We decided on a second round of Elton John after missing him at Harvey’s Outdoor Arena last summer. The summer date was too recent, as we’d seen him perform with Billy Joel in Oakland the previous February. So, this February, we paid the inflated ticket prices to see him perform at Reno Events Center.
The bad news? Elton was getting over bronchitis, and he felt badly enough to admit it. The good news? He played a 3+ hour set without missing a beat – double kicks off the piano and all. Opening with the double shot “Funeral For A Friend/Love Lies Bleeding” set the stage for a dramatic and well-played show that combined his greatest hits with samples from “The Union,” his collaboration with Leon Russell, which came out last fall.
Performing from "The Union"
Now, although I would have traded some of these backwater tracks for renditions of “Sixty Years On” and “Border Song,” I was rather fond of “Monkey Suit” for its tongue-in-cheek delivery and “Gone To Shiloh” if for no other reason than the fact that Neil Young was a guest vocalist on the album cut.
At any rate, with Elton’s voice only marginally waylaid by illness, he jetted through the rest of my favorites: “Levon,” “I’m Still Standing,” and “Madman Across the Water,” while also managing to make Debra cry with the opening lines: “Daniel is traveling tonight on a plane…” These performances, along with a still jovial John, who jumped up from his piano bench to walk the stage and thank the audience after nearly every song, were enough to make the night worthwhile.
Setlist:
1. Funeral For a Friend/Love Lies Bleeding
2. Saturday Night’s Alright (For Fighting)
3. Levon
4. Madman Across the Water
5. Tiny Dancer
6. Philadelphia Freedom
7. Goodbye Yellow Brick Road
8. Daniel
9. Rocket Man
10. I Guess That’s Why They Call It the Blues
11. Hey Ahab
12. The Best Part of the Day
13. Gone to Shiloh
14. Monkey Suit
15. When Love is Dying
16. Sad Songs (Say So Much)
17. Take Me to the Pilot
18. Never Too Old (To Hold Somebody)
19. Sorry Seems to be the Hardest Word
20. Candle in the Wind
21. Burn Down the Mission
22. Bennie and the Jets
23. The B is Back
24. I’m Still Standing
25. Crocodile Rock
Encore:
26. Your Song
27. Don’t Let the Sun Go Down on Me
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