Online World Tour With Muhammad, My Man

I wanted to talk about the StageIt concerts Cook has been playing whilst the pandemic succeeds. Of course, the shows don’t replace the live experience, the sound of the crowd, the kick drum seemingly in your heart, and the smell of beer everywhere. But something about a casual 9 o’clock show in my living room with some wine and food is something I’m glad I got to be apart of. Obviously I’m not happy about the pandemic, but I doubt we would have ever gotten concerts like these from David Cook had COVID-19 not shut down the world. And it’s interesting, now that I look back on it, why weren’t shows like these ever considered before? And why not continue on with shows like these in a post-pandemic world? Especially for fans who aren’t located in the States and can’t easily travel to the live shows.

Most of the shows average a ticket price of about $10, which for what’s all included is more then fair. Some of the shows David just lets you decide what you want to pay with Pay-What-You-Can shows. This is one of the reasons these online shows are so addictive, the affordability of them makes coming back every month something to look forward to every time.

Anyway, my thoughts on the actual StageIt shows are that they’re actually really fun. I don’t know why I say actually like there was a reason they shouldn’t have been, I don’t really have a reason to doubt Cook’s ability to put on a damn entertaining live show at this point, even if they are done over a webcam. I love the intimacy of the event. I love how Cook hypes up the events themselves like they are some sort of mini-concert by labeling the shows as part of The David Cook Online World Tour and creating respective merchandise. I thought stuff like that was not only hilarious, but also self aware of the oddity of the situation. The themed StageIts keep the concerts feeling fresh. My personal favourites were the Digital Vein and Chromance anniversary shows where Cook would play through songs from each album. He’s also gotten creative with a drinking/hangover themed string of shows with Saturday Afternoon Live and Re-cover-y Sunday. There was a pajama themed episode, Christmas themed episodes, the list goes on.

The actual concerts run about six songs long, with Q&A and banter thrown throughout. The format of the StageIt shows, though shorter at about 50 mins a show, does parallel the way a live David Cook concert feels, with lots of banter and stories and “crowd” interaction. Where the StageIt shows actually supersede the live shows is with the inclusion of a Q&A section. This is hands down the best part of these shows. Whether it’s a few questions between songs, or back-loading the end of the show with questions only, I’ve had more then a handful of questions answered over the year 2020. Some questions I’ve always wanted to ask this guy and there he is answering them. Whether it's him giving insight on why "Kiss On The Neck" was a "hidden track", or the confirmation that "Sunlight" (hopefully we'll hear it one day) was indeed a completely separate track that didn’t make the deluxe edition of This Loud Morning, our deep-cut questions as fans are finally being answered. A lot of the time too, David will give back-story to certain songs he's about to play, giving an even further in-depth look at some of his new and classic songs.

StageIt has a Tip Jar feature that allows fans to basically tip the artist for the show. The highest tippers usually receive some sort of compensation for their generosity with tiered prizes, usually the highest tiered prize is a one-on-one virtual meet and greet with David Cook himself. Second and third highest tippers can receive items like signed albums/posters, t-shirts and stuff like that. I’ll be honest, I’ve never tipped high enough to receive one of these prizes, so I kind of forget what they all are. But for those fans that are able to support on that level, the prizes would be worth it. One-on-one meet and greet with the man himself, c’mon, that would be unreal.

So how are the setlists? I love the songs he's been playing. "Come Back To Me" and "Declaration" usually stand as openers, he'll usually play a cover, whatever the new single(s) is, and "Light On". Sometimes he’ll throw in something different like "Home Movies (Over Your Shoulder)", or "The Truth". I was getting tickets for every show, and I started to notice the setlists to be somewhat stagnant week-to-week, tuning in sometimes to hear almost 5 of the same songs from the last show. I guess if you weren’t getting tickets for every show this definitely wouldn’t be that noticeable, but I think it would be cool if he caught us off guard a little more. Using a different opener every show might make each show feel that much more different. I absolutely love "Declaration" though so I don't know why I'm complaining about the fact that he plays it every show, and to be honest as much as he plays it, I'm still not tired of hearing it. Especially the way he performs it acoustically. I guess Cook has his reasons though. Maybe just in case there's a new viewer he wants them to hear the "classic" show opener. I do realize though that Cook does play the odd setlist where a lot of the songs are different. I missed the show he supposedly played "But You Won't" and I'm kicking myself for it. I remember one of my favourite StageIts was when David did three shows in one day. The first and last shows of the day were songs from his own catalogue and the middle show was an all covers show. He also didn’t repeat any songs, so if you were there for all three shows, you’d have heard basically 18-20 different songs. What a great day. Unexpectedly Cook pulled out "Rapid Eye Movement", a song he doesn’t play often and one of my favourites. That was a highlight moment from these shows for sure.

In June of this year, it will be the 10th Anniversary of This Loud Morning, I would love to see Cook hold a 10th Anniversary StageIt for the album. Would be so cool to see him open with "Circadian" and close with "Rapid Eye Movement", picking a handful of songs from the album to play in between. If I had to make the perfect This Loud Morning setlist - six songs long - it would probably look like this:

1. Circadian

2. Let Me Fall For You

3. Hard To Believe

4. Paper Heart

5. Goodbye To The Girl

6. Rapid Eye Movement

I didn’t think I was going to make a blog post on the StageIt shows, but once I realized that a big part of my 2020 last year was watching David Cook shows whilst throwing questions at him in the live chat like a mad man, I felt it might be worth touching on it all. I hope the shows stay around from time to time even after the pandemic. I can’t wait for the live shows to come back, but until then, the StageIts are a fantastic substitute for the real thing.