String Theory
As readers of this blog already know, I had my reservations about the String Theory album, which had left me pretty underwhelmed. I figured that String Theory was a project designed to be appreciated as a live concert, with a full orchestra and the kind of acoustics that only a symphony hall can offer - not something cobbled together from mostly old recordings with the orchestral parts emailed over from Eastern Europe. A lot of my US friends had been to shows during the US leg of the tour and said the same: you have to see it live. I’d set out to avoid most spoilers - watching only a few seconds of clips here and there, just to get a sense of what to expect. I had to lift my self-imposed embargo for the String Theory show at BTTI, but aside from that, I made it to February with an open mind and my expectations still untainted. And so, on a cold Sunday afternoon, five days after returning from Jamaica and dragging a suitcase that was bursting at the seams, I boarded a train to Birmingham.
Following Hanson on a Whistle-Stop Tour of Europe’s Symphony Halls
Birmingham
The orchestra steps onto the stage, the musicians take their seats, followed by the audible rustling of sheet music pages. Right from the start, the live experience of String Theory is very different from the album. As my first proper String Theory show, I was dazzled and swept away by the music to a point that I can’t really remember much, save for the audience and that was all for the wrong reasons. Drunken women yelled and catcalled the band throughout the performance - something that doesn’t usually happen at U.K. shows. To make things worse, towards the end a lot of those people rushed to the stage, taking selfies as they pouted, Kardashian-style, turning their back to the band, showing no respect to the very artists they had come to see. It was embarrassing, and the sad thing is that Hanson are probably used to it.
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| Birmingham, symphony style |
Manchester
Manchester was my ‘home’ show - the closest one to home and also the one for which we had the best seats: I don’t even know how that happened but somehow I ended up sitting right in front of Isaac. If you haven’t experienced ‘seated front row’ at a Hanson show, let me tell you: it’s a very, very different experience from standing against the barrier. Maybe it’s the height disparity between artist and audience, combined with the fact that, at least for that particular show, the guys tend to stay put on their spot, but there were times when I really didn’t know where to look. But I digress: overall, Manchester had an even better energy than Birmingham, especially after the intermission, when the band - and Isaac in particular - came back bouncing around as if they’d just downed six espressos. The crowd was better behaved too, and I was glad to see security stop a repeat of the ‘selfies against the stage’ scene from the night before. You can’t pick your audience, but you can surely hire good security.
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| Isaac in his trademark 'priest pose' in Manchester |
Nottingham
Nottingham was a ‘rock’ show - i.e. a regular Hanson show without the orchestra, held at the legendary Rock City, the kind of place I would have seen bands in my twenties - dark, uninviting and located in a none too salubrious part of town. Inside, it was so cold that I kept my jacket on until well into the second support act.
I had prepared myself for a solid but predictable “MOE Tour” setlist and a “MOE Tour” -style experience to match: a lot of singles played one after another, with very little talking in between songs and the band somewhat on autopilot. But I was wrong. Hanson had put together a setlist that was more classics than greatest hits, and delivered it with so much energy and passion that I can honestly say it was one of the best Hanson shows I’ve seen to date.
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| No jackets required in Nottingham |
London
The Royal Festival Hall show in London was sold out and you could tell that Hanson were feeding off that buzz. It should have been perfect - with a great performance, a packed venue and the band in top form, had it not been for the acoustics: sitting on seventh row, Zac side, the volume was too loud and and at times I could feel the bass rattling my bones. Like in Birmingham, there were, again, a lot of drunk people who danced on the aisles right from the start and who rushed up to the stage way before “No Rest for the Weary”, which is the third to last song in the setlist and the point at which Hanson get the audience to stand up. I had hoped that in a venue like the Royal Festival Hall people would know how to conduct themselves but obviously that was not the case. To make things worse, security seemed to be more interested in telling people to stop filming than to control the crowd.
In terms of Hanson’s performance though, London had the best energy out of all three String Theory shows I had seen that week.
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| On stage at the Royal Festival Hall |
Glasgow
If I had to rate these shows by venue, Glasgow would definitely come last. The inside of the Royal Concert Hall certainly matched the outside in terms of its severe, utilitarian style, with a so-called bar that looked more like the cafeteria of my Sussex University department’s common room in the mid 90s than something fit for a symphony hall. However, by that point the chemistry between the band and the orchestra was absolutely perfect and finely tuned after three shows. Shame that Glasgow was the last U.K. show and that the orchestra would change in Utrecht.
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Glasgow, Scotland - but no kilt in sight |
Utrecht
If Glasgow was the worst venue, Utrecht was my favourite. The Tivoli is a truly beautiful theatre, with the stage located ‘in the round’, and despite a large overall capacity, the venue has a very intimate vibe. My Facebook status from that night confirms my memories of Utrecht being the best show of the whole tour - best venue, best atmosphere, an utterly flawless performance by the band, not to mention the best crowd made up by the most respectful Hanson fans I’d come across in a long time. It’s always hard to pinpoint what makes a show better than another: to use the title of a famous Queen song, ‘it’s a kind of magic’, of the type that Hanson can do so well when they want to. If they could turn it into a product, bottle it and sell it, the world would certainly be a better place.
