Feeling Blue: The boys make a showing, finally
Hera Diani, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
First there was the gokart accident, and then came the SARS epidemic and the inevitable, foreboding travel warning.
So the Australian Embassy blast earlier this month could have been another good reason for British boyband Blue to delay their performance here for the third time.
While they were a long time coming, on Thursday night, to the delight of about 3,500 concert-goers, mostly teenagers, they finally made it to Bung Karno Indoor Stadium in Senayan, South Jakarta.
But was it worth the wait?
For it's a given at a boyband concert that fans will get hysterical at just a glimpse of their idols, regardless of the quality of the performance.
Even if Thursday's concert turned out to be perfunctory, bland and failed to camouflage the group's unemotional, generic and derivative songs, everybody understood. Or they did not really care.
However, despite a few sliding falsettos, at least the members of Blue showed they were not completely inferior in the vocal department.
There was no denying the harmonization was pretty neat, as they belted out their hits If You Come Back, Guilty, U Make Me Wanna, All Rise and One Love.
"We're very sorry for twice delaying our concert here. I hope we're not disappointing anyone. We apologize," said Duncan Matthew James, before singing Elton John's 1976 hit Sorry Seems to be the Hardest Word, together with three fellow members Antony Costa, Simon Webbe and Lee Ryan.
At the press conference earlier Thursday, promoter Adrie Subono of Java Musikindo made a rather strange appeal to journalists for them not to ask about the recent bombing.
"They only want questions related to music. So, please don't ask them about the bombing. It might ruin their mood on stage," Adrie said.
Perhaps the group has decided to dodge political questions, out of fear of making another insensitive comment that lands them in trouble.
Blue had many seeing red when Ryan, claiming to be the most outspoken member of the boyband, announced to the press that people were overreacting to the 9/11 attacks, and that saving animals, like the whales, was more important.
Ryan, whose injury in a gokart accident had led to the group calling off one of the previously scheduled Jakarta concerts, later apologized for the remark.
Adrie may have been particularly sensitive before the concert as two artists he invited to come, American young diva Alicia Keys and classical crossover quartet bond, called off their performances in the wake of the Sept. 9 bombing.
With just Blue left, perhaps it was a case of doing anything to keep the boys happy.
Initial tickets sales were slow, as many parents did not want to let their teens watch the show due to security fears, especially with rumors flying of a second blast about to happen.
Enter Australian pop singer Derek McDonald and Indonesian Idol runner up Delon as the added draw as opening acts.
The tactic worked; the concert was not a full house, but 3,500 of 5,000 tickets sold was pretty good, considering the circumstances.
McDonald received a lukewarm reaction, but Delon was greeted with shrieks and screams, even if he only sang two classic songs and one song of his own from his upcoming album.
Blue then took over, with minimal lighting, four dancers and a group of musicians.
As boybands go, it has to be said that Blue can hold its own among its peers.
They first came to public attention with their debut single, the dance track All Rise, which shot to number four on the UK charts in 2001. The album of the same name eventually sold 1.5 million copies in Britain alone.
Commercial success followed with One Love, an R&B-tinged pop album, where they did a duet with Elton John. The album sold over 1.3 million copies in their homeland and 2.7 million worldwide.
On their third album, last year's Guilty, the group again collaborated with another musical legend, this time Stevie Wonder, in reprising his classic Signed, Sealed, Delivered, I'm Yours.
They won several awards in the United Kingdom, and topped the charts in Sweden, Italy, the Netherlands, Australia and New Zealand.
Blue is also big in Asia, with their songs receiving high airplay on radio and MTV.
They grabbed the best pop video award at MTV Japan, the best international group from MTV Southeast Asia and scored big with their albums in Hong Kong, Thailand, Malaysia and also Indonesia.
Several Asian artists were gathered to cover their hit One Love with the boys. Again, who needed a big extravaganza of a concert when a simple one would do just fine?
Meanwhile, back on stage in Senayan, Ryan teased the screaming audience by opening his belt, unzipping his pants to flash his white briefs while dancing seductively.
Ah, let them be and savor those 15 minutes of fame. For it will be just a matter of time before they join the ranks of Robbie Williams and Justin Timberlake, or become a "where are they now?" question when the next group of cute teenage boys comes along.