Saturday night, my wife Karen and I attended the Billy Joel concert at the Los Angeles’ spanking new Intuit Dome.
For me, the past and future merged. Billy Joel is old, reliable and reassuring. The Dome is new and intimidating.
Just getting to the venue proved to be a curious intermingling of current and future technology. The Intuit Dome was built by former Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer at a cost to Ballmer of more than $2 billion dollars, so you would expect nothing less.
I ordered our two seats over the internet. Okay, no problem there, but it got a bit dodgy when I tried to print out the tickets. There were no actual tickets for the event. We would have to log in on the Intuit Dome app.
Anxiety crept in.
This child of the 50s finally figured out how to get the app and even gave my e-mail address and password. The app said because entrance was via facial recognition, everyone would have to have a ticket on their phone. Oh, and since the Intuit Dome was cashless, I would need a credit card to purchase concessions or souvenirs.
Now, in full panic, I called my daughter, Erin, who came over to the house and transferred our tickets to our phones. She also had to log in to our license plate number to the app, as the parking lot only granted entry via license plate recognition.
We arrived at the Intuit Dome’s parking lot and held our breath until the gate opened allowing us entrance. We still weren’t inside the arena, but that process was at least made easier by an army of diverse, well-trained, well-groomed, courteous, Stepford-like ushers who assisted us through the facial recognition ordeal.
Once inside, finally, Karen wanted a beverage. No problem. Another Stepford-like bartender mixed the drink. The facial recognition identified my wife as Karen Pace and the charge was posted on our credit card. As we made our way to the seats, I marveled at the age we live in.
Earlier that week, I pulled onto the venerable century-old Warner Bros movie lot for a table reading of Night Court, the 80’s comedy hit, now revived by NBC. I was jerked into the future, later in the week when I learned Elon Musk was hosting a robotics event on the lot.
Amongst other things Musk unveiled 30 human-sized Optimus robots which, in his words, “can basically do anything you want; be a teacher, babysit your kids, walk your dog, mow your lawn, get the groceries, be your friend, serve drinks…”
Seeing what the future held was a sobering and frightening reality. Yet here, at the Intuit Dome, the future was now.
Because most people didn’t have the luxury of calling their tech-savvy daughter, the concert was delayed about 20 minutes, as the arena was only 3/4 full at 8 pm.
Dressed in a black suit with a black T-shirt, Billy Joel eventually made it to the stage and announced that he was going to do all new material. Then he quickly added, “Nah, we are going to do the same old shit.”
The audience roared its approval.
.Joel proceeded to play 2 1/2 hours of his hits. Mostly all of which were written before he was 35 years old. My eyes saw, a portly, balding, 76-year-old man with a grey goatee and bad back but my ears, and heart, heard the rebellious big haired, wild-eyed Joel of my youth. He remains in great voice I am happy to report, performing 31 songs, including five encores.
In an aside to the crowd between songs, Joel cracked the Inuit Dome was so state of the art that it boasted 1400 toilets and enough urinals to accommodate its 22,000 patrons — all of which are
powered with recycled water. Billy said, “I told the guys in the band,
whatever you do, don’t drink the water.”
The crowd was into it to say the least. To one side of us was a very
attractive woman in her mid-20’s. Braless, and well-endowed, she
wore a white stretch skintight top and tapered leopard print pants. She sported a red MAGA hat perched atop her head, as perhaps a reminder of the horror that awaits us in the upcoming presidential election. A blonde ponytail protruded from the back of the hat. She was with a man old enough to be her daddy, which we knew he wasn’t, because if he had been he would have been brought up on incest charges on the spot. (Bless his heart.)
One row in front, three attractive, mid-fiftyish women danced and
sang the words to every song Joel sang. They danced in such perfect choreographed unison they reminded me of the Andrews Sisters.
From “New York State of Mind” to “Uptown Girl” to “Big Shot.” Joel only relinquished the mic to accompany special guest, 90’s icon Axel Rose, on a rollicking cover of Paul McCartney’s 70’s hit “Live and Let Die.”
At one point in the show, Joel, stopped singing and held up the microphone as to amplify the entire audience singing the words to “Piano Man”, a tune he wrote some 50 years ago.
Imagine what that must feel like I I thought
It was a week for reflection on what we have, and the future that awaits our grandchildren. I look back on the night fondly but frankly look forward to the future with some trepidation.
I can only pray that when our grandkids navigate this new and intimidating world, they will tether it to their own Billy Joel—someone or anything, a little old but oh so comforting and reassuring.
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