There we were last week at a family birthday meal, full o’ the joys.
We suddenly got all excited about our bonanza of Christmas entertainment, including pantos for the kids, most already booked. We quines had two highlights. The first: Michael Ball and Alfie Boe’s festive special at P&J Live on December 11, with the Craighaar already booked for pre-concert supper.
I wondered if we’d be close enough this time for me to catch gorgeous wee Alfie’s eye. Maybe he could give me a come-hither wink in return.
“The popmeister will not be farewelling in Aberdeen, or anywhere else, any time soon
Even more exciting would be the gig the night before: Elton John’s Farewell Yellow Brick Road Tour. We laughed about how we’d actually bought the extortionate tickets in 2018, for the concert in November 2020. Then Covid struck and it was set back a year. Given his age, my pretty funny joke about it all this time has been: “I hope he’s still standing by the time he gets to Aberdeen.”
Delays on the Yellow Brick Road
Many a true word said in jest… The very next day from our chat came the announcement that the popmeister will not be farewelling in Aberdeen, or anywhere else, any time soon. My new date to follow the Yellow Brick Road is June 15 2023.
Peer loon. He’s explained he fell awkwardly on a hard surface during the summer. His hip is so painful it now needs surgery and loadsa physio.
Hey min, Reg, I ken exactly fit yer gan through. I tripped and hitered like a bag of coal when I heard the scaffies coming weeks ago and my shin is still being dressed by the nurses at my GP surgery.
As they say in the Neest, al’ age disnae come itsel’. And I really dinna think the boy’s gammie hurdie would be conducive to zappin’ his piano with the heel of his boot.
A live performance jinx?
Ken ‘is, I suspect I’m a bit of a jinx when it comes to those big gigs. When I was tiddlin’ masellie with anticipation ower seeing Peter Kay live for the first time, he had to cancel. I wonder if he’ll ever stand-up on tour again.
Thanks to Covid, another comic hero of mine, Steve Martin, had to suddenly call off the rest of his UK tour with Martin Short and fly back to the US the very day after I saw them in Glasgow in March 2020.
And, yonks ago, when my favourite crooner Jack Jones was at the Capitol and I was doing the review for the EE, he started by apologising he’d a touch of laryngitis. Sure enough, he missed a fair pucklie of his customarily clear-as-a-bell high notes, which I duly noted.
Michty me, I was bombarded with hate mail (presumably from the grunnies of today’s trolls) protesting that he was note-perfect and I shouldn’t have reviewed the concert if I wasn’t a fan. Deef dingbats.
Not quite ready to hang up the dancing shoes
Even though Elton and I are the same fairly ripe age, to quote the great Dusty, I’m wishin’ and hopin’ and thinkin’ and prayin’ that his and my giggin’ days haven’t come to an end.
I’m on red alert for any sign of Frunkie Valli hitting the UK again. My pop expert pal tells me at his concert in Glasgow in 2019, the 85-year-old still had the amazing voice of his youth, which is sadly more than can be said for Paul McCartney.
But there’s one gadgie I long to see in the flesh again before we’re both totally decrepit. I still love you, David Essex, albeit now bereft of your curly locks. You must remember. You winked at me at the Music Hall in 1983.
Read more by Moreen Simpson:
This article originally appeared on the Evening Express website. For more information, read about our new combined website.