“I’ve got good news and bad news” Billy Joel said wryly from the outset of his only European concert of the year. “The bad news is I have nothing new to play. The good news is you don’t have to hear anything new”.
Without a conventional pop album in 30 years, the 74-year-old is fully leaning into his legendary status – Joel is the seventh best-selling artist of all time – and his reputation as provider of guaranteed old-fashioned good times: stories, jokes and piano songs everyone knows. Who wants to hear new stuff anyway?
Not the sunkissed crowd at Hyde Park, who lapped up every moment of this perfectly honed, professional yet utterly joyous show. Joel’s ongoing hometown Madison Square Garden residency in New York, where he has played a show every month since 2014, means that despite being one of the more grounded superstars – Joel has kept something of the underdog about him all these years – he has this showbiz-tinged entertainment down to a tee.
He looked the part in dark blazer and shades, with onstage banter as well rehearsed as his band – a sharp eight-piece ensemble equally comfortable rocking out (the closing 70’s chugger “You May Be Right”) and providing smooth saxophone accompaniment (a beautiful, epic mid-set “New York State of Mind”) as they were providing a cappella backing during the mass singalong of “The Longest Time” – but it undeniably worked a treat.
Four songs in, he asked the audience to choose the next song by cheering for their favourite (they plumbed for an album cut, the affecting bar-room ballad “Vienna”, over “Just the Way You Are”). “Don’t get your knickers in a twist, I’m no Mick Jagger,” he said when he first stepped away from his revolving piano: to prove the point, he then performed some stilted but very funny Jagger-esque dance moves as the band struck up The Rolling Stones’ “Start Me Up” (“I told you” he said, when he finished).
Worried he wouldn’t hit the high note from “An Innocent Man” he told the crowd to “pray for me”: he needn’t have worried, as his voice, unlike some of his contemporaries, has weathered well.
The occasional odd choice aside – guitarist Mike Delguidice bizarrely sang “Nessun Dorma” – this was a hit-laden set from opening “My Life”, with Beethoven’s Ode to Joy by way of introduction, through to the funky – by Joel’s standards – “River of Dreams” (which neatly segued into “River Deep Mountain High”, sung by saxophonist Crystal Taliefero, and back again) all the way to the closing harmonica-led “Piano Man”. Joel’s 1973 breakthrough hit, a paean to the downtrodden, was evocatively magnificent as ever.
A lengthy encore showcased his versatility; a spirited take on pop-rock tongue-twister “We Didn’t Start the Fire”; “Uptown Girl” – which, for reasons that weren’t immediately apparent, became a duet with Joe Jonas of the Jonas Brothers – was jubilant; “It’s Still Rock ‘n’ Roll to Me” an infectious tribute to his 50s rock roots.
There was even time for an energetic take on The Beatles’ “A Hard Day’s Night”. “I don’t come here that much and I don’t know when this old ass is coming back,” Joel said. If he never returns, this was a fitting goodbye.
