Elton

Last night I attended the European premiere performance of Elton John's Las Vegas show, the Red Piano, at the O2 Arena in east London. It was very good.

The O2 Arena is located east of Canary Wharf, and it takes about an hour to get there on the tube from Parsons Green. So its a fair trek. Aside from an area probably a little larger than the Rose Garden, it holds a movie theater that contains Europe's largest screen, and a number of restaurants, all with really long lines. And it basically has its own tube stop. Anyways, so after realizing it would take ages to get food at any of these restaurants and with not knowing what time the show actually started, we ended up just getting food inside the arena. This means it was not that great, greasy, and slightly overpriced. If I had walked 50 feet further I could have gotten a ciabbatta cheeseburger, but alas, not that clever. The opener was some singer women who played cheesy songs that I'd never heard. We'll brush over her and get to Elton.

The word show is almost a bit of a stretch. It was really just an elaborate concert, with fancy videos for each song and inflatable stage items, and a red piano on a star that lit-up on which Elton perched. Elton played what can only be described as a string of classics, and he did them all amazingly well. He has a beautiful live voice, and had a few amusing stories to toss in between songs. It started on an up-beat vibe with a bit of Benny and the Jets and Philadelphia Freedom, tossed in a about 6000 more classics, including well, all of Elton John's classics (Believe, Tiny Dancer, Goodbye Yellow Brick Road, Someone Saved my Life Tonight, Daniel, Rocketman, the Bitch is Back, etc.). I didn't quite understand all of the inflatable stage items, like the upside down ice cream cone holding a cigarette, but some of them were nice. Couldn't really see all of the video stuff from where we were sitting, but some seemed a bit distracting. When Elton is about, you don't really need all that stuff. He saved Your Song for the encore, and it was really the only song where you could hear everyone in the audience singing along. It was very touching.

Apparently he was going to take the Red Piano show over to mainland Europe but all the shows got cancelled. No clue what went on there, but if he does the show again in Vegas whilst anyone is there, I would give it my endorsement.

Things were a bit crazy trying to get back to the tube, but it wasn't as bad as one would assume and we made it back to Waterloo in time for the 11:39 train. Some of us slept on the train. Back in Southampton for a couple more days, making the final move up to London on Sunday now. I think. Hopefully.