Houston changes pace but is still in step

Date: July 19, 1999
By Neil Strauss

From New Straits Times (Malaysia)
Submitted by: Rachel D.


FOR a contemporary rhythm-and-blues show, where backup tapes and the faithful replication of studio singles are usually de rigueur, Whitney Houston's recent two-hour performance at the Theatre at Madison Square Garden, New York, was remarkably unscripted.

Nearly every song was rearranged live, with the band waiting for Houston as she isolated a line and made it a wailing crescendo or paused mid-song to talk with fans.

When guest stars like Brandy and Luther Vandross joined Houston on Exhale (Shoop Shoop), they didn't emerge from the wings: they were called from their seats in the audience and sang with Houston from the foot of the stage.

This was the new Houston, a 35-year-old mother whose sleek, sophisticated recent album, My Love Is Your Love - her first non- soundtrack album in eight years - is as rooted in the trends of today (staggered hip-hop beats and silky-smooth multitrack harmony singing) as her 1987 album, Whitney, was in the aerobic pop of its time.

She is also a woman who in public appearances often seems unnaturally placid and disconnected, as if surrounded by walls of glass. As she performed, in the first of two performances at the theatre as part of her first tour in four years, the glass became ice and slowly melted.

Though she cancelled several concerts this month because of vocal problems, Houston's voice was impeccable throughout the show. She is easily one of the best pop singers of her time, yet none of her hit-heavy albums have weathered well enough to rank among the era's best.

As if aware that her voice often outclasses her material, she tended to slow down and stretch out her hits so she could pull surprises - melismas, crescendos, groans, octave-jumping wails, funny voices - from her bottomless bag of diva vocal tricks.

She had more eccentric mannerisms than a talk-show host. Often she seemed to be deliberately lingering vocally as the band tried to push her forward through the set.

Perhaps as a result of time constraints, the hits at the end of the show, particularly I Will Always Love You and her latest break-up hit, It's Not Right but It's Okay, were curt and abridged.

Perspiring profusely from the first song, Houston often walked to a table filled with towels, sprays, glasses and other containers to freshen up. Over the course of the night, she descended three times from a stage- set balcony (a true diva must always descend), each time wearing a different shiny or glittering Dolce & Gabbana outfit.

She introduced the audience to her mother, the gospel singer Cissy Houston; her brother and backup singer, Gary Houston (who sang Stevie Wonder's Higher Ground), and her daughter, six-year-old Bobbi Kristina, who helped with My Love Is Your Love, the latest Wyclef Jean song reminiscent of Bob Marley.

Before performing In My Business, a plea for privacy that's equal parts Michael Jackson's Scream and Bessie Smith singing Ain't Nobody's Business if I Do, Houston brought out her husband, Bobby Brown.

In what has become a tradition at Houston's and Brown's shows, not unlike the way parents might demonstrate affection for their children in a formal setting, she let the audience watch as he planted one on her (a kiss, that is).

The show also featured disco-enhanced versions of older hits like How Will I Know and I Wanna Dance With Somebody (Who Loves Me) and a riveting gospel medley from the movie The Preacher's Wife.

But Houston was at her best when taking songs from her new record and turning them into workouts to exercise a voice that continues to raise the standard for female rhythm-and-blues vocals in the 80s and 90s.