On the 27 February 2021, rapper and singer-songwriter Austin Richard Post, better known by his stage name Post Malone, hosted a little virtual concert to celebrate Pokemon's 25th anniversary.
Despite the concert only lasting for about 13 odd minutes, it was a computer-generated concert that featured digital Post Malone dancing around with various Pokemon surrounding him.
Throughout his set, Post Malone can be seen traversing the world of Pokemon, taking in the sights and sounds of the environment. Numerous iconic Pokemon can also be seen throughout the entire concert. It really was quite the spectacle.
Watch the video here:
The setlist for the virtual Pokemon concert featured a few of Malone's original songs such as 'Psycho' and 'Circles'. The show was widely enjoyed by fans all around the world, and here are a few reactions from Twitter:
Despite the amazing visuals and good vibes, a controversy soon arose after users pointed out the fact that, Post Malone had performed an uncensored version of his song 'Circles' that had the word 'S*x* in it.
Given the fact that Pokemon has a huge audience base that includes children, the move was met with a bit of criticism, but most people laughed it off with memes.
Here are a few reactions from Twitter:
Are Virtual concerts like Pokemon's 25th-anniversary celebration becoming a norm?
Due to the pandemic and social distancing norms, real-life musical concerts have been few and far in between. Pokemon's 25th-anniversary celebration is just the latest virtual concert to take place during post-pandemic times.
In 2020, Fortnite even hosted a huge virtual concert that featured Travis Scott in-game as a larger-than-life avatar of himself. Suffice to say, the fans went crazy.
More recently, Lil Nas X debuted a new song on Roblox during an in-game show. It's no surprise that with limitations on physical interactions, in-game concerts are slowly becoming a trend.
It comes as no surprise that companies are tying up with musicians to make the most out of the situation. Games become the virtual stage for an event and gamers have nothing in shortage to make for an enthusiastic audience.
Based on how things are going, social distancing norms will be in play for a while. If virtual concerts were not popular before, they surely are now. Hopefully, this trend catches on and stays for a while as people seem to absolutely love the idea of experiencing virtual concerts from the comfort of their homes.