Blackpink brings its pop arsenal to Barcelona

BarcelonaThe show hasn't even started yet, but the audience has been singing along to the songs playing through the sound system for a while. They follow along as they wield a large, pink and black plastic hammer that lights up when they move - one of the gadgets of the merchandising most successful of the night - while images of Jisoo, Jennie, Rosé and Lisa, the members of Blackpink, the Korean band of the moment that performed this Saturday, August 9 at the Estadi Olímpic Lluís Companys in Barcelona, are projected on the screen.

The group appears on a platform that rises in the middle of the stage and starts the night singing Kill This Love with a spectacle of firecrackers, fire, and a group of nearly twenty dancers who follow the rhythm militarily. The aesthetic is dominated by pink, and the effect the hammers have on the audience is curious, turning them into that same color. After Pink Venom and How You Like That, which lights up the catwalk to the second front stage, the show progresses with Playing with Fire and Shut Down.

The group has had some technical problems, since in recent concerts they had a double screen, which in Barcelona has been reduced to half. Hidden behind it, a band of drums, bass, guitar, and keyboards adds muscle to the live show - they are there because they have been projected. The concert is divided into five acts, separated by interludes that allow for costume and register changes. There is no stage design, except for some objects that the dancers themselves introduce and dispatch. Both hours and a half advance with some pauses, but the Barcelona fans are tireless: they jump, sing, cry, and maintain the energy in the interludes. Some dance almost violently and others are hypnotized, transformed into human tripods holding a telephone.

Each member of the band has their solo moment: Jisoo dresses in white and sequins to perform Earthquake and Your Love; Lisa presents herself as a dark goddess with Thunder and Fuck Up the World; Jennie raps with a rockstar vibe; and Rosé slows down the pace with an acoustic guitar, goes nude, and has a touching moment with the audience before exploding with APT, her collaboration with Bruno Mars. These are the songs each of them has released solo, and they've also managed to conquer the charts.

Blackpink is a project created and carefully thought out by YG Entertainment, the Korean entertainment company responsible for positioning K-pop and marketing it on a global scale. The tour Deadline It's a massive high school party, celebrating the relationship of the four inseparable friends and bringing the dances that have gone viral on social media to life. With two albums released, the band celebrated nine years of success on the same day as the Barcelona concert - there was a failed attempt to celebrate it with a Happy Birthday that hasn't finished being sung.

The sound hasn't been impeccable and at times the tuning hasn't been up to par with a concert of this magnitude, but the audience has bought every song and the stands have trembled with the most thrashing ones. Jump, the band's latest single, has unleashed its full potential and made everyone jump. Afterwards, they played Boombayah, Ddu-Du Ddu-Du, As If It's Your Last and reggaeton in Korean Forever Young.

The closing ceremony came with an encore that was not fully understood as such. Kick It The night closed under a full moon, which was left alone after a final wave of firecrackers. The audience, of all ages and wearing costumes coordinated with ink and pink, left the venue shaking the luminous hammer as if they wanted to retain something more of what they had experienced that night.

[The photographs in this article were provided by Live Nation. They were from a concert on Blackpink's tour, but not from the Barcelona concert because the artists didn't credit photojournalists.]