Ricky Martin heats up Detroit

DETROIT - It's a testament to Ricky Martin's appeal that a woman stood under a spotlight at the rear of The Palace Of Auburn Hills arena relaying his lyrics via American Sign Language to a section for the hearing impaired. Not only is the Puerto Rican pop star something to look at, but he's a performer of the first order.

Throughout his hour-and-40-minute concert, in the seventh city of his Livin' La Vida Loca Tour, he made us go insane. He rose up poles, sang from suspended platforms, taught dance moves, slid on a conveyor belt and shook his bon-bon.

Following introductory video footage of Martin being hounded by paparazzi and escaping in a convertible, the 27-year-old made his grand entrance with "Livin' La Vida Loca," standing atop a car which popped up from a hidden contraption beneath the stage. He was joined by coupled Latin dancers, the women with legs as long as the life of his first English-language album, "Ricky Martin," which has sold over 12-million copies to date.

For "Love You For A Day", Martin's fully-equipped band -- drums, percussion, guitars, horn section, keyboards -- were all separated on a two-tiered set up. At the end of the song, Martin, arms out-stretched, soaked up the applause and screams, eventually tapping the chordless microphone rhythmically on his chest. "That's my heartbeat ladies and gentleman," he declared.

Martin, decked out exclusively in Giorgio Armani, is a man of great beauty, style and class, immediately creating an intimacy with the audience by the announcement that the set would be filled with "emotional ups and downs," dancing and romanticism, and that we all had to leave our egos at the door and do whatever we wanted without fear of embarrassment.

Flags of the symbols music, peace, life and spirit were lifted for "Vuelve," the title-track from his last Spanish-language album, a love song he described "about wanting to let go but not being able to because you made the wrong decision," for which he sat flanked by two acoustic guitarists. Other numbers featured more brazen feats, like ascending to the top of the lighting rig by hanging on to a pole and coming back down on a platform.

To lead into "I Am Made Of You," Martin, who has been a star since his teen years in Latin pop group Menudo, said, "I read about those legends who are not with us any more because they couldn't deal with it (the craziness and addiction of the road). The only way, after 15 years, I've been able to deal with this is with God."

But from that spiritual rocker, he launched into the pure, sexy, Latin party appeal of the new single, "Shake Your Bon-Bon," probably one of the weakest tracks on his eponymous album. A series of what he called "Latin sounds" followed, before he returned to the reason he had asked us all to check our egos back at the start of the show. Martin divided the crowd in two, commanding us to follow his simple dance steps: hands waving up, down, in a prayer position, then rubbing our tummy. All obliged.

Streamers and glitter fell as he ended the show with "Maria" and another dance lesson, this time in hip-gyrating. As he disappeared up the pole, the band played on for another five minutes, the crowd still mad with the Latin vibes, the dance troupe sharing in the magic.

For the encore, Martin appeared again from beneath the stage, sitting on a modern couch for the beautiful ballad "She's All I Ever Had." The obligatory "The Cup Of Life" followed with acrobats in harnesses somersaulting and swinging in front of fast-paced video footage. Thanking his band and dancers, and, of course, the Detroit audience, he disappeared without any theatrics, a sheer curtain closing behind him, as his backing vocalists sang, "Go, go, go! Ale! Ale! Ale!"

A consummate showman, Martin somehow managed to pull off a concert that was both over-the-top yet down-to-earth.