Last Friday I headed to Candlestick Park with Adam and Eva to see Justin Timberlake and Jay-Z on their “Legends of Summer Tour“. I’ve seen JT in the past and his show was amazing – even if you don’t like the music, he is a great performer. After reading Jay-Z’s book “Decoded” I became a fan, as he discussed in great detail the meaning of his songs and lyrics. I’m convinced he’s a really smart dude.

The sound was less than stellar, partly because Candlestick Park is such a huge, open venue. I didn’t realize until after, but this tour is strictly a stadium tour, which I think is an interesting choice. The show itself was awesome. I think the really neat part for me was how they wove the show together. Instead of the traditional opening act, they had a DJ for about an hour. He was not the best in the world, but came up with some good (and interesting) song combinations. “California Love” by Tupac followed by “All Night Long” by Lionel Ritchie, anyone? Then the show kicked off. The stage setup was great – it was this massive shiny red stage that they projected all sorts of things on depending on the song.

There was definitely some thought put into the flow of the show – rather than JT doing a set and then Jay-Z doing a set, they innerwove their music. This was really cool for me because the two styles of music, while different on the surface, actually flowed really well together. They also made it super easy for the guys to switch back and forth via a trap door/elevator on the stage. Most of the time, you never saw the guy leaving. It was a great show as evidenced by the following picture:

Finally, we had something really cool happen as we were leaving the show. We were walking through the parking lot when we heard sirens. Around the corner came roaring a couple of motorcycle cops, cars, and two black SUVs. We started trying to figure out who it was when Adam flashed the shaka (ie. hang loose sign) and none other than Jay-Z popped his head and arm out the window to give it back. Too cool!