Friday was a wild internet day…wild…hackers, sites crashing, work…blessedly interrupted and all of us crossing our fingers for our Friday night fun. Not to worry, the staff of Empire are trained professionals, so we buckled down, set home, glued our feet to the pose stands, battened down the hatches and got ready to rumble.
Now…it is October and let’s face it. There aren’t many folks in SL that aren’t addicted to Halloween….and we are no exception. Jilley went wild with the blood and pumpkins and creepy curtain; the theater looks AMAZING and it wasn’t even the theme show yet! DJ Gunner, as per usual was spinning great tunes, Paul was out minding the house, and there was a stunning buffet set up for some pre-show snacking! The crowd wandered in…gaping at all the halloweeny goodness and settled in for some fantastical dancing.
Jilley opened the show with Baby and Sammy Magic to “Spooky Scary Skeletons” and what an epic opening act it was. Dark blue linear textures were the back drop with white skeletons on the ground, while multi-colored droopy skeletons floated overhead moving to and fro. Our ladies wore latex skeleton outfits with wild hair and pale skins and with legs as long as the Mississippi they boogied away with no fear of the skeletons moving around them or the cool skeletal heads that were poofing around above them…and with that…we were off!
JenzZa and the misfits joined us for the second act. JenzZa had a mix called Rockin Goblins. She was joined by Seb on guitar, Rumor as the skeletal Elvis and Dulcikate, Cuddlebug, Phoebe, Miny, and Love Lefko as her Oogie Boogies. It was all I could do to not kidnap the Oogies and run away with them. JenzZa’s sets bring tears of silly happiness to my eyes and this set was no exception to that. The Oogies danced, climbed trees and danced some more….Elvis skeleton rocked it out on lead vocals, and Seb did some serious guitar shredding..all while the lighting changed giving everyone different eerie halloween coloring. Brilliantly fun JenzZa!
I took the stage to Kate Bush..”This Woman’s Work”. My SL friends know that I am a stage IIIA breast cancer survivor..I just turned 7 this year, and I don’t let an October go by that I don’t do a version of a breast cancer dance to this song. Every year it’s a little different, I used a shadowbox this year, because the dance is for everyone touched by this disease, not just me. I do some local chat encouraging people to be tested, poked, squished and prodded because it’s such a treatable disease and the fear of what may happen is far worse than treatment…trust me…I had it all from surgery to chemo to radiation and I’m here…as are so many others….and I can enjoy my real life and my second life ❤
Asali was joined by Baby, Jilley, Renee and Kyshra to “The Allure” by Beats Antique. Great song…GREAT! Electo violins…so freaking great…and the girls looked spectacular in steampunk finery..goggles and all! The set had huge rotating gears that moved the girls and sank into the floor and they were also around on the walls. It was mesmerizing and everyone looked so fabulous…the dresses were sooooo great. Ok…gush-a-potamus there, but Asali doesn’t dance as often as we need her to, because she is amazing.
Lady C joined us with a techno remix of the them from “Halloween”. Lady is one of the first people I met when dancing on the big stage a few years ago…She is an oldschool burlesque dancer and by that I mean chic and sexy as all heck and she does classic striptease in such an amazing way that she knocks everyone’s socks off with her sets. She was a creepy bat lady in a gorgeous graveyard (yep..how’s that for alliteration?). It was seriously cool with a huge moon and fence and black cat. She had lovely little particles on her hands and feet and she swirled and bumped and bopped…and she her teensy suit for the cutest spider web pasties ever. It was a treat to dance with her again and I hope she visits with us more!
Melvis….Melvis, Melvis, Melvis….first of all, he had a great song mix..none of it which is on the notecard….but here goes. Stormtroopers…Seb, Paul, Wiz, Jilley, Shay and Diamonte marched onstage…and down some stairs to frame out poor frozen Han Solo. Darth Vader saunters out, and I may not remember the whole mix, but when Darth pulled out his light saber and started to boogie to Diana Ross’ “I’m Coming Out” I laughed so hard my seltzer came out my nose, I woke up the dog and lost a slipper somewhere under the couch. It took me a bit to pull myself together, but I also seem to remember Mona and SoCo in Stormtrooper-ette outfits, but bald and without headgear. Melvis is a treasure and what a brilliant set…what I wouldn’t give to get a peek inside that brain of his!
The lovely Goddess Shayna was next to 311’s “Amber”. She was a beautiful butterfly fairy dancing on a leaf. She wore pretty particles and little dragonflies fluttered around her stage. It was a magical set;. stunningly done, but Goddess was so pretty in the middle of it, my eyes didn’t take much of it in. She also had some very pretty makeup on. I need to see this one again so that I can cam out and enjoy some of her hard work making the whole stage look fantastic.
Baby closed out the evening with Wild, Jo and Fuki. She danced to a rockin song by Korn ft. Skrillex and Kill The Noise – “Narcissistic Cannibal”. I’m still struggling with how to explain this set. It was a two tiered palace with Jo in white on one balcony and Fuki in black on the other. Baby and Wild started on separate sides, merged together in the middle and then came down the stair and split apart again dancing amongst some creepy circling hands. Jo and Fuki came down and they danced as couples and then all merged together. It was wild….sort of Dr. Strangelove meets Kurt Vonnegut meets A Clockwork Orange and everyone drops some acid. Ok…that didn’t really explain it, but it was really weird and freaky and beautiful all at the same time. It was something only Baby’s imagination could come up with and I desperately want to see it again to enjoy the mindbending a second time 🙂
Poof! Before we knew it, it was time for those pesky but awesome dance balls to make an appearance and for everyone to hop on stage and dance the night away. Kyshra did our crowd dances this week and she chose Bad Things “Roll with the Devil” and two mixes, a Halloween Ghosts and Fear mashup and a Halloween Boogie mashup, both by Dirty D. It was a wild and wooly end to a wild and wooly day on the interwebs, and we got to spend it with good friends and family…or framily as Babypea likes to say 🙂 She took a few group picks, so I’m posting a few because it’s fun to find ourselves and giggle! Thanks for a great show and the Halloween Theme show is next Friday…just in case you thought it was last night with all the fun Halloweeny sets! Thank you all for coming out and supporting us!!
Elysium Cabaret 