Review: Lindsey Stirling’s The Music Box Tour

Last Friday I celebrated a first for me. I went and saw a concert put on by someone who made their career almost entirely off of YouTube. I am referring to Lindsey Stirling and for those who haven’t heard of her, here is the music video for her steampunk inspired song “Roundtable Rival”:

Described as a “hip-hop violinist“, Lindsey went from being rejected from America’s Got Talent to becoming one of YouTube’s biggest stars. She combines classical music from her violin playing with modern hip-hop/electronic dance music. She is probably best know for not just playing the violin in her music, but dancing with it, giving her a rather unique performance style and sound. Despite her popularity on the Internet I find it rare to meet someone “in real life” who has actually heard of her, but then again, who cares about what the “normies” think is cool. Nevertheless, I find her instrumental music quite enjoyable to listen to and she knows how to reach out to the geek crowd with her covers of videos game music from franchises like ZeldaAssassin’s Creed and Skyrim.

So when I learned that her Music Box tour was coming through Chicago, I bought tickets for my wife and I to see one of the few musical acts we both enjoy. The show was at the historic Chicago Theater, which I had only been too once before to see a Q&A with Kevin Smith. Trust me, if you get a chance, go see a show at the Chicago Theater. Its a beautiful and old (well, by American standards) theater from an era I previously covered in my last article about dieselpunk films. While waiting for the show to start, I found myself people watching and was surprised I couldn’t quite find a good category to put the crowd in. Lindsey seemed from my perspective to be attracting people of all different types and even the ration of men and women seemed rather equal.

Lindsey had two opening acts, Cailee Rae and Karmin, the later of which had a big hit a couple years in the form of “Brokenhearted“. Cailee was alright, but she lacked the pipes of Karmin’s lead singer Amy Renee Heidemann. My wife and I actually tracked down some their other songs on YouTube because they really started to grow on us during their set, especially for the alternative and rap influences on their general pop style.

Okay, enough up about the opening acts, how was Lindsey Stirling? Actually, she was great. Her entire performance was well-done with fantastic lighting, choreographed dances that must have taken days to get right and wonderful effects. Lindsey showed off many of her famous dance moves and played most of her big hits instead of just the tracks off her most recent album. As for the video game covers I mentioned earlier, she combined those into a “Nerd Melody” to appease those fans who always complain that she doesn’t play their favorite cover.

My wife enjoyed the performance as well. She has some experience with dance and tried to describe some of the moves she was doing using terminology I never heard of before. It went over my head, but if you can impress someone who knows a little bit about your profession, then that is pretty cool.

Admittedly I found it hard to believe at times she was actually playing the violin as she danced since some of those moves seemed so complicated it was hard to believe she could do them and play the song at the same time. Granted the music did sound less polished than what you would hear on one of her music videos, so perhaps I am just being cynical jerk. Even if some of the violin tracks were pre-recorded, it still was an entertaining show.

What else can I say but go watch a Lindsey Stirling music video if you haven’t had the chance already. I would like to point out this is the second time I have reviewed music on Amazing Stories (the first was Starbomb’s Player Select album) and I hope to do it again soon. There is a lot of great geeky music out there so don’t feel you have to listen to only what is popular.

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