Philadelphia: Deborah Cox & Kenny Lattimore Live

I attended a free performance on Saturday at a place called Penns Landing, featuring two fantastic soul/r n b singers. (I doubt London would ever put on a free concert with a platinum-selling artist.)

The performance started at 3pm with other artists, but the headlining acts were on at about 7:30pm, so that's when I decided to turn up. I went with a friend and we were running a little late (say 30 minutes lol), but we still managed to catch some greatness. There were people of all ages there and almost everybody and their grandmother had brought their own foldaway chair!

Deborah Cox is gorgeous and amazing. I've been listening to her music since I was 12 or 13 (she got me at 'Sentimental') but this was the first time I had seen her live. I had heard some tracks from Kenny as well and loved his stuff; but as of last weekend I am OFFICIALLY a Kenny Lattimore fan.

Deborah was already on stage when we arrived and we could hear her belting out those notes as we made our way to the front: through a trail of people, down some steps, down some more steps, finally squeezing into a spot at the front somewhere. (The lady at the side, with the blonde hair, wasn't standing on anything - that's just how tall she was...I did wonder why she was so close when she was so tall...could have made more room for shorter people!).
Anyway. Deborah C was belting out those tracks! We caught her in the middle of a new song 'Did You Ever Love Me', from her new album The Promise. She then went on to sing 'We Can't Be Friends' (the track she did with R.L. from Next). I have a mini-clip and want to apologise for the distortion (I was too close to the speakers!)




The crowd were really into it, singing along and so happy to be there! It was great to watch DC charm the crowd, she was completely comfortable on stage and having a good time. Midway she paused to talk with the crowd and introduce the band. Legendary producer/songwriter Shep Crawford was there playing the keys! DC was even taking song requests. 'Same Script, Different Cast' was one of the final songs she performed (originally a duet with Whitney). Whitney was not there and though she didn't sing it all, DC held her own.

Her last song (to which there was an instant reaction from the crowd) was 'Nobody's Supposed To Be Here'. Due to lack of space on my camera, or my lack of good filming (can't remember which!) I wasn't able to get it all - but I did manage to get a miniclip to show exactly why Deborah Cox is still loved and why artists who can truly perform live are always the best! Take note RhiRhi (again I apologise for the minor distortion; just ignore that please):



Next up was Kenny Lattimore, smooth, cool Kenny:

*There was a woman with big hair in front of me, bobbing up and down to the music, so I didn't get as many (good) shots as I would have liked. But this is one of the few decent ones.

I'd never seen him perform either but he was also great. A real entertainer: charming (singing well and posing for shots at the same time - this man knows what he is doing!) and funny. Whilst plugging his latest album Timeless (a tribute to artists from before), he waxed lyrical on why it's so important to keep music like this alive (and I agree with him!)

He came on performing Days Like This, he was filled with so much energy; he was fun to watch:



Really enjoying himself on stage, somehow in singing and dancing on stage he managed to remove his sunglasses and hat:
He also performed Never Too Busy and For You, songs requested by the audience. My camera died on me, so had to take the next few mini clips with my BB phone (which doesn't do his voice justice at all!) A snippet of For You which went down extremely well with the audience and myself (I think I found my wedding song!):



As he performed this song I caught a lady in the audience sobbing her heart out:

He also performed some tracks from the latest album: You Are My Starship, It Aint No Use and Everybody Here Wants You (beautiful song!):


*The distortion on the high note was the fault of my BB camera - not the vocalist.


A lot of the audience were shouting out Michael Jackson songs for him to perform, so he did a little tribute:



Closing with Weekend, the hat found its way back on his head:
Next came the jacket:
And finally the glasses:

Afterwards we went to get something to eat and ended up at a lovely little Malaysian restaurant in town. The thing about me and food is that I will often experiment and because this place had been reviewed so many times, I was confident:
When my meal came, it looked delicious (from a distance):
But on closer inspection, it started to look a little weird. I was trying out these noodles I'd never tasted before 'Pearl noodles' and my eyes just weren't appreciating their resemblance to a certain crawly thing:

And my tastebuds weren't really feeling the chewy texture either. I don't care what Time Out New York has to say about the 'irresistible chewy fat noodles'; I could resist:

And I did!