Australian super-songstress Kylie Minogue brings her musical extravaganza, KylieX2008, to Taipei’s Zhongshan Soccer Stadium (中山足球場) on Thursday. Tickets range in price from NT$1,500 to NT$6,000 and are available online at www.ticket.com.tw or by calling (02) 2341-9898.P>
KylieX2008 kicked off last May in Paris and has already traveled to more than 40 cities in Europe, South America and Asia. The “X” references the fact that this is the singer’s 10th concert tour, features 10 back-up dancers (and four acrobats) and is in support of her 10th album, titled (guess what?) X.
The tour’s production cost was a staggering US$16 million (about NT$514 million). It marks Minogue’s return to touring after defeating breast cancer in early 2006, and the singer has taken the opportunity to go all out for her fans. In previous media interviews, Minogue said that Freddie Mercury, the late Queen frontman, inspired her.
“I’m releasing my inner Freddie Mercury. It’s hard to explain but parts of the show are so over the top. When I sing Disco Needs You, it’s a real Freddie moment,” she told UK tabloid the Sun.
Minogue’s show features costumes designed by Jean-Paul Gaultier and is divided into seven acts, which Minogue has described as “shows within a show,” including the futuristic disco-themed opening act, Xlectro Static, in which Minogue has performed her addictive smash hit Can’t Get You Out of My Head at previous concerts. Another act is based on US high school pep rallies and has Minogue and her dancers in cheerleader outfits, while in yet another Minogue makes her grand entrance perched in a giant skull suspended above the stage while performing Like a Drug from her latest album.
Tickets for the singer’s initial run of concerts in the UK sold out within 30 minutes last December, and the enthusiastic response by fans on the tour’s European leg supported additional dates in South America, Asia and Australia. The success of KylieX2008 may be making up for Minogue’s reported disappointment over X’s relatively lackluster sales in the US (the tour currently has no stops scheduled in that country). The album, which the singer began working on towards the end of her cancer treatment in 2006, was a chart topper in Europe, Australia, the UK, Japan and Taiwan, but stalled at No. 139 on the US Billboard 200 despite good reviews for its electronica-tinged pop tracks.— CATHERINE SHU
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