Beyoncé whets Dublin’s appetite with Lemonade

By Beartriz Tellez  @TellezNews

Beyoncé will be performing in Dublin this Sunday at Croke Park, the fifth show of the European leg of the Formation Tour.

In true Beyoncé fashion, the high anticipated world tour was unexpectedly announced in February following her Super Bowl performance and the release of the Formation music video.

The sold-out Dublin show is expected to include performances off her latest visual album Lemonade with a mix of the Queen’s classics such as Single Ladies, Run the World, as well as tracks from her now disbanded girl group Destiny’s Child.

Watch Beyoncé clip at Wembley here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7u8z6SySJJM

Lemonade received mostly positive reviews from critics – with Rolling Stone giving it 5 stars – and it was praised particularly for its visual production, leaving many to argue that it is Beyoncé’s best work to date.

Not only does the album defy conventional production expectations by creating an intertwined listening and viewing experience, but it is also an ode to black America, particularly black women.

The album also deals extensively with her marital woes, showing a much darker side to her otherwise picture-perfect marriage to rapper Jay Z.

Musically, the album differs significantly from Beyoncé’s previous work. It ventures into all genres, from the deliciously upbeat Reggae track Hold Up to soul and rock anthems like Freedom and Don’t hurt yourself.

It features popular rappers Kendrick Lamar and The Weeknd, as well as the more unexpected collaboration with Jack White.

The visual production is not just aesthetic; it is strategic. The one-hour film takes the viewer through the various stages – loosely based on the stages of grief – of the emotional roller coaster a woman experiences after learning of her husband’s affair: Intuition, denial, anger, apathy, emptiness, accountability, reformation, rorgiveness, resurrection, hope, and redemption.

Opening up with Pray You Catch Me the singer expresses her suspicion. “Deep inside me was the need to know — are you cheating on me?”. But she ends her story with All Night, a ballad about forgiveness and acceptance; “With every tear came redemption and my torturer became a remedy,” she sings, before jumping into the killer hip-hop track Formation for the grand finale, to do what Beyoncé does best –slay.

Rob Sheffield for Rolling Stone accurately sums Lemonade up as the “heartbreak and betrayal and infidelity and the hangover that follows Drunk In Love.”