"tour de force"

Reviewed Item: Glam Nation Live DVD, by Adam Lambert
Reviewer: C Smith

These days it seems like so much pop music is autotuned and engineered that all life and reality is drained out of it. Then, along comes Adam Lambert to turn the industry on its head. Listening to the CD it is easy to think it is another crafted studio production piece with an added fake audience track. Not because it is lifeless, but because it is that good, that polished, that flawless! This was recorded one night about three months into a grueling national/international tour. No combining of the best of 10 concerts shot. No second takes. No studio magic. No editing except for camera angles and the brief pauses between some numbers (for the audience to go crazy.) This guy performed these vocals this amazingly, live!

The impressive range we have come to expect with Lambert is there. The soaring vocals. The rock edge. The high energy. The jaw-dropping ballads. The flawless delivery. The sense of joy and fun. It sounds too good to be live -- but it is. Then, when you watch the DVD you add the showmanship, the costumes, the dancers, the staging, the audience interaction, the camp, and the non-stop momentum. All this from a new artist on his first head-lining tour, off his first album.

This guy is the real deal! The effortlessness of the performance comes from many years of rigorous vocal training and performance experience on musical theater stages, in underground indie clubs, on the set of reality TV, and even on vacation cruise ships. He has paid his dues, he knows his craft and it shows.

Lambert is going to have a long and successful career. We are lucky to have this performance available as a baseline for where he will go and what he will do. And to show other pop singers how it is done. Bravo!