Davenport, Iowa singer-songwriter and two-time Grammy-nominated artist Julia Michaels is ending her music year off on a great note based on her recent two-part EP release Inner Monologues: Part One and Inner Monologues: Part Two. The first EP featured guest verses from notable pop acts like Selena Gomez and Niall Horan, and her second EP persists her strengths on doing songs independently and having the right vocal performances and abilities to cater to each message. Along with being an opener to Pink’s Beautiful Trauma World Tour earlier this year, she decided to initiate her own headlining tour of her, entitled the Inner Monologues tour. During her time in Toronto, she decided to perform in one of the city’s best venues, which was the Phoenix Concert Theatre. As excited as I was, since I respect her as a songwriter and her debut EP was one of the best projects I’ve heard from a pop artist in a while, I am excited to hear and find out if she can perform well live and she does.
Starting off to open her show was soul singer, Rhys Lewis. He came by with only his pianist and started to perform quite well with the Toronto audience. He performed a unique set of love and sad songs for the crowd, and they enjoyed the set that he put out. He delivered some unique vocals with his exquisite vocal range and managed to hit every right now, as expected. He can play the guitar very well and did exactly what he was supposed to, with his great delivery and unique pitch for his style. The emotion and feelings that he pours out into every lyric and every track suggest that he has a deeper level of understanding and connectivity of how he portrays his music and such. The lighting and production settings were also good, making it a pretty good set in my opinion. I’m also excited to hear more music from him in the future.
Before her set started, a rep from Julia Michaels’ team installed a posted stand on the centre of the stage, entitled Julia Michaels’ Judgement-Free Zone. The sign was a means to encourage the fans to sing, dance, laugh, jump, and feel whatever vibes are needed for the show. It was also a way for fans and other people to not be judgemental and to have a great time, for the entire show. In my opinion, the setup of the stage was very unique and it made the lighting and stage production a hundred times better.
Once it all started, Julia Michaels came with a four-piece orchestration band and they brought a variety of talents along with their performance. The songs that she performed, such as “Pink, Make It up to You,” “Worst in Me” and “Heaven,” really captivated her teenage and adult female fan base and she brought a lot of creativity and colour to her stage production and wardrobe. She seemed to have a lot of energy when she was on the stage and she moved a lot in the crowd and did a lot of stage participation with her bandmates. Julia is an amazing vocalist and brings so much innocence and unique energies to her songs and she has a captivating and positive style to her emotions. Her fans were the only ones that sang every line, brought their happiness and energy to perform with her, and elevated their vocal performances while she was performing on stage. With the variety of songs that she performed, like “Deep,” “Into You,” “Hurt Again” and “Happy.”
Michaels relied strongly on band production to initiate each emotion she brings into each lyric and every verse. She seemed comfortable with the way she dressed and didn’t care about the negative energies. She truly seemed to care about bringing a great show and making sure that every fan is happy and comfortable in the state that they’re living. Furthermore, she stated that every fan that came was very important and that every old and new fan deserves a lot of importance for coming to the show and joining along to sing every song she performed. At the end of her set, she performed her most-well known song that everyone sang, which was “Issues” and it turned out to be one of the best shows I’ve seen so far. Julia Michaels will continue the Inner Monologues tour until November 23rd, 2019 at the Tecate Bajio in Leon, Mexico. You can find out more at http://www.juliamichaelsofficial.com/tour.
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Julia Michaels
Rhys Lewis
By: Joshua Habtwold | Exclusively for @Music, Why Not!
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