Concert Review Javier Colon

If you've ever been to Glenside, PA, it's probably because you were trying to get to Philly and get swallowed up in the maze of it's northern suburbs. Even though I live near Philly, I still can't say I had ever ventured to Glenside, but when you invite a star with a great voice and put him in an old school theater that is 84 years old (Keswick Theater) and has great acoustics, I'll find a way to make it.

Luckily for me, the concert didn't start until 7:30, which gave me plenty of time to make the trip down to Philly, grab some Chipotle and even check out the Willow Grove Mall. When I arrived to Keswick with my stunning date, I was surprised to see that less than half of the seats were filled. Coming fresh off winning NBC's The Voice, I figured there would be a pretty sizeabale following for @javstwtr. Still, instead of thinking "hmm I wonder if the people who didn't buy tickets know something I don't know", I chalked it up to the event being rescheduled and considered myself lucky that the kind ushers at Keswick were allowing us to move up to the front 10 rows...#Sweet

Coming into the concert I had never heard of the two opening acts, @erniehalter and @kevin___daniel. During both of their sets, I found myself enjoying their music enough to start taking down some song titles to research post-concert. The first act, Kevin Daniel is a spitting image of @GAVINDEGRAW vocally. From the solo keyboard to the smooth, soulful voice, he's got it. Apologies for not at least partially documenting his performance, but below is his best song to date in my opinion, Better Than Gold.

Kevin Daniel - Better Than Gold

Next up was Ernie Halter, who had a stage presence and sense of humor that kept everyone well in tuned to his solo acoustic set. From his Justin Bieber story to the story of how his now wife loaned him her car to tour the country after they had just met, he was downright entertaining. I liken his voice to Marc Broussard because of the bluesy soul undertones that come from his vocals. He does a pretty damn good Gavin Degraw impression himself, but I still enjoyed his song Lighthouse the most. Below is a clip of him joining Javier onstage to cover Bill Withers's classic Use Me Up...

That brings me to the main event, where Javier was joined onstage by his band of personalities. I say that because it was really difficult to not pay attention to his bassist "Big Sexy" gyrates wildly throughout the show. I'll put it this way, if any of us liked anything half as much as he enjoys music, we'd all wake up on the right side of the bed every morning.

The great thing about seeing Javier isn't just his incredible voice, it's hearing his version of classics like Time After Time (Cyndi Lauper), Man in the Mirror (Michael Jackson) and Fix You (Coldplay). Shame on me for admitting this, but I had yet to hear his entire album prior to the concert. All I knew is that I really liked Stitch by Stitch and I wanted to hear more of his music.

Hear more is exactly what I did when he went through the majority of tracks on his new album Come Through For You. From his new track Stand Up with @ADAMLEVINE to his heartfelt Ok, Here's the Truth, he's got a lot of stuff that most people haven't heard that is awesome. My personal favorite from the concert (hands down) was his cover of Adele's Someone Like You, but a close second was his newest single A Drop in the Ocean featuring @NATASHABDNFIELD...

Even though Javier has been in the music industry for almost 10 years, it's great to see people are now starting to catch on to how talented of an artist he is. All in all, I left feeling like the intimate setting was perfect for the lineup that played and I woulds strongly recommend both Keswick Theater and Javier Colon (and company). Oh yea, did I mention the free parking? #RareTheseDays

Javier Colon - A Drop in the Ocean

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