8.1 | / 10 |
Users | 4.0 | |
Reviewer | 4.5 | |
Overall | 4.1 |
To mark the closing of New York's historic Shea Stadium in 2008, Billy Joel drafted an all-star musical team, including Paul McCartney, Tony Bennett, John Mayer and Garth Brooks, for a last play at Shea. This hits-packed feature is a grand slam!
Starring: Billy JoelMusic | 100% |
Video codec: MPEG-4 AVC
Video resolution: 1080i
Aspect ratio: 1.78:1
Original aspect ratio: 1.78:1
English: LPCM 5.1 (48kHz, 24-bit)
English: LPCM 2.0 (48kHz, 24-bit)
English: Dolby Digital 5.1
English, French, German, Italian, Portuguese, Spanish, Dutch
50GB Blu-ray Disc
Single disc (1 BD)
Region free
Movie | 4.0 | |
Video | 4.5 | |
Audio | 4.5 | |
Extras | 2.0 | |
Overall | 4.5 |
Billy Joel was one of the first concerts I went to, when I was still a kid and probably shouldn’t have been exposed to the “herbal enhancements” older participants were partaking of. Joel blew my mind that night in a free ranging concert that saw him covering his then recent hits from "Streetlife Serenade" and “Piano Man” as well as a previous album that I think I was probably the only person in attendance that night had ever heard of, “Cold Spring Harbor.” (I remember being the sole person clapping when he started talking about it). Being a keyboard player myself, I had relatively few Top 40 piano heroes back in those guitar-dominated days. The 1960's had been an era largely of guitar oriented bands, and in fact only a few pianists in the pop-rock world like Ray Charles and Sergio Mendes managed to break through with substantial chart action as the decade wound down. While you could make an argument that Paul McCartney qualifies as a pianist, the truth is The Beatles were never thought of as a keyboard-oriented band, and though a lot of McCartney's early post-Beatles work did in fact feature keys ("Maybe I'm Amazed" is a great example), for some reason Paul never really seemed to "be" a pianist in most people's minds. As the 1970's moved more toward singer-songwriters, piano fans had had to wait several years for a new generation of piano men (and women) to take the stage and pound the ivories to within an inch of their lives. In fact the only real piano presences on the charts then, at least in terms of general public consciousness, were Joel and Elton John. Joel has never made many bones about being firmly in the Tin Pan Alley tradition. Joel in fact seems proud of his usually inerrant songcraft. While he may not be the most innovative writer out there, he consistently has proven himself to be a savvy craftsman who is able to pull instantly memorable hooks out of thin air and weld them onto often surprisingly thoughtful lyrics. Elton John, who has done a well received duo tour with Joel, has himself recently gone public with his dismay that Joel’s penchant for drinking too much may hobble Joel’s performances (I remember to this day Joel had a glass of whiskey on the music stand of the grand he played the night I saw him, from which he drank rather liberally). Maybe the last few years have seen a slow dissolution on the part of Joel, who has famously had a few run-ins with various law enforcement agencies due to driving drunk and the like, but if this Live at Shea Stadium concert is any indication, Joel had it all together for at least a little while back in 2008, when this concert was filmed as part of the Last Play at Shea series.
Billy Joel Live at Shea Stadium looks absolutely fantastic on Blu-ray courtesy of an AVC encoded 1080i image in 1.78:1. This is one of the clearest and sharpest looking concert Blu-rays in recent memory and once again proves that Sony does these live concert Blu's like no other label. Colors are bright and bold and fine detail is often amazing. Close-ups of Joel reveal copious perspiration as well as what looks like a recent "ding" to his head with its attendant scab. Camera coverage on this concert is stupendous. We get multiple angles, including what must have been helicopter or blimp shots over the entire stadium, and the sharpness and clarity of the image is really amazing. There are one or two very brief moments of aliasing on the huge projections which back Joel and his band, but otherwise this is a spotless video presentation.
Three audio options are offered on this Blu-ray, and two of them are stupendously robust. The lossless LPCM 2.0 and 5.1 tracks (both 48kHz/24-bit) are brilliantly alive and incredibly dynamic, sporting wonderful, near reference quality audio and extremely faithful fidelity. The one bad apple in this trifecta is the alarmingly bad standard Dolby Digital 5.1 mix, which strangely is the second option in the audio menu. In fact, I wonder if our user review mistakenly chose the DD 5.1 track by mistake, because it is woefully inadequate and not just in the lower frequencies. The two uncompressed tracks are both fully robust throughout all frequencies. The 5.1 track is beautifully positioned around the surrounds, with the piano sounding clear and precise. The band sounds absolutely fantastic and the balance is very artfully handled. Though this concert was played before mammoth sized crowds, very little obtrusive audience noise penetrates the performances themselves.
Note: After the two unhappy user reviews, I have gone back and rechecked my disc's two uncompressed audio options and I again do not hear any major differences. The bass and low end are certainly more diffused on the 5.1 track, but there is abundant low end, at least on the disc I got.
Three Bonus Songs are offered, all with Joel taking a back seat to other Shea headliners of days past. "Walk this Way" (1080i; 4:31) features Steven Tyler, "My Generation" (1080i; 4:09) features Roger Daltry, and "Pink Houses" (1080i; 6:04) features John Mellencamp.
Unlike some other aging rock gods, Billy Joel, at least as evidenced by this 2008 outing, remains in remarkably good voice and he also still has that frenetic piano man energy that made him such a sensation when he broke through with "Piano Man" in the 1970's. This is a wonderfully diverse concert with some great performances, and the many duets with other great stars just makes Live at Shea Stadium all the better. Highly recommended.
2008
2007
2010
25th Anniversary
2009-2010
2012
2004-2013
2005
1987
2008
2009
2009
2009
2008
Live at Roseland Ballroom, NYC
2010
2008
2005
2011
2008
U2360° at the Rose Bowl
2009
2008