Act of liberation behind the pandemic mists (and in the face of other floating threats), with gender pride and ‘black power’, sensuality and ‘cyborg’ sex, and a rarely seen video screen, and a trip to the galaxies, and a papier-mâché horse, and a giant oyster from whose interior she came out. Yes, Beyoncé, in imperial mode, giving entertainment on a grand scale on the back of that little revolutionary but overwhelming album called ‘Renaissance’, this Thursday on his return to the Estadi Olímpic (55,000 tickets sold out as soon as they went on sale, last February).
Generous concert (long thirty songs, and transitions that were ‘performances’ in themselves), with up to six different blocks on which Queen Bey gracefully rode on her high heels, delighted to ‘normaduvalise’ and to show herself as a ‘sleeping Venus’ (work of the Renaissance Giorgione), and at the same time integrating into a ‘show’ capable of taking away the hiccups, rich in brightness, sensationalism and inventiveness. Which began (half an hour late) with the ballads section, soft and close, still in daylight: from the distant ‘Dangerously in love’ to the tina turner tribute in a slowed down ‘River deep, mountain high’ that, all told, will not make history. A lot of messages of gratitude to the public, like the folkloric songs of before: “for your loyalty”, “for your love”.
The echo of the house
The best was yet to come: the immersion in that stunning ‘Renaissance’, which for the moment shook us with the sensual r’n’b of ‘I’m that girl’ and the, parody?, of the glamor of ‘Cozy’ (“yatchin’ in Capri”). Leafy 90s house bases (the climactic ‘Break my soul’), nods to Diana Ross (‘Love hangover’, approached by the showgirls) and some silky intimacy (‘Plastic off the sofa’), reminding us that Beyoncé has taken a step back in sound innovation compared to his two previous albums.
But ‘Renaissance’ is an album that doesn’t let up, even if it lacks a bit of human warmth, an observation applicable to the ‘show’, although the spectacularity and frenetic cadence of the live performance are such that you can forget about everything else. Perhaps Beyoncé is more gifted to dazzle than to excite, but, in addition to showing off his voice without going overboard with the trills, he provided several sequences to remember: the ‘afro’ moment around ‘Energy’, the retro-avant-garde in red of ‘Black parade’ or the gothic gospel touch of ‘Church’ girl’.
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All this, hardly depending on the ‘hits’ from previous albums: his most played song, ‘Halo’, was left out, although not a couple of numbers that have already completed two decades, ‘Crazy in love’ and ‘Naughty girl’. With these themes, and others of a new type such as ‘Heated’, Beyoncé consummated the conquest of the place in a concert in which banned press photographers and it prohibited journalists from entering computers in the Estadi, with which chronicles like this had to be written on a mobile.