Maxi Priest Counting Crows Bryan Adams Flo Rida Blondie Shaggy

8 KAABOO PERFORMANCES AT A GLANCE MONDAY FEBRUARY 18, 2019 • CAYMAN COMPASS

Maxi Priest Flo Rida Maren Morris Maxi Priest brought his calf-length dreadlocks and his signature Nobody escapes a Flo Rida set without throwing their hands up and Maren Morris gave her KAABOO audience “The Feels.” Morris, a brand of reggae and soul to Friday’s performance, and he worked spinning “Right Round.” The American rapper got Friday’s audience 28-year-old Nashville-based country siren, unleashed her rich the crowd into a frenzy during his hour-long set. Lead guitarist energetically moving to his hit “Good Feeling,” and he filled the stage and robust voice on “Sugar” and a series of tracks from her 2016 JJ Sansaverino added some flair by playing his guitar riffs behind with women from the crowd eager to dance and get “Low, Low, Low, debut album “Hero.” Morris, wearing a black blouse and a pink his head, and Maxi Priest worked both sides of the stage while Low.” The sun followed suit as his set began to close out, and Flo skirt, sultrily powered through her latest single, “GIRL,” and running through many of his hits, like “Caution,” “Just a Little Bit Rida also welcomed an unlikely backup dancer – Sir Richard Branson, shone on album tracks like “I Could Use a Love Song,” “How It’s Longer” and “Wild World.” whose company Virgin Produced put together the KAABOO Cayman Done” and “Just Another Thing.” festival – to the stage to greet the crowd.

Bryan Adams Counting Crows The Chainsmokers Everything he does, he did it for you. He did it for KAABOO. Adam Duritz is more of an acquired taste. The lead singer for Electronic dance music duo Alex Pall and Andrew Taggart, aka Canadian rocker Bryan Adams pulled out many of his classics Counting Crows does not prance around the stage or engage The Chainsmokers, closed out the first day of the festival with a Friday night, and had the crowd singing along to some of his in theatrics. He’s more interested in taking his audience on an bang. The show was full of throbbing beats, high-register sound chart-topping hits. He played “Run to You,” “Heaven,” “It’s Only emotional journey. Known for playing many of their more obscure effects, pyrotechnics, spinning lasers, smoke cannons, and a Love” and “Summer of ’69” off his 1984 smash “Reckless” album. tunes in concert, or presenting alternate versions, the band stuck visibly happy crowd. Drummer Matt McGuire even played with Adams, who said on stage this was his first time in Cayman, closely to the hits during its hour-plus show, with “Mrs. Potter,” flaming drumsticks at one point. “This is what Fyre Festival was barreled through his repertoire, alternating between propulsive “Round Here” and “Mr. Jones.” The set ended with rousing and supposed to be, right?” Pall said, before the performers launched rockers and mid-tempo ballads. energetic versions of “Hanginaround” and “Rain King.” into their smash hit “Something Just Like This.”

Shaggy Blondie Live “Mr. Lover Lover” brought his impish sense of humor and smooth Wearing a short white skirt and long white cape – the latter bearing Live lives again. Ed Kowalczyk, lead singer of Live, returned to Caribbean reggae fusion to the Ironshore stage on Saturday. He an exhortation to save the planet that is not printable in the the American band from a five-year absence in 2016, He told told the crowd he had first come to Cayman in 1993, and he said Compass – Debbie Harry dropped the KAABOO crowd back to the Saturday’s crowd at KAABOO Cayman that he was thrilled to be he knows Grand Cayman has a strong Jamaican presence. He sang days when new wave music was washing over disco. The lead singer back with his bandmates. And it showed. Live opened with a “I Need Your Love” and “Don’t Make Me Wait,” along with his of Blondie pulled her band through a series of hits, including propulsive rendition of “All Over You” and went on to play several 1993 breakthrough international hit “Oh Carolina.” He then told “Call Me,” “Hanging on the Telephone” and, of course, “Heart of hits from their seminal album “Throwing Copper” including the male members of the audience “You should not be like Tiger Glass.” Harry, now 73, still has the voice to pull off the classics. “Selling the Drama,” “I Alone” and “Lightning Crashes.” Woods” before launching into “It Wasn’t Me.”

Zedd Jason Derulo Duran Duran Zedd may well be the world’s best Zumba instructor. The award- As much a dance performance as it was a music concert, Jason The KAABOO headliners, with lead singer Simon Le Bon winning Russian-German DJ and songwriter had the Millennial and Derulo and his crew of six dancers muscled their way through an resplendent in a white suit over a black “Wild Boys” T-shirt, Generation X population sweatily dancing elbow-to-elbow deep evening of jumps, spins, hair flips and actual flips lifting the music opened their set with “Paper Gods.” Two songs later, Le Bon into the night. The 75-minute set of electro-house music kept to another level. Derulo opened with “Watcha Say?” followed asked the crowd, “Did you get your conch fritters? … Or is the crowd in perpetual motion and was underscored by stunning by “Tip Toe,” then led the band through such songs as “Wiggle,” everyone hungry?” before the band launched into “Hungry Like visual laser-lights and pyrotechnics. Time and time again, Zedd “Swalla,” and a shortened version of “Colors.” By the end, he the Wolf” and a series of mega-hits, including “Notorious,” “I incited the crowd to jump while mixing in hits by Michael Jackson, had doffed his shimmering silver tank top to deliver bare-chested Don’t Want Your Love,” and “The Reflex.” The group came back Cardi B. and other artists. versions of “The Other Side” and “Talk Dirty.” out for a brief encore to play “A View to a Kill” and “Rio.”

Words by Spencer Fordin and Mark Muckenfuss; photos by Stephen Clarke and Taneos Ramsay.