All eyes were on Phoenix’s Herberger Theater when AMPERS&ONE’s Born to Define Tour visited their Center Stage venue on Thursday. The rising K-pop group packed the intimate space with hundreds of eager fans decked out with themed outfits, lightsticks and trinkets for the group’s second Arizona appearance- and made an excellent case for more K-pop shows in Phoenix.
The theater buzzed in anticipation as the lights went down and the members emerged in a modern take on traditional Korean hanbok for their first outfits of the night and got the room jumping to “What You Talking About” and “I’m Down”. The fans chanted for Kamden, Brian, Jiho, Siyun, Kyrell, Mackiah and Seungmo as each member took a turn in the spotlight, showing off powerful vocals and satisfyingly synchronized choreography.
“Hit Me Up” and “Slide” were clear favorites in the middle of the set before the guys branched off into subunits for specially selected cover performances on this run. Jiho and Kamden gave the audience a sultry dance cover of Enhypen’s “Fever” while Kyrell and Brian were pure sweetness on their rendition of Taylor Swift’s “Love Story”. The subunit section was rounded out by Siyun, Mackiah and Seungmo hitting all the right notes on One Direction’s “Drag Me Down”.
At this point, the night was just getting started and the energy really kicked in during the undeniably catchy “He + She = We” and “Seesaw”. The group erased the boundary of the stage, preferring to periodically jump into the audience to dance as the fans kept a respectful distance while still showing the members plenty of love. Their onstage antics had the crowd laughing and singing along and it was abundantly clear that both the group and their ANDEARs were having a blast just being together.
The main stage came to a close on “My Way” and “Get Famous” but the incessant chanting for the group’s return brought them back for an extensive encore, including “On and On” and “I Know You”. After the final goodbyes of the night- and another leap into the audience for one last dance- AMPERS&ONE and their beloved ANDEARs left the theater thrilled at an evening of “Crazy Stupid Fun”.
