Vic and I did not have any grand expectations on the concert of Billy Joel tonight, because we thought, well, at 59, his voice should be croaking by now and his arthritis might not allow him to play at his best. Not having released any new material since 1993, almost nobody among today’s 20+ young ‘uns have heard of him. Our model friends would say, “Billy Jo-? who”? It’s only when you say, “Oh, he was the guy who originally sang Uptown Girl, and they would say - Ooohhh – that was a remake?”
Anyhow, his concert came at the worst of days for me. The onset of the autumn cold suddenly descended here in HK, and to someone used to the heat of Manila , the combined chill gave me unwanted colds, a mild flu and an irritated throat. I thought I won’t be able to sing along tonight, or even holler.
A cursory glance at the people who boarded the Airport Express to the concert’s venue at the Asiaworld Arena showed the imbalance in the age group, brought mostly by the fact that Mr. Joel hasn’t written any new song for the past 15 years, which is really a pity, considering his immense talent and songwriting prowess. He practically denied today’s generation a peek into his talent - and there was an abundance of that tonight. Interestingly, Vic was averse to watching this show when I first broached it out to him a month ago. When I learned he was going to perform in HK, I told Vic that I just had to see him live. He was probably the most dominant male performer in my personal history as a young boy, with George Michael coming in a very close second. And at his age now, the chances of seeing him live again are very, very slim. Vic never ran out of bad things to say about what would happen in the show. He’s a dinosaur. He’s doing concerts now because he has no more money and he needs money. It would be a very boring show since with his arthritis, he would probably be just sitting down and singing off-key.
Boy, he was wrong. So wrong!
However, Vic’s change of heart did not come immediately. The show started “early” by HK concert standards. Usually, the ticket says 8PM, but the reality is, most live performances here, or even in Manila , start at 9 or 9:30, but Mr. Joel started early, at 8:30PM. He started with a rather unknown song, “Angry Young Man” and the first 20 minutes of the concert just showcased some of his early work, some unknown, some famous, like “Honesty”. After the fifth song, Vic was worried he would fall asleep. However, things slowly picked up, right after that. Mr. Joel, apparently has an incredible sense of humor, and a string of divorces with matching songs for each divorce. Also, the way he said “Thank you” in Cantonese seemed unrecognizable, as any non-native speaker of Cantonese would know, the seven tones of that difficult language can leave any native speaker wondering what you were actually saying.
Personally for me, there were many wonderful and emotional moments. First was when he sang “Just The Way You Are”, a song which he wrote for his first wife. One plus factor in his show was the clarity and strength of his voice. Vic said “He is like Celine Dion. It’s as if you were listening to a CD.” He just meant that there were no out-of-tune notes here and the power and the emotion that he gave hewed closely to what you hear on a CD, and even more, because this was a live show! A second plus was the clarity of the piano playing. Mr. Joel, also lovingly called as the “Piano Man” showed everyone why he truly deserved that accolade. Every note he struck was clear, forceful and evocative. Norah Jones and Diana Krall, also both piano-driven performers need to learn a thing or two about how to do live shows while playing the piano. I am not a technical person but Mr. Joel probably sought the assistance of a very good sound engineer as every instrument that night was explosive and sounded beautifully – from the sexy saxophones to his piano chords, to the beat of the drums – and with his gruffy, growling and still strong vocals – it was a musical experience that was new to me – a concert veteran of sorts. What I mean by new was, usually, today’s live shows are just slam-bang affairs, sans any emotional hold on the audience. With his interpretations tonight, coupled with the weighty lyrics, the clear live sound, it was hard not to feel emotional, especially that many of Billy Joel’s songs evoke memories of a much younger me. The last time I felt like this was with Paul Anka’s show last year. Maybe it’s their maturity, or the wonderful way they interpret their songs live, but, surely, a lot of the younger performers can learn a thing or two on how to do a live show from these two veterans.
By the time Mr. Joel did “The River of Dreams”, everyone in the crowd was already on their feet. And it was about time too! With a short intermission of an AC/DC song from a roadie, Mr. Joel returned to do a slew of his early hits which the audience lapped up with unbridled giddiness and cheers! Although there was no “Uptown Girl”, “Tell Her About It” and “I Go To Extremes”, the slew of pre-1983 hits that he sang towards the end of the concert, songs whose titles I don’t know, but which Vic aptly referred to as “Lutopan songs”, since they were radio staples when we were growing up in the boondocks of Cebu, more than made it up for us personally, and gauging from the very warm response from the audience, Mr. Joel impressed the normally, staid local Chinese crowd. Not to be mistaken though, there was a sizeable expat crowd that night, and they were more rowdy too and more openly appreciative of the performances.
I am actually now at home, but I still surf Youtube for live versions of “ Allentown ” and “Piano Man”. Those two songs were my favorite performances that night. He closed the concert with the latter song, a classic which many in the audience knew the lyrics to. During the last refrain, Mr. Joel stopped singing and aloud the audience to do their own singing – “Sing us a song, you’re the piano man, Sing us a song tonight, Cause we’re all in the mood for a melody, Keeps us feeling alright” – at least that’s how I sang it. Never got around to check the actual lyrics though. Hate to correct myself, hahaha! I was rowdiest though with “We Didn’t Start the Fire”, a song which I sing with when I drive along EDSA. It was great singing it with him. He never missed a word. He said every single word correctly and at the right placement!
