartthrob, sported a flashy wedding band, but I think the girls were too hysterical to notice. His clothing looked like a cross between David Lee Roth and Goodwill. And the youngest one just looked like he was there to be cute.
Fans do not want to let go of their Hanson image, making it harder for this boy band to evolve.
I admit it – I liked some of their new songs. But the music lacks in variety and becomes monotonous after a while. They had to play their old pop hits just to keep the crowd interested.
During my odyssey that night I found my attention span waning and so I began to observe the characters in the crowd.
There was a girl hanging over the balcony, obscenely exposing her overwhelmingly fake assets. A forty-year-old woman was smoking marijuana and proclaiming her love for the youngest Hanson, while an older man with no apparent reason for being there, creepily followed my roommates around the entire night. And of course, a girl fainted when they took the stage.
This concert reminded me how fickle and obnoxious the pop music crowd can be. I will never know why they go to concerts and do nothing but scream the entire night.
Hanson does have talent, they just waste their potential writing music that follows the same formula.
Their die-hard fans still judge them by how attractive they are, and any attempt at true musical evolution will fall by the wayside.
Their fans are not girls, not yet women who still hold on to their pop music upbringing. Anything unfamiliar is wasted on the majority of this audience.
And what the heck is an “MMBop?”