STEVIE

Stevie was absolutely amazing.

Arrived at the closest subway station to the Osaka Municipal Gym at about 6, and street vendors were setting up festival food stalls, and loads of people were milling around. From the young to the old, the fashionable young guys and cute girls to middle aged businessmen, it seemed that everybody in Osaka wanted to see Stevie.



The venue itself was quite big, imagine round arena just a little smaller than Albert Hall with just one layer of stalls. (I normally don't like seeing acts outside of a club, but obviously Stevie is an exception) We were sat in the stalls right oppostite the stage, behind the arena, third row back, so although he wasn't that close, we had a great view.

Stevie was clearly in a brilliant mood, being playful with the audience and playing around a little with the songs. It was the last night of his Japan tour and the band were clearly on a high. His voice was in unbelievable form - I'd say better than his last couple of records, and better then on Natural Wonder. The band was smaller than then - no strings, it was drums, bass, perc, guitar, extra keys, trumpet, sax and 4 singers. There was so much energy and you can tell everyone was loving it.



I would have taken more pictures, (as these are terrible I know) but there were stewards milling around looking out and I didn't want to risk it.



I've always had the opinion that Innervisions is Stevie's best album, and so you'll see why I loved the way the concert started. Check the full set list:

Too High
Visions
Living For the City
Golden Lady
You Are The Sunshine of My Life
Higher Ground
Superstition
Don't You Worry Bout A Thing
If You Really Love Me
Never Dreamed You'd Leave In Summer
Lately
Stay Gold
Overjoyed
Go Home
Part Time Lover
My Cherie Amor
Sir Duke
I Wish
I Just Called To Say I Love You
Master Blaster
So What The Fuss
As
Encore: Another Star

UNBELIEVABLE set list.

Loads of little touches to the arrangements made them great, such as a latin segue at the end of Don't You Worry Bout A Thing, additional vocal refrains at the end of songs, and a whole bunch more solos. (I can't be 100% sure, but I'm fairly certain that during Stevie introducing the band over the As intro looped around, he said the other keyboardist was Ronnie Foster, who's a Blue Note artist - 'Mystic Brew' big tune remixed by Madlib on Shades of Blue.) The tunes flowed straight from one to another (except for a couple of times when Stevie would talk to the crowd) and it built perfectly, towards massive tunes like I Wish (complete with those stops) and Master Blaster. Just to hear all these songs you know inside out that mean so much to you performed with such energy and mastery was incredible.

Stevie was really playful with the audience too, during If You Really Love Me giggling and making little musical jokes during the soft part and before Part Time Lover he announced he was going to sing something acapella and stood up. The bassist started saying something about 'Da Da Da, Da Da, Da-Da Da-Da' and him and Stevie kept this going for a few minutes before getting the audience to chant it, and joining in making it the intro riff from the tune, finally singing it just with bass and drums.



After that tune, Stevie sat at the piano and started playing.
"Welcome..." he said in a strict voice "to the class of Steveland."
"This means, that this is my music class. I want it to be the best music class... in the world. Tea!"
Somebody brought him some tea and he put on a terrible British accent.
"Thanks sou much forr ther teea!"
People start applauding, for no real reason.
"Stop!! This is my class!! Don't do anything till I tell you!"
He started getting the crowd to sing little music exercises, little arpeggios and stuff, and for a crowd of a few thousand odd people it sounded pretty good. It sounded for all intents and purposes like he was going to launch into "Ribbon in the Sky", but then he switched it around, had males and femals singing different interlocking parts at the same time, and launched into My Cherie Amor :o)

Hard to pick out highlights because every track was amazing (kind of trite, but again, with Stevie he sidesteps all that. Same with lyrics, half the things he sings from anyone else would be cheesy, but he's just so honest with it that its not even in question), but I guess for me were the deeep version of Visions, the tunes we used to play in Steel and HYM of course, Part Time Lover which had an incredible energy. If You Really Love Me was fantastically arranged and a lot of fun. And the final encore, heavy rendition of Another Star, perfect finish. When the band did finally finish, unlike the smooth soul they'd been piping in before the concert, triumphant string music like a march from Star Wars was played around the venue. Right kind of feeling :)

After they were selling some CDs including a new double album Best Of, this guys job was to stand there with a massive sign with the tracklisting on, seemed kind of funny when they could have just hung it up. Note how they've highlighted with a red star the tunes Stevie played tonight. Japan is all about attention to detail.



Got the last train back and got home around 1.00. Nice to know I can make it to Osaka and back in a night, even if it is more time travelling than actually being there, but it was more than worth it.