With a polkadot shirt and a drum that had his face sultrily glued to its kick, Miles Francis felt like the weird theater kid that grew to understand “weird is awesome.” Everything about you that is eccentric and differently fun should be celebrated. You should wear polka-dotted pirate shirts, swing your hips and arms as if you are an inflatable balloon man, banter with your crowd as if you were buying rounds, and sing your higher notes like a magician pulling out a rabbit for a trick. Yes, I did use a lot of metaphors to describe Miles, but the man has a vision, and, at Baby’s All Right, he performed for us, but you got the feeling that he was in the cosmos.
It happens to me all the time, and I am SURE it happens to you: daydreams. One minute, you are watching a movie, and, the next, you see yourself in it. You imagine you are Anne Boleyn on the screen and telling Henry VIII to screw himself or you are watching Avatar and picturing how you would look in a new world with blue skin. For Miles, music is like a movie that he cannot stop picturing himself starring in, which is why his delivery of tracks like, “Popular” felt as visual as they were vocal. He was seeing himself as a protagonist, and every lyric was a scene closer to him getting a grand finale.
I have always said that the hardest part about being a performer is keeping your bold. People admire talent but love boldness. Why? Because, truthfully, there are so many talented people, but an artist is courageously gifted. They are the ones that light up their capacities like Christmas trees they leave on for the whole year. Francis did that throughout his show, and, frankly, people ARE DESPERATE to feel like they are in the presence of groove and fabulosity. In essence, now, more than ever, confidence is the key to success.
I feel like all of my concert reviews end with some type of analysis on how the pandemic changed live music, particularly because I felt like most artists and concerts, before, were all about sad music and how to be the bravest person to cry. Then, we had two years that, actually, left us in tears, and now people want artists that re-teach “the new them” to be confident. Miles Francis does exactly that. For more On Miles Click Here
