Making her first headlining presence at the iTunes Festival at SXSW, Isabel is certainly one to fill the shoes of some top names in music. Of course, most might see Izzy as still in the early stages of her career but that doesn’t mean she isn’t ready to compete and hang with the big dogs. It was her first time performing at the iTunes Festival and this year, she was asked to headline one of the main stages. This goes hand in hand with the release of her new EP, Release, and she decided to perform the songs for the first time together plus she gave us a sneak peek of her new music which is set to premiere in May.
She kicked things off with her track, ‘
La Mariposa,’ the outer-space, butterfly metaphor having single that will definitely have you rocking to the beat. Izzy astounds in a beautiful red and black outfit which is just the right amount of sexy and classy. Her signature brown locks of course are in position and ready to be shaken all over the place as they usually are. In her hand, she has one of her many customized microphones, this one golden, while she takes the stage and gets into position. She greets the crowd, bearing a beautiful, white smile on her purple lips. On the side of her, she has a few backup dancers, 4 males in all red, and she is in the center of them. She delivers the heartfelt and catchy dance-pop song while she seems to be in high spirits. Izzy is a crowd player so there’s never a dull moment when she’s on and she makes sure to include them in her performances. The roars of applause and screams can be heard even miles away. There’s a little choreographed number that accompanies the number and she is clearly singing live as you can hear the small breaths she takes before going to the next lines. Her vocals live have improved a lot, though she’s still not the best but at least there’s an effort and she’s not drastically terrible.
They break into the next song which is a little slower, ‘
Who To Trust?’. Still feeling the energy from the crowd’s rowdiness after the first song, she takes the chance to have some fun with them. Occasionally, she’d go out and grab a hand, sing to a fan, and then give a wonderful vocal performance to the lyrics. She gets some back up vocals from the singers as well as a little of the track assisting as well but for the most part, it was a solid performance. The wind machine, which is blowing her hair to make her look like part performer, part goddess, is lightly hitting her just enough to get in some great pictures. Izzy is no dummy when it comes to the stage; she knows what to do and how to do it!
The next song is obviously a crowd favorite, the EDM track which gets everyone dancing, ‘
Recovery’. She gave a stunning acoustic performance of this song a few weeks back but now she decides to let the DJ do his magic as she pumps up the crowd some more. Along with jumping and some fist pumping, she isn’t stiff when it comes to entertaining. She will put on a show and you WILL get your money’s worth no matter what dance or silly thing she does. She has a strong vocal performance here, digging down somewhere deep inside of her and pulling out that fiesty latina side to her (Would love to see more of that) and she’s dancing as well. She’s joined by some girl back up dancers now, dressed in red outfits as well, and it’s easily one of the best performances she’s done in a long time. During the chanting parts, Izzy allows the crowd to sing back to her and let me tell you, they are LOUD. They adore their idol and everything she does so it’s easy to see why they are always having a great time.
Slowing things down a bit again, Isabel takes time out to give her amazing performance of one of her ballads on the EP, ‘
Lottery’ and this time, she doesn’t rely on the stage or even her dance moves, no, she focuses on her voice which instantly connects with the crowd. Again, not the best and she could definitely use some more practice, but all in all she did a fantabulous job! She really reaches for the high notes, maybe missing one or two but at least she tried. It didn’t seem to bother the crowd anyway because they were all too busy swaying with their camera phones. The band did a great job with playing and overall, definitely a great slow song to catch the critics attention. Before it was over, she went into singing the powerful ballad, ‘
Too Much’ and there were almost a few water works in the crowd. Fans definitely weren’t expecting the amount of emotion she was pouring from herself, at least not since she seemed so happy. Izzy was always a mystery at some point, you weren’t really sure if she was genuinely happy or really sad on the inside but if she was, she’s a hell of an actress!
Next on the list was the uptempo and raucous ‘
Whatever I Want’. Izzy was joined by all her dancers as they marched and paraded around on stage and proclaimed her freedom to do whatever she damned well pleased. This number was joined by some fascinating props (chairs and even some beach balls that were thrown into the crowd) as well as some great entertainment. Why this wasn’t chosen as a single is beyond me because it represents everything Izzy stands for. It shows her ability to switch things up and to be on her own if she wanted to. It also showed her sassy side which the world just can’t get enough of. She flips her hair and smiles, showing her plafyul side and flirty nature. She’s seductively moving her hips, showing she’s definitely enjoying her adulthood. Probably the funnest performance of the night and great job on the vocals. Moving around and keeping herself to stay on beat is a challenge in itself but one could guess since she’s almost screaming the lyrics anyway, it wasn’t hard to do.
Now comes the emotional part of the night, even more than the other ballads, her smash hit, ‘
Do What You Do’ and we are talking about dramatic wind blowing, dimming of the lights, dramatic dance moves and vocal performance, she pulls out the stops here. Her low voice fits perfectly and allows her to catch her breath at the same time from all the dancing previously. Even though she didn’t break down and cry this time, it still managed to touch you when she performed the song. You can’t help but to think of the video and feel for Daisy, her character, and then watch the young and beautiful Izzy deliver such an emotionally charged performance, well I’m giving this the best ballad of the night. Sure, her voice might have cracked during that attempted high note (maybe I was the only one who noticed because the crowd just screamed their lungs off) but obviously, she proved herself.
Before she headed off, she decided to give the crowd two more songs. Now the first song was of course, the last track and last single from the EP, ‘
Release’ and she gave a beautiful dancing number to this one. It was her and a back up dancer who managed to dip her and spin her during the instrumental parts she created. She song was so catchy, the crowd was singing along during the chorus. The last song though, was a sneak peek of her new single, one she said would be released in May (Hopefully she’ll perform at the Chaos Awards and this one is the one she chooses?) She doesn’t give much background, but just says that the song is called ‘
Rule The World’ and then enters the synth friendly pop track. Her entire, I mean ENTIRE, demeanor changes, as if she just transformed before my eyes. She only sings the chorus and I guess the bridge of the song?
("Watch me on the throne/I'll be the best you've ever kno-oown/Watch me on the throne/I'll be the best you've ever kno-oown/(Oh) You don't believe me?/(Oh) I make it look easy/(Oh) Together we can, rule the world") Who knows, but it sounds fantastic. It sounds diva like, powerful, sexy, and all in all like it’s going to be a great year for Izzybells with music and her album. Props are to Isabel for delivering such a fun and magnificent performance. It’s clear what they saw in her to be a headliner and we can only hope we get more shows like this from now on. Like I said before, she’s clearly proven herself as an artist and now as a live performer. I’d give her a A-, just for the simple fact that she brought her A game but I still feel like she was kind of holding back.
Everyone must see Isabel in concert at least once in their life. I will leave you with the lyrics to her sneak preview!
"Watch me on the throne
I'll be the best you've ever kno-oown
Watch me on the throne
I'll be the best you've ever kno-oown
(Oh) You don't believe me?
(Oh) I make it look easy
(Oh) Together we can, rule the world
It don't make sense that you would ever downgrade
(Rule the world, rule the, rule the world, rule the world baby)
Just one kiss could easily help to persuade, but I know you're better than tha-at"