Billy Joel - Live At Shea Stadium

Performance 
Production    

If the United States gave out knighthoods to musicians, Billy Joel would certainly be a Sir. He is, essentially, the American Elton John. In 1994 these two piano men even embarked on a hugely successful series of "Face-to-Face" tours together, and their music continues to share an enduring worldwide appeal that few artists have matched. I have always been more of an Elton man myself, um...figuratively speaking, but the chance to watch Joel rock a packed-to-the-rafters Shea stadium, just months before it would be demolished, was something I could not pass up.

I first got into Billy Joel back in elementary school when The Stranger climbed to #2 on the U.S. album charts, and the hit songs "Just The Way You Are," "Movin' Out (Anthony's Song)," "Only The Good Die Young," and "She's Always A Woman," were just about all you heard on the radio. A year later, 52nd Street was even more successful, reaching the #1 spot, and spurning three more top 40 singles. Joel retired from recording pop music in 1993, but up to that point he had already scored an incredible 33 Top 40 hits, 23 Grammy nominations (and 6 wins), and has sold over 150 million records worldwide.

Live At Shea Stadium was filmed over two nights, July 16 and July 18, 2008, before a combined crowd of about 110,000 fans, and these would be the last two shows ever played at this historic stadium before it was torn down in 2009. The video begins with some marvelous overhead shots of the stadium and its capacity crowd, which brilliantly capture the enormity and excitement of this event, and leaves no doubt that this will be one of the most impressive looking Blu-ray concerts you might ever see.

Joel wisely kicks off  the show with a spirited performance of "Prelude/Angry Young Man," from his Turnstiles album of 1976, and the energy in the place is amazing. "My Life," keeps the electricity flowing a little longer before Joel slows it down a bit with one of his best early ballads, "Summer, Highland Falls," also from Turnstiles. This would be the favored album of the first half of the set, with fours songs played, including the classic "New York State Of Mind," and the deeper cut, "Miami 2017 (Seen The Lights Go Out On Broadway)."

Joel is one of the few artists who have the luxury of being able to leave out over a dozen top-20 hits from his setlist, and still be able to fill a two hour show with smash hits and fan favorites. Sure, I was wondering where in the hell "Movin' Out (Anthony's Song)," and "Big Shot" were, but fans of his '80s mega-hits like "It's Still Rock & Roll To Me," Tell Her About It," and "Uptown Girl," will also surely be disappointed that so many of those songs were left out of the set. I certainly wasn't. The setlist did feature at least one song from every Joel studio album, with the only exception being 1974's Streetlife Serenade.

As the concert wore on it became more apparent just how tired and unengaged Joel seemed to be, especially when compared to other recent performances, such as his 12 Gardens Live concerts of 2006. He half-assed his way through "New York State Of Mind," with Tony Bennett, mostly just doing a cheesy lounge singer imitation. About half way into the set, Joel invited country music legend Garth Brooks out to perform the song that Brooks had turned into his own hit back in 1991, "Shameless," and then for the next number, "This Is The Time," John Mayer lends some of his tasty blues guitar licks to performance. Joel seemed to come alive the most during all of the guest performances, as if playing his own songs in front of a packed stadium of 55,000 adoring fans was just too "been there, done that" for him to get overly inspired.

Joel closes out the show with three of his best songs, "Scenes From An Italian Restaurant," and "Only The Good Die Young," from The Stranger, and a rousing "Piano Man, which was carried more by the enthusiastic audience, than by Joel himself. Oh, and Paul McCartney played a couple of Beatles' tracks too. Yeah, Paul hit a 450-foot home run into the center field seats with "I Saw Her Standing There," while playing his Hofner bass guitar and invoking memories of that historic 1965 Beatles' concert. For the final song of the night Joel graciously turns over his piano seat to Sir Paul while he sings background vocals on "Let It Be."

I have read a few scalding reviews of Joel's performance at these shows, with one longtime fan and reviewer going as far as to call it "pungently shitty," and although I can certainly identify with some of the "laziness" critiques, I still found this Blu-ray disk to be a very enjoyable show overall. Sure, if you have already seen any of Joel's better performances of the last decade, then this one might be a let down for you. But at almost 60 years of age, at the time, and in need of double hip replacement surgery, which he had in 2010, Joel was far removed from his performing prime.

There were a few other guest appearances by Aerosmith's Steven Tyler who sang their classic, "Walk This Way," The Who's Roger Daltrey, who sang "My Generation," and John Mellencamp who sang "Pink Houses." For reasons that escape me, these performances were relegated to the bonus features section instead of in the main setlist where they belonged.

As I already hinted at earlier, this is one of the most vibrant and sharpest looking Blu-ray concerts I have ever seen. The clarity and detail are remarkable in both the extreme close-ups and the longer shots of the entire stadium. The Blu-ray version includes lossless LPCM 2.0 and 5.1 surround audio tracks as well a standard Dolby Digital 5.1 surround mix. I was surprised to see so many extremely negative reviews concerning the audio mixes on this Blu-ray disc, which leads me to believe that there must have been a production problem with some of the disks. I found the two LPCM mixes to be excellent overall, although the bass could have been mixed a bit higher. My subwoofer was barely utilized. The LPCM 5.1 surround mix was the clear winner here, with the Dolby 5.1 mix sounding slightly weaker.

The camera work throughout this concert was brilliant. You get a variety of great angles, including all of those incredible helicopter (or blimp?) shots from above the stadium, which really captured the energy and scale of this concert. The only bonus features were the three special guest performances.

Live At Shea Stadium is not so much Billy Joel's finest hour, as it is a momentous occasion, brilliantly captured on Blu-ray and DVD, that is certainly worth checking out.

Reviewed by Paul M. Roy - May 2011

Comments or Complaints?

Technical Details

Audio Formats
LPCM 5.1 Surround 
Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround
LPCM 2.0 Stereo

Video Format
16 x 9 Anamorphic Widescreen
1080i High Definition

Performers
Bill Joel - Piano/Vocals,Harmonica
Tommy Byrne - Musical Director, Guitar, Vocals
Mark Rivera - Saxophone, Vocals, Guitar, Flute
Crystal Taliefero - Percussion, Guitar, Saxophone, Vocals
Dave Rosenthal - Keyboards, Vocals
Andy Cichon - Bass, Vocals
Chuck Burgi - Drums
Carl Fisher - Trumpet, Saxophone

Special guests: Paul McCartney, Tony Bennett, Garth Brooks, John Mayer, John Mellencamp, Steven Tyler and Roger Daltrey

Running Time: 140 Minutes

DVD Release Date - April 2011
Performance Date - July 2008

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