I had been looking forward to the Kanye West concert from the moment I heard he was coming. As I'm not really a hip-hop fan (I'm a fashion and style writer), it's West's status as the "Louis Vuitton Don" that fascinates me more than the music.
My friend and I were guessing what this "Man of the Year" of GQ magazine would wear for his Shanghai debut when we sat at Enoteca on Anfu Road for a glass of wine before the show. We arrived at about 8:15pm when Vaness Wu, a member of the popular Taiwanese boy band F4, opened the concert for West.
Wu's performance was surprisingly good, unsettling my generally negative thoughts about "pretty boys."
There was a long wait until the 10-time Grammy Award-winning American rapper finally appeared in a black and white jacket of camouflage-like print. He didn't wear his signature shutter shades, although many of his Shanghai fans did.
Indeed, the concert was one of the most exciting shows I have ever attended in Shanghai. The entire audience stood up from the very first song, stomping and shaking with West's style of beats, combining edgy pitched-up vocal samples and live band and instruments. Many of them climbed onto the chairs, which we tried as well, only to find them very likely to fall.
This reminded me of Beyonce's tepid concert last year - the atmosphere was quite the opposite of the mood at the West show. I still remember the R&B diva was so disappointed at the audience's indifference that she stopped half way.
West was received like a hero by his enthusiastic fans, many of whom, I guess, are also frequent partygoers at Muse, one of the city's most popular night haunts.
West brought to Shanghai almost all the smash hits from his trilogy of albums, like the introspective "Through the Wire" and "All Falls Down," the stunning "Diamonds from Sierra Leone," and other hits including "American Boy" and "Hey Mama."
Vaness Wu joined him in an innovative interpretation of "Good Life."
