My friend James, my sister and I went to see American Idiot on Broadway tonight despite already seeing it (me at Berkeley Rep, them on Broadway) and not loving it.
We went, of course, because like all middle-schoolers to whom “Basket Case” “spoke,” we weren’t about to miss this:
It was completely surreal to see a man who built a career on apathy love every minute of singing, acting (!), and dancing (!!) in his own Broadway show, and equally strange to hear an audience explode in cheers when an understudy was announced at the beginning of the show. They filmed the performance tonight, so hopefully there will be a DVD or MTV special of some kind documenting the chaos.
Billie Joe or not, I do love this program insert:
You text, some machine texts back and asks if you’re over 13 and for your e mail address (then you’re signed up for their list), and then a text comes in that says, “Tomorrow u’ll get an e mail with a link to downlad ur live recording of a track from today’s show. Pls turn off ur cell now. Thanks & enjoy the show!”
As we were walking in tonight, we were wondering who would buy this cast album. Presumably, if people are there, they probably already own Green Day CDs, so why would they buy what is basically a cover album? This promotion to build their e mail list is great, though: you get a souvenir from your unique experience at the musical, they get your e mail address, and maybe you like your free track so much that you’re inspired to buy the album to re-live the whole thing. This would also be a fantastic promotion for an artist or orchestra if they were brave enough to do it. So often, it’s a challenge for musicians to tour the exact repertoire that’s been recently released on CD, and yet that’s exactly the CD people want to buy after concerts. If that’s not possible, why not use a free track to collect their information, so when you do release an album of the repertoire they saw live, you know how to tell them about it.
Also, dear Nonesuch Records and A Little Night Music producers: please copy this idea so I can have a live version of Bernadette Peters singing “Send in the Clowns”.
Fans waiting at the stage door of the St. James theater after the show tonight:
