Maroon 5 Will Be Loved!

Maroon 5's love has taken its toll on me! Haha!

Last Wednesday, after a super busy day at the offfice, whose highlights include a super successful launch of the "Employee Appreciation Month" GP2W activities (The Chadwarts Quad Wizard Tourney), Mike and I went further up north (ahem Cubao) for the Maroon 5 concert. I felt a little guilty sneaking out of the office at 5:30pm. But I figured, I've been putting in a lot of overtime lately, so cut me some slack.

We arrived at Gateway mall past six. We had the parking fairy on our side. I had wanted to try a resto I've never tried before (Mike and I have both tried Ten Titas)... So we ended up eating at Italianni's. Haha. This was Mike's first time trying the olive oil, balsamic vinegar, and parmesan cheese combo. And my first time to be in the same resto as Katya Santos.

We ordered the Sicilian salad and the platter with pasta, ribs and fish wrapped in bacon. Yes Grouchy, I had a glass of wine and the table cloth was pretty decent.





After dinner, we went to Aranet for the concert. As expected, the show didn't start of time. The band didn't have a opening act, hence more time to watch the coliseum fill up with Maroon 5 fans. So we took some pictures while waiting.






I tried on Mike's glasses. Went pretty well with my black top. Although this whole get-up makes me look like a teacher.



Then the show started! The guys sang a good combination of songs from both albums, "Songs About Jane" and "It Won't Be Soon Before Long". It's pretty obvious that Mr. Levine has a huge fan base because for the their more popular songs where the crowd got to sing along, the girls' voices were pretty audible!

We were standing the entire time... which isn't exactly a long time, come to think of it. The entire concert was prolly 80 minutes long. They song almost all of the songs I wanted to hear, with the exception of "Nothing Lasts Forever".

My favorite performances though were "Won't Go Home Without You" and "She Will be Loved". For the first time, the crowd just sang with the band! And well, it's a fab fab fab song on its own. "She Will Be Loved" was Adam's moment. Haha... I can sooo see Mike rolling his eyes now, muttering under his breath "Nagpapacute lang yun." During one part of the song, he paused and was obviously overwhelmed at the warm reception and energy of the crowd. He stood there, spotlight on him, smiling. Waaaaaah.... All the girls just melted.









Overall, the concert was good. The band wasn't exactly the concert type of band. We would have equally enjoyed their performance in a smaller venue. They didn't have a lot of special effects or whatever. But they sound just as great. No huge regrets on what we spent (given the circumstances). Although if I had to do it all over again, I think I would have been more resourceful to look for someone from Smart to sell me tickets.

The band took a bow after their last song.



We also a couple of celebrities from afar. Regine and Ogie. Ann and Sam Milby. Macky said he saw Jericho and Heart (deng).

We waited till the crowd thinned out before leaving. So we had some more time for pictures.




We met up with Erik, Bibay, Macky, and Mau after the concert and the girls were swooning over Mr. Levine as well. We left Gateway a little past 1030pm, and we miraculously found our way back to EDSA.

I think this has been my most recent concert experience. The last one was Ben Folds (two years ago). The next one, I'm hoping, is Coldplay or The Police. Or Justin Timberlake? Madonna?