Ben Folds and yMusic Live Review

Ben Folds and yMusic Live Review | King Center, Melbourne, FL | Thursday, April 21, 2016

by • April 28, 2016

There is no un-weird way to put this, but I am a Ben Folds “stan.” In the last 12 years, I’ve seen the guy seven times in three states in several different musical arrangements. I’ve seen Ben solo in a gymnasium at a small college, I’ve seen him everywhere from Hard Rock, to Bonnaroo, to the University of Michigan auditorium, and a few places in between. I’ve logged a good amount of miles chasing the only key tickler that has ever garnered my attention through and through. When he announced that his tour with yMusic would be stopping in my once removed hometown of Melbourne, FL, at the King Center (my high school prom venue) I was embarrassingly excited at, one, the opportunity to see Ben Folds again and, two, the fact I didn’t have to plot a debt-inducing regional escapade just to see my all time favorite artist.

Sidenote: I actually did have to rush from downtown Orlando to Melbourne at the exact moment I finished playing Florida Music Festival circa 7:00p.m. with my band Gary Lazer Eyes (shameless plug). So I kind of lied. I had to plan a local/regional shitscapade around central Florida. The show was at 8:00p.m., and when all was said and done I had missed the opener and was decently drunk with a photo pass and a camera (who the f*ck gave me these?). With another whiskey in tow, I did the whole first three song photo pass thing. Bear crawling like a shitty punter on a shitty high school football team at the front of the stage, I met a dude claiming to be a contributor to Maxim, Rolling Stone, and Brevard Nightlife (hmm…). He thought he recognized me from shooting Ben at Bonnaroo last summer. Nah dude. I was shitfaced in the back breathing in freshly lit sage, courtesy of a sunburnt girl wearing a knitted top she’d just bought from another girl in a knitted top because she threw up on her dads Grateful Dead t-shirt last night. “Yeah dude, maybe I know you from there!”

I did have the opportunity to catch Ben with yMusic at Bonnaroo this summer, I was … unaware of my surroundings let alone the music being played on stage. I’d also just darted from having my pea brain blown at Alabama Shakes’ main stage set where I had, in my mind, decidedly quit playing guitar and singing forever. As I began to watch the show, the six piece orchestra from New York began to increase the overwhelming feeling of musical inadequacy. Under a setting Bonnaroo sun, I retreat to the back of Ben Folds temporary stage and lay gazing at a hazy Tennessee sky while he and yMusic finesse themselves a most uniquely beautiful show. When I woke up, it was dark and cold and somebody else was playing? I don’t know … shit that’s kind of all I remember.

After spending the first three songs trying to figure out how to work a camera in 2016 and doing enough squatted running to leave me sore, I digressed to my seat. Ben mixed in a nice array of tunes from his new album, So There, featuring yMusic as a backing band. He also played some classic Ben Folds Five and solo hits that had the whole crowd in a tizzy. If you’ve ever been to a Folds show, you’ll know that during a couple songs, he likes to play conductor on the crowd getting everybody involved — happening in songs like “Army” and “Not The Same”. I don’t mean to brag, but I think there was a healthy amount of musicians in the room that night because our part on “Not The Same” was delicately spot on (even Ben was impressed). The mood in the room was not only set based on Ben’s presence, but the seven other musicians on stage who were making everybody in the room feel their feelings out loud. yMusic is a sensory pleasure, the palpable sound from the strings blends with the vibrant horns creating a percussively airy sensation that I definitely am not doing justice with words (what a writer).

I could see Ben play piano 365 nights a year and not get sick of it. And I’m sure, between all the members of yMusic, I could be perpetually awed and educated for the rest of my life. Ben Folds is the reason I took piano lessons in 9th grade with the questionable pianist from my family’s church who really only taught me two scales and the true meanings of awkward and claustrophobia. In turn, Folds is the reason I play guitar. Rushing from a stage that I played, to see the artist who inspired me to perform/play any music at all was a cool, kind of a corny, full circle moment.

I could write on and on about Ben and his accomplishments; from his early days with Ben Folds Five, his solo career, performing with several orchestras, putting out an album entirely of college acapella groups doing renditions of his songs, doing an album with Nick Hornsby, to collaborating with William Shatner. I said I could go on and on, and I meant it. Ben Folds is a well-respected yet surprisingly unrecognized artist that, based on talent, should be playing a floating piano in the sky above major arenas that fill for the likes of Elton and Billy. The best part about Ben is the organic feeling that comes from his performance, it’s his distinct voice or the fact that he does an well requested improvised “ROCK THIS BITCH!” at all of his live shows, specific to each city that makes his cheeky performance one-of-a-kind and a treat for all of my fellow “stans.”

Ben Folds Live Review by Sean Gray, edited by Matthew Weller.

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