Over the weekend of Rihanna's New Jersey concerts; Atlantic City (26/4/13) and Newark
(28/4/13) the UK took up the reigns of attempting to knock Rihanna off
balance and ruin the shows. Primarily this centred around UK boyband
"The Wanted" releasing previews of their new single entitled "Walks Like
Rihanna." Featuring lyrics like; "She can't dance, she can't sing but
she walks like Rihanna" this is hardly complementary towards Rihanna.
However what Rihanna should be more worried about is that towards the
end of 2012 The Wanted recorded a single with Chris Brown but have since
declined to release it because Chris Brown is now pure brand poison and
they didn't want their reputation damaged by being associated with him.
Also UK pop mogul Simon Cowell has clearly got a sulk on about Rihanna's
failure to take him up on his invitation to meet up while they were
both holidaying in Barbados over the Christmas period. Therefore the
tone of the new single by 2011 UK series of X-Factor and notorious
Rihanna stalkers "Little Mix" "How Ya Doin" is very much "Don't call us
we'll call you." On Saturday (27/4/13) Simon Cowell judged an episode
the TV talent show "Britain's Got Talent" on which Asanda Jezile
performed a version of Rihanna's song "Diamonds." As Jezile is only 12
years old this prompted a minor scandal about Rihanna sexualising her
young fans and exposing them to drug references. Fortunately no-one
watches Britain's Got Talent so this was really only noticed by readers
of the UK's "Daily Star" newspaper.
Mainly because she was unlikely to have heard about any of this Rihanna didn't allow this to affect her Newark
concert in any way. She arrived on the standard stage at around 22:00
(local) and competently worked her way through the standard set-list and
costume changes although I don't know the exact running order for what
was a vocally strong performance. The only complaint was that Rihanna
seemed aloof and disinterested throughout. This should hardly come as
much of a surprise because we are at the fag end of the US leg of the
tour and trust me once you've performed this as many times as Rihanna
has and watched it as many times as I have it becomes really difficult
to get excited about it.
Ahead of Monday's (29/4/13) Washington DC concert disruption
duties had been firmly handed back to the Americans who led primarily
with the first day full day of the Micheal Jackson wrongful death suit.
I've already explained at great length how the Jackson families highly
questionable grounds for bringing this suit puts great pressure on
everyone in the California based entertainment industry and puts
specific pressure on Rihanna, Chris Brown and I through metaphorical
references to us. However what I found interesting is that the Jackson
family lawyers have given up alluding to Rihanna's concert promoters
Live Nation and instead have started naming them specifically. The
Jackson family argument is now that the pressure of competing with Live
Nation forced rival concert promoter AEG to disregard Micheal Jackson's
safety in order to go ahead with the "This Is It" tour.
The other main pressure ahead of the Washington DC concert was that it
was attended by Malia Obama - the daughter of US President Barack Obama.
That obviously should have been hugely embarrassing for Rihanna because
she spent most of late-2012 campaigning for Barack Obama's rival Mitt
Romney. It should though have given Rihanna's CIA handlers a moment for
pause by reminding them that the objectives they plan for through their
Rihanna operations simply do not get achieved. Therefore they should
stop annoying everyone by trying. It also raises an interesting question
for President Obama - namely if one of his daughters was being treated
as badly as Rihanna would he still be prepared to overlook it.
Again Rihanna didn't let this affect her performance delivering a
vocally strong and competent performance featuring the standard set-list
and costume changes although again I'm not sure of the exact running
order. Although Rihanna actually managed to arrive on stage early at
around 21:30 (local) the main complaint was that she seemed aloof and
disinterested. However again this is understandable especially as I've
just noticed the notes I made for Rihanna's Washington DC performance
are exactly the same as the notes I made for her Newark performance. On
this occasion Rihanna's aloofness did seem to be slipping into a
contempt for her fans so it might be an idea for her to remember that
the problem with this tour is the management not the fans.
As the US leg draws to a close Rihanna's management seem intent on
creating even more problems. Firstly it is now less than a week until
Rihanna is scheduled to play her rescheduled Boston concert and
Live Nation have yet to announce the cancellation of that concert
despite most everyone in the industry dropping major f*cking hints. The
reason for this boneheaded stupidity is that Live Nation seem to be
under the impression that the Boston concert will help boost customers
for the US TV showing and international DVD release of the documentary
on Rihanna's "777 Tour." I've not seen this documentary but those
who have inform me it is a complete PR gloss job that will be
unrecognisable to anyone who was actually involved in the 777 Tour.
For example it will make no reference to how that tour was used to apply
pressure to all parties involved in Israel's "Pillars of Cloud"
operation against Palestine in November 2012. Fortunately the Israelis
have decided to remind everybody of this by launching air-strikes
against Gaza over the weekend prompting the inevitable retaliation from
Gaza. Today Israel assassinated the person they claim was responsible
for the retaliatory strike. By local standards this is all very minor a
simply serves as an Israeli reminder to Rihanna's CIA handlers that the
operations in Mali and Syria are far too important to be jeopardised by
any Chris Brown related nonsense.
The big problem over the coming weeks is of course going to be Chris
Brown who celebrates his birthday on May 5th. So regardless of whether
Rihanna finishes her tour in Brooklyn (5/5/13) or Boston
(6/5/13) there is a lot of speculation that Rihanna and Chris Brown will
reunite to celebrate his birthday and Rihanna's three week break. This
speculation includes discussion about whether Brown's 'father' (read as
CIA handler) approves of the relationship and what present Rihanna will
be giving Brown. The tour has obviously been scheduled this way so Chris
Brown and Rihanna appearing together will promote discussion about
forced marriage and honour killing ahead of the Morocco (24/5/13) concert. However as everybody already knows this is the CIA's game it's unlikely to actually happen.
Therefore the main reason that I think Rihanna and Chris Brown should be
kept separate during the tour break is that after contact with Chris
Brown Rihanna becomes significantly more stupid. For example she's
barely recovered intellectually from her last exposure at the beginning
of April. Rihanna is really going to need her game head on for the
Morocco concert and Chris Brown will jeopardise that so it's simply a
case of him being banned from contact with Rihanna. Fortunately Brown
has already announced that he will be in Las Vegas, Nevada for the
weekend of this birthday (4-5/5/13). I suggest he stays there for the
duration of the tour break so Rihanna can use any of the other 49 states
to rest, recover and prepare. If she gets really desperate she could
even fly over to my cousins wedding. I mean what with the M63 hen-party
crash and the Essex hotel swimming pool deaths it couldn't really get
more weird.
17:00 on 30/4/13.
Edited at around 19:00 on 30/4/13 to add: I'm back from the pub but there's not going to be a massive rewrite.
However I should point out that Chris Brown and Rihanna reuniting during
her tour break will spark another round of those "Is Rihanna pregnant
rumours." This is unlikely to have much impact on anyone in the business
because if that's how Rihanna's handlers want to put her out that's
their business. It is though likely to increase pressure on the tour
party increasing the risk of screwed up shows.
Also at the time Live Nation were arranging the South Africa concerts
they were trying to set up a concert in Israel. However the Israelis
turned them down. Other nations could learn a lot from that example.
(Originally Posted on 30/4/13)
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