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Justin Timberlake fell in love with Israel, and the feeling is
mutual
With great dances
and perfect performances of his biggest hits, American pop star rocks
audience of more than 40,000 people at Tel Aviv's Yarkon Park for nearly
two hours.
Oh, don't we
Israelis just love to be blown away by live gestures on stage from the huge
international stars who visit our country year after year.
We roared so much on
Wednesday night when Justin Timberlake got on
the stage at Tel Aviv's Yarkon Park and shouted, in Hebrew, "Yalla
balagan," "I love you all" and "Shalom Tel Aviv."
We often view these
shouts, in the reviews too, as the highlight of the show. But Timberlake
cannot be summed up by a few inarticulate sentences in Hebrew. He brought
much more than that to the park. Unlike another equally big star who came
here a short while ago and disappointed us big time – I'm talking about Rihanna, of course –
Justin Timberlake did come to work.
In the very first
songs, despite a slightly drowsy opening, one could see the homogeneity
characterizing him and everything else taking place on stage: He adjusts
himself perfectly to the successful big-band orchestra backing him, and
sings in perfect harmony with the excellent backing vocalists which rock
the audience together with him.
And we must not
forget that Justin Timberlake is a great dancer. Because of that, he
integrates perfectly with the three male dancers and three female dancers,
who appear to have worked on each step for months, and should have arrived
with a sign reading: "Don't try this at home, you'll break your
head."
Back to the music:
Some of the songs from Timberlake's' regular set list in this concert tour
were not performed at Yarkon Park, but he did not spare the Israeli
audience from his greatest hits. "Like I Love You,"
"Señorita," "Cry Me a River" and, of course,
"SexyBack" and "Mirrors," which concluded the show,
lifted the unending swarm of fans up in the air. Even the less familiar songs
were exciting, thanks to the excellent performance.
And I must commend
Justin's spine-tingling, accurate performance of Michael Jackson's
"Human Nature." There is a reason why this prince is seen by some
as the successor of the King of Pop.
We do!
Let’s go back to
Timberlake's gestures for a minute. Despite being a calculated and
well-organized show, accompanied by great videos which add a lot to the
performance, it’s not a mechanical show like one could argue about Madonna,
Lady Gaga or Britney Spears' concerts.
It has some
spontaneity as well, which we witnessed in the first part of the show when
a guy standing at the first row held a sign with a marriage proposal he had
promised his girlfriend only if Justin posed for a picture with the two of
them.
Timberlake
immediately got off the stage, provided the required selfie, and went back
up. It doesn't matter that those two were actually a married couple which
staged the entire scene. The roars and satisfaction and excitement among
the audience proved that it was a real source of enjoyment for tens of
thousands of people, and even for a singer who came to enjoy his big night
in front of the Tel Aviv audience.
And that was perhaps
the main story of the night. Justin Timberlake, probably the biggest lover
in world pop, did not only come to work for us. He came to enjoy himself as
well. And that was evident without any particular effort:
Armed with a hat
which only left his head when he bowed to the audience, he sang, danced,
jumped and mainly laughed and smiled with the audience which fell in love
with him – and it appeared to be mutual.
What else can I add?
Let's hope that each of the shows arriving in Israel this summer will be as
successful as Justin Timberlake's.
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