Photo credit: Kings Theatre official Facebook
This Friday 5/10 the one and only GRiZ is making his way to NYC to perform his new album, Ride Waves, at Kings Theatre. Kings has a 3000 person capacity and is already sold out which means GRiZ is probably planning a special show for us! I was extremely excited when I found out that GRiZ was playing at Kings because in my opinion, it is arguably one of the most beautiful venues in New York City.
Kings Theatre was surprisingly built almost one hundred years ago, in 1929, as one of Loews original 5 wonder theaters. The theater closed in 1977 and just four years ago underwent a $95 million dollar restoration. In February 2017, General Manager Tyler Bates took over. Tyler heads the booking team with Stefanie Tomlin and Matthew Tanaya who together have helped to increase bookings 50 percent year over year, booking up to 150 events per year.
I visited Kings Theatre last October 2018 to see Modest Mouse and this was the first time I had stepped foot into this incredible venue. Kings has a design and color scheme of mostly velvet with gold and mahogany two of my favorite color combinations. The moment I walked into the Theatre I was blown away by the intricacies of the patterns across the carpet, walls, and ceiling. The breathtaking dome ceiling has intricate golden artistic patterns painted across the entirety of it. The rim of the dome is outlined with white up-lights that shine onto the gold making it pop to the viewer below. To me, the dome almost looks like the inside of a Himalayan salt crystal shining down upon 3000 people scattered across the three levels of the balcony, the mezzanine, and the orchestra – it truly is a beautiful sight. Staring out at the velvet seats, walking by the golden statues and carvings on the wall, anyone can feel like royalty for a moment when inside this magnificently designed historical work of art. Kings Theatre has been increasingly becoming more popular in the electronic world, which many are excited about. Just a few months ago Tipper played at Kings and I heard the venue really contributed to enhancing the normal Tipper performance. I can guarantee that GriZ performing his future-funk, electro-soul, live music at Kings will really enhance the experience for everyone. Great choice, GRiZ!
Now for the Ride Waves album that everyone has been talking about, once again GRiZ has outdone himself for the sixth time in a row. This remarkable producer is never afraid to push the boundaries of music, and with each album he does just that. The album dips its toes into the booming genre of hip-hop featuring Snoop Dogg, DRAM, Wiz Khalifa and more. GRiZ is truly such a talented, multi-instrumentalist and great collaborator with 11 featured artists on this album. Surprisingly, this will be my first time seeing GRiZ, I am hoping to see some guest performances this Friday, considering it’s a sold out NYC show! The sound system in Kings Theatre is going to really contribute well to hearing this album live, I can’t wait to hear the acoustics of the signature saxophone that is GRiZ.
GRiZ, formally known as Grant Richard Kwiecinski, is an artist that I’ve always admired and wanted to see live. Kwiecinski never signed to a major label and instead created his own record label, All Good Records. This is something that is extremely impressive to me as a manager myself and someone that used to work at a record label. I know how hard it is for an artist to remain independent and succeed without label support. All Good Records is home to The Floozies, Manic Focus, The Geek x VRV, and more, dipping its toes deeper into the genres future-funk, old school Motown soul, electro-soul, and disco.
On top of being at the forefront of these future sounding genres, GRiZ is also an extremely generous artist and created his own two-day charity event called GRiZMAS. The “twelve days of GRiZMAS” are the twelve days leading up to this two-day event where all proceeds generated during these twelve days are donated to a variety of charities. This event has raised over 100k to date. Being such a talented, independent musician with a big heart has really gained GRiZ a lot of love, he truly has some of the most loyal fans who provide him with his unique platform. GRiZ knows how important his fans are and so he created the GRiZ Fam and Liberators which is a way for GRiZ and his fans to connect, they are essentially his street team. I am sure some of them will be at the show this Friday!
If you live in NYC and are free this Friday, grab some resale tickets and come check what I can guarantee is going to be a dazzling show!