Posted on 04/15/2024 6:22:42 AM PDT by FLNittany
Sunday night (April 14) was slated to be a triumphant first for Billy Joel. After half a century in the music business, the Piano Man was headed to prime time for his first-ever broadcast network concert special, The 100th: Billy Joel at Madison Square Garden – The Greatest Arena Run of All Time.
Announced during this year’s Super Bowl and taped on March 28 during Joel’s 100th consecutive performance at the legendary New York city venue, the show was slated to run from 9-11 p.m. on CBS. Unfortunately, the network’s live coverage of the Masters golf tournament pushed back the start of the Joel concert’s airing, which meant that the climactic ending of the show was cut off for many viewers to throw to the local news.
To make matters worse, according to posts from livid viewers, the screen went black at the worst possible time, near the celebratory ending of Joel’s signature sing-along ballad, 1973’s “Piano Man.” “#BillyJoel #MSG #100 concert not only starts a half hour late, but then you cut off the last 3-4 minutes for local news to start at 1130?,” read one rage-filled tweet that opened with a not polite, four-letter salutation to the Tiffany network. “Are you serious. Absolutely pathetic decision making, on an event that’s been advertised for MONTHS, and you f–k it up.”
At press time a spokesperson for CBS had not returned Billboard‘s request for comment about the abrupt cut-away from the broadcast, which some X users compared to the infamous moment in 1968 when NBC jumped from a nail-biter New York Jets/Oakland Raiders football game to switch to children’s movie Heidi.
“CBS has been promoting the Billy Joel concert special every two minutes for WEEKS. So what better way to air it than to preempt it for a half hour and the cut him off MID-PIANO MAN? C’mon guys,” read another annoyed tweet. That same fan further explained that she’d spent “three wonderful years with CBS and I love the network dearly… but as a media professional, I am straight up confounded by this decision.”
In fan video of the moment, Joel is leaning into the denouement of the song, singing, “And the piano it sounds like a carnival/ And the microphone smells like a beer,” amid footage of fans at the MSG show singing along and cheering as the screen abruptly jumps to local news. To be fair, the cut-off came near the end of the final verse, with just a round of choruses, and around a minute, left to go. According to one report, the edit only affected viewers in the Eastern and Central time zones.
While CBS has not issued a statement so far, one of the affected stations offered an apology, with 10 Tampa Bay sport director Evan Closky writing, “As a man who grew up right next to Billy Joel’s hometown, who went to The Last Play at Shea, it was my duty to apologize to everyone about cutting off our telecast of Billy Joel tonight. Not to get into the weeds, but there was a special report after the Masters and it wasn’t accounted for by the powers that be beyond this building.”
Joel will be back at MSG on April 26 and May 9 for two more gigs at his home-away-from-home, before hitting the road this summer for a run of baseball stadium gigs that run through November.
The Billy Joel concert I went to in 2005 was possibly the best concert I’ve been to.
On the east coast, all the network had to do was put one of three 60 minutes segments in the can for a week, and they would have been back on schedule.
I haven’t watched 60 minutes in decades, but I can only assume that at least 1 of the 3 segments was a PDJT smear.
Blaming this on local stations isn’t exactly correct.
To be fair, I give 60 Minutes credit for exposing George Soros as the slimy Nazi apologist that he is:
https://youtu.be/YeThpbBGNQ8?t=417
Ha! yeah. Golf Channel is NBC. Soooo...CBS ain’t saying a word about that.
Scenes From An Itillian Resturaunt is his best.
We are pretty close in age, and I grew up in Connecticut listening to Casey Kasem on WDRC, even getting a Long Distance Dedication in 1982. Also won the Captain Fantastic contest in 1975 by holding the last digit of the phone call to the station until I heard the Captain Fantastic whistle.
By definition, the Billboard Hot 100 doesn’t do album tracks. That wasn’t what it was for. So, Bruce Springsteen could be on the cover of both Time AND Newsweek, and the “Born to Run” single didn’t crack the Top 10.
Billy Joel was a bigger thing in Connecticut than nationwide in 1973 (possibly due to him being NYC centric). I remember his Turnstiles album was only available in mono from the Columbia Record Club, so he was pretty fresh then.
“Show Me the Way” only made #6 (as I recall), even though “Frampton Comes Alive” was among the all-time greatest selling albums.
I was told by a former Billboard employee that there was latitude in chart placement (advance orders and radio airplay being especially squishy measurements). That is how the Captain Fantastic album could debut at #1. I got suspicious when a novelty record called “18 With a Bullet” debuted at #18 . . . with a bullet. I have no idea how they measured double-sided hits (e.g. Ringo Starr’s Snookeroo/No-No Song, Wings’ Jr’s Farm/Sally G, Elton John’s “Grow Some Funk/Feel Like a Bullet”)
Of course “Piano Man” was a thing, but it was not a Top 20 single. His follow-up “The Entertainer” from Streetside Serenade barely tickled the Top 40, even though I liked the number. He had to get out of singing and playing songs about singing and playing songs before he could hit really big.
I certainly agree that you cannot compare one era with another. There was something democratically leveling about going to the Barker’s store and buying a 45 of your choice for 69 cents. A half dozen streaming sites with different track pricing and promotional models and freebies throws everything off. It would be like if they counted those Archies’ records that were printed on the backs of “Super Sugar Crisp” cereal.
Tiger didn’t even play Sun. I didn’t see anything about him on that day.
I was happy to see Heidi. It was a great movie. I didnt care about football as I was 4.
I’ve never particularly liked Joel’s music. But Piano Man is a great song.
My favorite as well. Anyone who has been to a class reunion (just one) can relate.
His heroin era was really good too imo (though he obviously looks strung out on the cover of The Stranger). Captain Jack, Miami 2017, New York State of Mind, etc.
Tiger finished last amongst those that made the cut w/ 82-77 the last 2 rounds.
I give him credit for making the cut. Many better players didn’t. It pretty much ends there though.
Tell me about it. My wife and I used to go visit my folks a couple of Sundays every month and they would always be plopped in front of the TV watching golfzzzzzzz.....
I didn’t watch Sunday. but on Saturday, it was thick and heavy.
It was 30 minutes behind already.
They could have cut 60 Minutes short. Everyone had it on mute so they didn’t forget to change the channel back after the Masters anyway.
So Tiger played Sunday?
-PJ
No.
The diddonuffin crowd will rob them blind.
No, it was SeeBS.
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