Face2Face

So, remember a few months ago when I posted about how disappointed we were that Elton John and Billy Joel were performing in Denver when we were going to be out of town? Well, that concert ended up getting canceled and, shortly thereafter, rescheduled. Luckily this happened before Torsten decided to quit his job and we implemented the spending freeze, so we purchased tickets (though at least we were smart enough to buy the less expensive seats) back in what is now known as our Happy Go Lucky Period.

And, well, I'm so glad we did. The concert was last night and it was one of the best concerts I've ever been to. Torsten feels the same way. We are both still half deaf but it was so, so worth it. Look, here's a crappy BlackBerry for posterity/to prove we were there (though I'm not sure this photo could actually be used as evidence of anything):


I'm what you might call a casual fan of both of Elton and Billy... as in, I know and love their big hits, can probably recognize their voices if a more obscure song comes on the radio, but am not familiar with their work beyond that. So, I was a little concerned that they might play a bunch of album cuts that I had never heard, but I guess both of them are veterans enough to know what their bread and butter songs are, because I swear they played every one.

Seriously, every time they played another one I thought that surely they must have hit the limit of songs of theirs that I know and love, and then another one would happen. They started with Your Song, which made me super happy because that's one of my favorite songs, and only continued from there. I swear, the only song I can think of by either of them that wasn't played was New York State of Mind.

Elton is a total kook, which I hadn't realized. His outfits were insane, but also awesome. And Billy Joel could have a backup career as a stand-up comedian. Torsten tells me that's his thing, but I didn't know, which just made his dry one-liners extra hilarious. And, they both signed autographs on stage during their set, which I thought was super nice of them.

Plus, these two are a brilliant pairing. Their voices and styles mesh so well. AND the concert was so long! There was no opening act, and we were there for almost four hours. They played a few songs together to start, then Elton did a set on his own that lasted over an hour, and then Billy did the same thing, and then they played a long set together. The crowd was super into it, and to my own surprise, we were far from being the youngest people there.

And... bizarrely... it was romantic. I wasn't expecting that AT ALL, but there it was. It was an awesome experience to share.

Absolutely worth the price of admission, even if we had purchased the tickets post spending freeze. If they ever come back to Denver (assuming we aren't totally broke at that point), we will DEFINITELY go to see them again.