2NE1 / Girl Power

2NE1 showed off the right stuff

SINGAPORE – It was a weekend of K-pop fever. But to the thousands of fans who waited patiently for 2NE1 to come out on Saturday night at the Singapore Indoor Stadium, Psy hardly figured.

When the fantastic foursome finally burst onto the stage with their hit, I Am The Best, the crowd went wild, waving their light sticks with manic force. 2NE1 felt the love for sure.

Despite being on their first global tour, the girls exuded enough confidence to almost match their YG Entertainment seniors Big Bang. Throughout the two-and-a-half-hour concert, they churned out several of their urban pop tracks like I Don’t Care, Fire and their newest hit I Love You.

There was plenty of spectacle and pageantry. The set, for one, included inflatable slides and explosive pyrotechnics. The stage was even converted into an LED rollercoaster during leader CL’s and Minzy’s duet Please Don’t Go.

Sure at some points, the vocal chops weren’t quite solid as they sounded a little shaky. The choreography wasn’t executed to a finish and ballads fell a little flat but the foursome more than made up for these shortcomings when it came to their more energetic songs.

2NE1’s leader CL took charge of interacting with the audience and presented the most charisma and confidence. During her solo spot, she mock-DJ’ed to Girls Just Wanna Have Fun and Rihanna’s We Found Love. She wasn’t fooling anyone, but it was definitely something different and it got the crowd pumped up.

Member Dara also had a solo bit where she brought a lucky male fan up onstage during her performance of Kiss. She teased, “Where should I kiss him? On the lips?”, but in the end, the guy walked away with only a small peck on the cheek. Hey, it was a K-pop concert. Strictly PG-13, okay?

Following this performance was a Kiss Cam filler that didn’t see much kissing going on either. The Singapore audience didn’t really get it and most of them were too young anyway to partake in such things (at leastin public).

A highlight for this writer was when the band performed Pretty Boy and their dancers took off their shirts and paraded around the stage in inflatable, transparent balls. Memories of Abercrombie & Fitch’s opening in Singapore came to mind. CL, Dara, Bom and Minzy expressed how bittersweet it was that Singapore was their last stop. They got the audience to take a picture with them and offered a post-encore encore of I Love You as demanded by their fans. Boy, do these girls know the way to a fan’s heart.

Source: TODAYonline