Get The Hype Online!

John Legend, a man of many ironies, once sang about ordinary people but as the world has seen he is anything but ordinary. Walking in the light of swag and arrogance, but still persevering through humbleness is not an easy feat to take on, but somehow Mr. Legend continues to exist in a multitude of realms. Realms including but not limited to entrepreneurship, music, charity, and acting.

Before the interview, I had the privilege to view Mr. Legend in concert alongside India Arie. Before I get into what I thought about the concert, here is what Mr. Legend thinks about his own world tour. “The tour is really not just about this album, it’s about all three albums and even a couple of cover songs. It’s for the fans, if you’re a fan of me and want to hear all the music you’ve heard over the years we tried to put all of that in there as much as we can. And to put it together in a way that’s interesting, energetic, and soulful. I honestly think we put on one of the best shows in the industry.” Now in most cases I would have called Mr. Legend out for pumping his own tour up like that but honestly the tour was riveting and engaging. The show had all of the elements that he described and more. Everything from the lighting to the sound was simply amazing. One of the biggest things that held the audiences attention was the timing aspect of the show. Like most people, I have never been to a concert or showcase that started on time, but not Mr. Legend. The show started promptly on time and from beginning to end, the audience and myself were lost in time as we allowed the music to guide us on a journey through our own subconscious thoughts of past relationships, present loves, and resentment. The highlight of his performance was on the very last breath of his show. He performed “Ordinary People”. At this point everything and everyone on the stage was gone. The audience began to suspect that the show had just suddenly ended, but then a shimmer of light gleamed on to a Grand Piano and a white coated Mr. Legend sitting in front of it. Then he began the final, the best, and the most perfect performances of all time.

Though the show was seriously polished it wasn’t immaculate. The biggest objection within the show was not held by John’s performance but by his brothers’ performance. When John introduced his brother “Vaughn Anthony” to the audience, like most of the audience, we all expected to hear another vocal beast, but to our disappointment he wasn’t. You could see that most of the audience literally tuned out a whole three minutes of the show. But the moment John opened his mouth again everyone went wild. Now because he’s related to a musical genius, I did some research on his music and as it turns out his music is pretty nice. He needs some cleaning up, but overall I would buy his cd. I just hope he caught the flu or something for that boring performance. Next, Estelle was another guest artist in the concert and is the first person actually signed to Home school records owned by Mr. Legend himself. He says, “Estelle and Vaughn Anthony are the first two artists off of my label. Estelle is working on her second album right now and I’m real excited about it. She’s in the studio right now with some great producers. And Vaughn has been opening for me on tour, so you will see him if you come see the show. He’s an R&B artist somewhat similar to me, but he has his own kinda style as well...”Estelle turned out to be quite the surprise. She stood out from her background singing counter parts in a couple of numbers from the show. She defiantly hit the mark for beauty points; vocally she could have done better at executing her runs. Overall I enjoyed her as well.

The last component to this concert that cannot go overlooked is India Arie, or I should say the beginning because she opened the show. I dare any one to challenge the vocals that resonated from this soul mother’s voice. Her performance similar to Johns was completely enchanting. She took the audience through a rollercoaster of emotions as she sang hits from every album. She looked amazing, sounded amazing, and apparently has a good ear for singers because her back-up singers where vocally brilliantly in their harmonies. The Highlight of her performance was of course the last song, “I am Ready for Love.” The crowd was in chaos as soon as the tune began to play. At the very end of the song she called her mother out to the stage and passed her the microphone…..DAMN is all I could whisper to myself as I recognized were India’s gifts were born. Her mother can sang her butt off. John was on the same wave length as my sentiments saying, “I love being on tour with India. She’s one of the best singers I’ve ever seen live. I’ve seen a lot of artist perform live, some of them sound as good as they do on records and some sound better, but there are very few people that I feel are great singers and India’s one of them. I think she’s great to have on tour. It gives the fans a great packaging, when you spend as much money as people spend to come to our shows you don’t just want the headliner to be great you, you want the whole experience to be great!”Great is an understatement to the total consensus of the show, magnificent is more accurate!

As the interview progressed, I asked Mr. Legend, “Since you’ve accomplish so much in a lifetime, what would you consider to be your most memorable moment?” John answered,” Being apart of the election, the Inauguration was a lot of fun and certainly historical. Playing with Stevie Wonder at the BET awards in 2005 was a pretty big deal for me….and winning best new artist at the Grammys. Those are just a few. There have been many though…” Speaking of inaugurations, John played an important role in the campaigning efforts of the one and only Barack Obama. In April 2009, John spoke on behalf of the president at the University of Pennsylvania, his alma mater. He also performed at the 2008 Democratic National Convention in Denver, Colorado. As far as social endeavors are concerned, Mr. Legend has managed quite well over the years to not only continue to stay on top of the charts but to be socially aware as well. Mr. Legend has performed on numerous occasions globally, to benefit special charities. But the most impacting action that he is taking to end poverty worldwide is his Show Me Campaign. The Show Me Campaign was launched in 2008 and it encourages his fans to donate as much as they can to support the fight against poverty and to promote sustainable development.

Now to the good stuff, Mr. Legends personal life. Our society is deeply vested in the lives of celebrities, what are they doing, who their dating, and how they adopt their kids illegally… Luckily John hasn’t been one to be a constant headliner, but he does admit that his personal life does suffer, “Being a celebrity gives you less time to socialize and hang out. You really have to prioritize the people that are important to you and make sure you spend time with them, but a lot of the acquaintances that you have you really just don’t have time to spend with them. It makes you make choices because your free time is more precious and more valuable. Even the people that you really like to spend time with sometimes you just cant.” Sound a little lonely, but I’m sure screaming fans every night, limos, and a fat check compensates for a lot of that! As the world has seen, Mr. Legend continues to shield the world from his personal life, so I asked, “What is one thing that your fans don’t know about you?” From his moment of silence I could tell he was shocked by my question and contemplating just how to respond. He replied, “Everything they know about me is the stuff I want them to know Ha! If I haven’t spoken about it or it’s not in an article then it’s none of their business!”