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4 Things We Learned At Billy Joel's Long Island Show Last Night
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Gothamist Staff
Published Oct 17, 2013
Modified Oct 17, 2013
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By
Gothamist Staff
Published Oct 17, 2013
Modified Oct 17, 2013
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Last night, Billy Joel played The Paramount in Huntington, NY as a warm-up for his upcoming tour of the United Kingdom. It was his first Long Island concert in more than a decade, and we’re not even going to pretend to be objective: it was amazing. Here are four things we learned from the performance.
1. He’s not afraid to bust out the deep cuts.
After Joel opened the show with “Everybody Loves You Now” and “Movin’ Out,” he said: “We’re not going to play all hits tonight. I’m tired of that.”
He was true to his word; though the two-hour set included plenty of radio favorites, it also featured a barrage of album tracks including “Vienna,” “A Room of Our Own,” “The Great Wall of China,” and “Blonde Over Blue,” the latter of which Joel said he’d never played live before.
If you were a hardcore Joelite, the setlist was glorious. And one would have to assume that only a very serious Billy Joel fan indeed would, given access to $600 or more, pick up a ticket to this show on StubHub.
2. He’s still got some pep in his step.
Midway through the show, Joel used a towel to wipe sweat from his glistening head and declared: “this is harder than it used to be.” And, yes, he is a 64-year-old who’s contemplated retiring from performance and has had both hips replaced but he can still be a showman.
His voice sounded strong, even if some melodies were transposed and he received help from his backup singers on a few high notes. And while Joel did spend most of the show securely perched on his piano stool, he pulled out the stops for the encore, swiveling those replacement hips and twirling his microphone stand during “It’s Still Rock and Roll to Me.”
3. Long Island loves Billy Joel, and he loves them back.
Okay, maybe we didn’t need to learn about the mutual admiration between Billy Joel and his home landmass”it’s pretty well known at this point”but it’s powerful. The crowd roared at jet-engine decibel levels when Joel took the stage. They sang every word of “Scenes from An Italian Restaurant” and “Piano Man.” And they hooted ecstatically at local references like the Cold Spring Harbor namedrop in “Everybody Loves You Now” and a tweaked newspaper roll call in “New York State of Mind”: “The New York Times; Newsday, too.”
For his part, Joel dedicated “Miami 2017” to “everyone who’s been through Sandy,” and the performance itself was a benefit for Long Island Cares. While it’s possible that ticket resellers made more money off the concert than any charity, Joel claimed not to understand shelling out so much to see one of his shows: “maybe,” he said, “if Hendrix came back.” And despite the prices many attendees paid to get in, most of the crowd seemed positively blissful.
4. You can never have too many saxophones.
At the conclusion of “Movin’ Out,” there were three saxophones on stage at once. It was just the right number of saxophones.
Here's the full set list:
“Everybody Loves You Now”
“Movin’ Out”
“Vienna”
“The Entertainer”
“A Room of Our Own”
“She’s Right on Time”
“Allentown”
“The Great Wall of China”
“Miami 2017 (Seen The Lights Go Out on Broadway)”
“New York State of Mind”
“This is the Time”
“Don’t Ask Me Why”
“Stop in Nevada”
“The Downeaster ‘Alexa’”
“Blonde Over Blue”
“Scenes From an Italian Restaurant”
“The River of Dreams”
“Piano Man”
--
“We Didn’t Start the Fire”
“It’s Still Rock and Roll to Me”
“You May Be Right”
“Only the Good Die Young”
Jonathan Zeller is a writer, editor and all-around Billy Joel fan.
Tagged
billy joel
concert
long island
Gothamist Staff
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