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| A perfect show at the Tivoli |
Brussels
The last show always carries a certain bittersweet quality and Brussels was no exception. As the opening notes of String Theory began to fill the theatre, I knew that it was the last time I’d hear an orchestra play Hanson songs for a long time. My everlasting memory of the final show of the tour, unfortunately, is the moment something went majorly wrong at the beginning of “Siren Call”: from where I was looking, it looked as if the orchestra had messed up - possibly having started too soon. Taylor turned to look at the conductor with a “WTF” expression, and from a video that a friend showed me recently, you can clearly see Zac also doing the same. They eventually rescued it, but it’s a shame that it happened in the first place. I guess that’s the risk the band took when they decided to play with orchestras they’d only met for the first time at soundcheck.
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| After "No Rest" in Brussels |
The Overall Verdict
String Theory: Album vs Live
You can’t compare the two: with a real, live orchestra, String Theory fully comes to life, and the gimmicky nature of the recorded project is instantly forgotten, replaced by the rare auditory and visual treat of seeing a rock band play with a classical music slant. Trust me: seeing Hanson perform with the backing of a symphony orchestra is really a sight to behold and I challenge even the coldest hearted member of the audience not to get goosebumps.
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| The U.K. orchestra was rock'n'roll |
The Repetition Factor
People have asked me if it doesn’t get boring to see several shows with the same identical setlist. My answer was no: not yet anyway. It might get repetitive after a while, but with six shows, I had the chance to see the stage from different angles, getting a slightly different experience in terms of visuals and acoustics the opportunity to focus on different songs and catch nuances I had missed before. Would I feel the same if I saw the show ten, fifteen, twenty times? Probably not, but I would certainly see the show again if Hanson brought it back as a one-off, something they clearly hinted at on several occasions. Now that String Theory has been tried and tested on the road, all that Hanson need to do is to find a venue and an orchestra, get on stage and play. Come to think of it, String Theory is like cake mix: you keep a box of Betty Crocker in the pantry, knowing that all you need is a couple of eggs to whip up a cake at a moment’s notice.
A Non-Story
The one element of String Theory that didn’t really work for me was the through story with the boy as the protagonist. Aside from the frankly unoriginal theme, I found the connection between the narrative and the songs tenuous at most. Want some String Theory Sparknotes? Act I: Struggling! - Act II: Fighting Back! There: that’s all you need to know to pass the test.
The Audience
Hanson wanted to make String Theory a special experience for fans: seated shows and music to listen to and enjoy in a different way from the usual GA show. They even say that at the introduction of every concert: I don’t have an exact transcript but the gist of it is, ‘sit down and be quiet until we tell you to stand up, three songs from the end’. Unfortunately, a lot of fans are unable to adapt to a different concert setting, and think it’s perfectly okay to stand up and block somebody’s view when everybody else is sitting down. Some people also think it’s perfectly acceptable to catcall the band members, ‘Zac, I love you!’, ‘Taylor, you’re so hot!’ - in the middle of a song. And it’s a depressing sign of the times when it becomes more important to have a photo of yourself with the band in the background, than to show respect to them as they are playing a show.
Unfortunately, this is the state of things and all you can do in those situations is grin and bear it, and maybe hope that security will do their job. You can’t argue with inconsiderate people and to make matters worse, we live in a Kardashianised, Instagram-obsessed world. But I can’t help wondering what Hanson are really thinking when they see their audience treat their life long dream symphony project like a bachelorette party.
Conclusions
It’s clear that Hanson love String Theory: their passion for the project clearly came across at every single one of the performances I saw. Would I see it again? Of course: and I hope Hanson will bring it back, maybe as a one-off show here and there, maybe in between regular concerts - in a reversal of this year’s UK tour with the show in Nottingham. String Theory was more than just a series of shows - it was a whole different experience, and I loved the fact that we could dress up and rock up to our seats fifteen minutes before a show, without having to queue for hours. We don’t often get seated shows in Europe and that was definitely part of the fun. But I’m looking forward to having the ‘real’ Hanson experience again too and Nottingham certainly whet my appetite in that respect. So let’s hope a new album is in the making because, for all the bells and whistles, you really can’t beat the alchemy of Hanson, Andrew and Dimitrius and a bunch of new songs - live on stage playing to a packed standing crowd. Didn’t I tell you? It’s a kind of magic.
Hanson will be performing String Theory in Tulsa on 17th May 2019 (sold out).
As always, love reading your commentary! This post made me wonder about Hanson's decision to produce the String Theory album the way they did. I had previously assumed that they went the route of mixing separately recorded orchestra parts with old tracks and a few new vocals (instead of recording and releasing a live performance) because it would allow them to finish the album in time to sell it while they were on the tour. In other words, prioritizing an opportunity for short-term financial gain over making a better piece of art.
ReplyDeleteBut reading your post, I wonder if between the unruly fan behavior (ugh), and the short amount of time they had with most of the orchestras to prep for and rehearse the performances, they weren't confident that any of the shows would provide the quality needed for a live recording--or, that they might not be able to predict ahead of time which one(s) would turn out to be worth recording and releasing.
I still think the ST album is a (to borrow our mutual friend's description) disappointing Frankenstein monster of a recording, and that I would have preferred a release that captured at least some of the spirit of the live performances. But the idea that Hanson approached it this way for reasons other than sheer laziness and/or greed is at least a little reassuring.