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Billy Joel Moscow 1987 meltdown (1 Viewer)

dickey moe

dickey moe

Fingerpicker
I have to admit I'm not exactly a huge Billy Joel fan, so apologies if this is common knowledge, but for those who had never heard about THIS like me...

 
Story I always heard about that was that whenever the lights went to the crowd they would freeze up and stop dancing and signing given this was communist Sovient Union and they were scared of being identified, etc..  This was the second night of two nights and he had basically told the crew not to do it after the first night but they ignored it and kept doing it so he went ####### ballistic.  

 
Redwes25 said:
Story I always heard about that was that whenever the lights went to the crowd they would freeze up and stop dancing and signing given this was communist Sovient Union and they were scared of being identified, etc..  This was the second night of two nights and he had basically told the crew not to do it after the first night but they ignored it and kept doing it so he went ####### ballistic.  
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Yep they kids would allegedly get in trouble

 
Here's a full explanation:

In an attempt to speed up the connection process with a fresh slab of audience, he cut many of the ballads from the second night's set to lean on the surefire crowd-pleasers. One song that seemed to win over the audience was his 1980 Top 40 hit, "Sometimes a Fantasy." Sure enough, when Joel looked over his piano which was situated towards the rear of the stage, he didn't see a crowd as still as an oil painting for the song. Instead he saw exactly what he hoped for: people throwing their hands up and dancing. They were having so much fun, in fact, that his documentary crew wanted to get better shots of them and shone the house lights on the first few rows. But that caused a huge problem.

The Soviet crowd, raised by decades of Iron Curtain austerity, stopped dancing and froze like deer in headlights when they were lit up, petrified that the security guards would crack down on them. Then the lights would go out again and they'd resume dancing. Lights off, dancing. Lights on, frozen stiff. This went on and on like a game of red light, green light, one-two-three. With each flick of the lights, the perfectionist Joel saw his hard earned connection fading away. Mid-song, he started screaming at his crew to cut it out and, like a consummate professional, didn't even miss a beat as he barked orders between lyrics.

"When am I gonna take control, get a hold of my emotions? STOP LIGHTING THE AUDIENCE!
Why does it always seem to hit me in the middle of the ni-i-ight? STOP IT!
You told me there's a number I can always dial for assistance. LET ME DO MY SHOW FOR CHRISSAKE!"

"I hear Billy singing and he's saying something, but I can't hear what he's saying," lighting director Steven Cohen recalled in A Matter of Trust. But even though Cohen couldn't make out Joel's words, he would definitely recognize what came next—the sound of a piano crashing onto the ground. The five-foot-five-inch Joel had gotten a sturdy grip under the keys, put his back into it, and, with red fury in his face, flipped the whole thing over. Band and crew members recall stray chunks of Yamaha whizzing past them as the piano landed completely upside-down with a loud crash.

With the crazed eyes of a man blacked out on rage, Joel hopped past the overturned piano and stormed towards the front of the stage just feet from the crowd. Since those in attendance had never seen a real rock and roll concert before, they clapped and applauded, thinking it was all part of the act. Joel picked up a microphone stand, swung it above his head, and bashed it into the floor like a lumberjack chopping wood and the crowd cheered even louder. Joel's petrified bandmates stayed clear of his warpath but didn't stop playing, and neither did he. He landed a flying kick into his grand piano as he continued to sing, "Sure it would be better if I had you here to hold me." Then he took a hard swing at it with the mic stand and knocked a big dent into it. The bottom half of the mic stand snapped off and he continued singing into a broken stick while the crowd went wild. No wonder rock and roll shows were so popular in America, they thought. For just five rubles, you could watch a curly haired man beat a piano half to death with a microphone stand. What a deal!

Even though Joel cooled off enough to get the concert back on track, and later apologized for his "real prima donna act" in post-show interviews, the headlines back home turned on him the next morning. "Billy Joel Has A Tantrum" read an Associated Press story picked up by The New York Times.

"I've been on the road for 11 months," he told the reporter. "It's difficult. I'm running ragged."
Click to expand...

 
Redwes25 said:
Story I always heard about that was that whenever the lights went to the crowd they would freeze up and stop dancing and signing given this was communist Sovient Union and they were scared of being identified, etc..  This was the second night of two nights and he had basically told the crew not to do it after the first night but they ignored it and kept doing it so he went ####### ballistic.  
Click to expand...
You may be right.

 
I did a show with Joel years ago. I stood right next to him before soundcheck and thought he was a stagehand lulz. He was wearing a t-shirt and shorts, and had something in his hand near his piano. It was a Sharpie that he used to sign it. He looked like he just got finished driving the truck, and was delivering a piano.  Nice guy though, put on a great show.

 
Can't watch now but maybe he was inspired by Rocky IV?

"During this fight, I've seen a lot of changing, in the way you feel about me, and in the way I feel about you. In here, there were two guys killing each other, but I guess that's better than twenty million. I guess what I'm trying to say, is that if I can change, and you can change, everybody can change!"

 
eoMMan said:
Can't watch now but maybe he was inspired by Rocky IV?

"During this fight, I've seen a lot of changing, in the way you feel about me, and in the way I feel about you. In here, there were two guys killing each other, but I guess that's better than twenty million. I guess what I'm trying to say, is that if I can change, and you can change, everybody can change!"
Click to expand...
Can we, though? Have we? 

 
The show went even more off the rails when Joel dropped his pants in the middle of the stage and made love to his tonic and gin.  

 
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