Commentary

My heart fell today when I read the fan reviews of the initial TR/JJ concert outing. I am in the interesting position of being a lifelong Todd fan, proudly collecting music and mementos from the inception of his career into the present, and traveling extensively to see his performances. However, like a mother who loves two children equally, I have always harbored the same love, respect and affection for Joe Jackson’s work As the years have passed, I have discovered that both men’s approach to life, culture and music is not so different, although the end product (their music) is. Both artists participate in popular culture exclusive of music, Todd through his technical innovation with computers and Joe through his widely published opinionated essays and books. Both have railed against the music industry’s business practices. While Todd was busy establishing Patronet, Joe was releasing CD’s to be purchased exclusively online, as well as downloadable materials. Both have lifelong fans that are unwaveringly devoted to them and willing to forgive each and every sin, and unfortunately both artists can exhibit occasional unpredictable bouts of bad temperament toward these fans. I was surprised to discover that they did not know each other until recently, particularly because Joe has occasionally performed live covers of Todd’s material and mentioned him with high regard. I was flabbergasted, overjoyed and amazed to hear that they would be performing together.

I have found that one area where the two artists cannot compare unfortunately is with respect to performance preparation. JJ is his own worst critic, and an unrelenting taskmaster when it comes to insuring that he and whichever musicians are backing him up are prepared. Like Todd, he frequently works with the same rotating cast of characters; in the form of Graham Maby he has his very own Kasim Sultan that the fans are dedicated to. This is not to say that he will not make mistakes, however. A few years ago I had the pleasure of taking a vacation to England where I watched JJ reunite with his original “Utopia” and perform a series of ‘warm-up’ shows. The performances were dirt cheap, and the audience got exactly what was billed - warm up shows that were casual and a lot of fun with the underlying goal of preparing a large repertoire of songs for concert readiness. Note: JJ always performs with written music, he is a classically trained musician who records separately on Sony Classical as such and won a Grammy for 1999’s “Symphony No. 1”.

Sadly, I have seen Todd trip and fall too many times at the beginning of a tour, exhibiting clearly minimal or non-existent preparation, particularly if the cities involved are not what I call ‘make or break’ cities such as New York or Los Angeles, where the audience is filled with Important People and Sophisticated Concertgoers who have a High Expectation. As fans, I think we are incredibly lucky that we are seeing our favorite artist in small and intimate venues; however flaws are greatly magnified in these settings. Notwithstanding the fact that concert going today can be indeed an expensive proposition, (they aren’t coming to my city either) I hope that Todd can bring himself to do some soul searching and set aside his ego and do what it takes to make this tour a great memory for myself and all of his other fans. This I think would garner him the greatest respect of all from his fans.