The last concert of 2024 was a Christmas gift for my wife; Billy Joel performed at the New York Islanders’ home , UBS Arena. Personally, I have seen Billy Joel so many times at this point I do not really need to see him again. We were supposed to attend Billy Joel’s last Madison Square Garden residency show in July but my wife threw her back out and we could not go. I managed to get rid of the pretty expensive tickets in the nosebleeds at the last minute and this New Year’s Eve concert was partly to make up for the show we missed. For this concert, I had managed to purchase a pair on the first row on right side of the stage and we were pleasantly surprised that the previously unannounced Jason Bonham JBLZE opened the show. The ticket said that the concert would begin at 9:30 PM( and we assumed Joel with his band was playing by himself) but Bonham hit the stage at the mostly empty arena, at that point, at 9:10 PM. I had seen Bonham perform at Westbury from the first row over a year or so ago so I knew what to expect, but the view from the side provided me a better view of Bonham drumming; it was a nice start to the evening’s festivities. Billy Joel hit the stage around 10:00 and it seemed to take awhile for the band to hit its stride this night. I do not know if Joel was sick, or if age is catching up with him, but I was not feeling it and found myself a bit bored at times. The energy picked up toward the end but much of the show felt rote as if on cruise control through much of the night. There were no additional special guests, and Billy’s band playing a Led Zeppelin tune with Bonham on drums seemed anticlimactic and not as good as the JBLZE versions that opened the program. While I have always liked Joel’s music, my wife is the bigger fan and even she expressed that the show was not quite as good as was anticipated. All things considered, it was still a good night out, being New Year’s Eve and all; we got to watch the Times Square ball drop on the Jumbotron, and it was not quite as bad getting out of the Emerald parking lot and home than I was expecting. The arena was built for hockey and I am not a fan of seeing a concert there without really good seats; we had pretty good orchestra seats for Eagles, not great seats for Journey with Toto but those were freebies. UBS Arena is too big and cavernous, with too many bad views and inconvenient parking at $54 bucks; it will have to be someone I really want to see to return to this venue.
Happy New Year Piano Man!
Rock on!
GQ