REVIEW: Generation Z and the weather make way for a big celebration at the music festival

BETHLEHEM, Pennsylvania – It was a night of excitement for Generation Z when Big Time Rush took to the Steel Stage main stage at Musikfest on Friday.

Crowds of pop fans flocked to the festival’s first clear night since the pride of Deluth (as described on Nickelodeon’s 2009-2013 television show “Big Time Rush”—none of the singers were actually born in Minnesota) seemed like an eternity ago.

It was an instant party as the crowd jumped to their feet in celebration. A warm-up with opening acts Sorelle and Crash Adams got the crowd in the mood before they worked their way through Nickelodeon-era hits and new bops.

The quartet is now all in their early thirties, and band members Kendall Schmidt, James Maslow, Carlos PenaVega and Logan Henderson seem to get along well with each other.

All four appeared on stage together, with none of them particularly in the spotlight, but Maslow and Handerson often came close.

Jay Bradley

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LehighValleyNews.com

It was the group’s second time in the area and their pandemic-era revival continues to catapult them into a touring act that is as energetic as it is nostalgic.

One could argue that other music fest acts this year are also focusing on millennial nostalgia (Ludacris and the Black Eyed Peas) or their parents’ nostalgia (ZZ Top, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Slash).

But on Friday night? The majority of the audience seemed to be roughly in the “mid-twenties” age group who had followed the band’s initial rise on the Nickelodeon show.

As if to spit in the face of Friday’s severe weather warning, the band took advantage of the clearing weather to rile up the crowd even more.

“Bethlehem! We missed you so much that we had to come back to hear more,” PenaVega shouted to the crowd.

“It’s not raining anymore, so we’re going to give it our all tonight,” Henderson added.

After three full-length albums, four seasons of television series, a feature-length television movie and a nearly decade-long hiatus, the group is back in full force with a fourth album, “Another Life,” released last year, and nearly nonstop touring since the group’s revival in 2021.

Yes, their sound is a bit childish. Yes, the group seems and always has seemed like an artificially created band (because that’s what it was).

But! That doesn’t mean that their songs aren’t fun or that the audience didn’t have fun.

New and old sounds mix

Dozens of handmade signs from the audience – and from some fans who admitted to having seen the group more than a dozen times – were brought onstage for an acoustic performance of the song “Worldwide.”

At the front, a “Fan since 2009” sign was proudly displayed and other fans wore the iconic “tree hats” from the show.

Jay Bradley

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LehighValleyNews.com

And the setlist seemed designed to satisfy those loyal fans, with more than half of the songs coming from the group’s first two albums.

For a listener who had only a vague memory of what was and wasn’t on the band’s first release, the new songs fit well with the old ones.

And the group’s vocals and performances still rival the music released at the time the show aired.

A real highlight were the harmonies of the acoustic versions of “Cover Girl”, “Ask You Tonight” and “Worldwide”.

A triumphant encore with three songs, including “Till I Forget About You,” “Big Time Rush,” and “Boyfriend,” finally broke the tension.

The instrumentalists played well and the energy remained high throughout.

The choreography was simple and not too flashy, but enough to maintain the dynamic of the stage.

The background video for the stage was essentially something generic that you would find at the end of a YouTube video. But that’s not what you’d see at a Sweetheart Group concert in early 2010 anyway.

Will Big Time Rush win a Grammy for these compositions? Probably not.

However, for those who went out to have fun or to reminisce about one of their favorite childhood shows, it was no less a special evening.

Reference to future work

The band hinted at big news for the future, including a possible return to the big screen.

“I can neither confirm nor deny that we may be working on a Big Time Rush movie,” PenaVega said. “But you didn’t hear that from me.”

“I can neither confirm nor deny that.”

However, Maslow confirmed that the group is working on a new album.

Supporting groups fit well together

The lovely three-part, light pop harmony vocals of Ohio’s Sorelle Trio paired well with the pretty pop-rock of Toronto’s Crash Adams as a warm-up to BTR, which you could say meets in the middle.

The members of Sorelle expressed their gratitude for the opportunity and said that it was their first really big live show since participating in the 23rd season of the television show “The Voice”.

Both groups made a point of using their social media presence and antics to encourage others to follow them in the future. While this sometimes distracted from the show, it can be forgiven for artists who depend on it.

Both groups, especially Crash Adams singer Rafaele Massarelli, kept the audience engaged and enthralled.

A favorite moment with the crowd was when they asked if there were any rappers in the audience and rap artist RMS joined them on stage for a freestyle verse.

Overall, the show is satisfactory for anyone who wants to have fun without a lot of hype.

Now we can only hope that the weather will remain as bad on the last days of the music festival as it was at this concert.