Thanks to the extreme gregariousness of Sharon Kalinoski, not to mention some unfortunate soul from the East coast who could not attend, I found myself escorting The Lovely Sharon to the Carbondale show with tickets to seats in the front rows. As a result, the experience of Elton was at a most intimate scale. Before cynics start discounting what I am about to say, let remind folks that due to the generosity of Dan Voss, I had the opportunity once before to be up front about 14 months ago. As much as I love Elton's music, that night at St. Louis, Elton was not "on." He didn't seem "into it". That night he did seem as if he was hiding behind the band. But these last two shows demonstrated that he needs no one else to sit in with him to have his best shows ever.
Like Peoria last week, Elton was very much on. Peoria was pretty close to perfection; Carbondale was perfect. I cannot think of a flaw and we all know what a cynic I can be.
Again, I noticed many subtleties and techniques that I had never fully appreciated until this tour. At Peoria, I was taken by the spaces and subtley extended pauses that Elton held in certain instances as well as tremendous evolution in vocal and keyboard technique. This evolution was again evident. Written In the Stars, introduced to this tour at Peoria, was perfected and very confidently delivered in Carbondale.
Additionally, I was taken at Carbondale by the sincerety and expression in Elton's delivery. I guess at some shows in recent years I felt Elton was going through the motions at times. At Peoria, and especially at Carbondale, Elton was very genuine in his performance. Long timers here know that I am amongst a minority of fans who in recent years found Ticking to be a bit "over the top" (ie. too meodramatic.) At these shows, I thought they were delivered with tremendous sincerity.
Your Song even seemed fresh, in part for the same reasons and because it came right at the beginning in a way that reminded me of the orginal Elton John album (as released in most of the world).
One could argue that it is "easy" to perform relatively obsure treasures like Skyline, Come Down In Time and Talking Old Soldiers with freshness. But I am a fan who has grown tired of the "Greatest Hits." Not that they are bad, I just played them to death long ago. I never expected Elton to perform Crocodile Rock and Bennie and The Jets which such engaing energy. But at Peoria, and more so at Carbondale, Elton got the crowd into it much more than usual. The most priceless moment for me at the show, perhaps at any show was the most hilarious expression on Elton's face during Bennie and The Jets when he sang in a sort of falsetto, "Candy and Ronnie have you seen them yet?/Oh but they are so spaced out." Now I am not all big on these photos of Elton with his mouth wide open and all, but his expression was just so incredibly spontaeous and worth a thousand words. All that ran through my mind thinking of this moment was Joni Mitchell's famous comments about siniging being a higher form of acting. And let me tell you, Elton just nailed these lines with his entirity as I have never seen him do so before. Incredible! (Sharon believes she was able to snap his picture at this moment which I will always remember, so perhaps I don't even need a photo.)
At this point I might interject that, yes, photo shooting was indeed permitted at this show. The only thing was that it seemed to get out of hand during the first songs and the only regrettable situation of the evening seemed to be that the photo taking, during the beginning of the show, seemed to get out of hand. I believe Elton may have asked the staff to have folks pull back for a while at first. But that was not a problem caused by Elton.
Another thing I noticed was how Elton positions and pulls his mouth away from the mic to achive certain vocal effects. I was very impressed by this and found this to be a revelation. Again, technically -- voice and keyboards -- he was superb!
I know some folks will view this all with cynicism, but this cynic has to say that Elton's performance at Peoria was a 95 out of 100 and his performance at Carbondale was perfect.
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