"Staying alive?"
(bangkokpost.com, August 2005)
It's hard to live a legend. But it was even harder for
Robin Gibb, who put on a live concert in Bangkok on Thursday, to keep the
Bee Gees "staying alive".
Since Bangkok was the last leg of "The Magnetic Tour 2005: Robin
Gibb" in Asia before he returned to the UK, the Bee Gee star might
have been tired _ perhaps that was why his appearance seemed scripted and
taciturn.
His two-hour show, organised by BNT Entertainment Plc, swung between two
poles: his brother's songs and his own songs.
After the loss of his twin brother, Maurice Gibb, who reportedly suffered
a heart attack during emergency surgery for an intestinal blockage in
2003, his older brother Barry Gibb decided to close the curtains on the
legendary band, which had been formed in 1963. This Is Where I Came In
(2001) was the band's last album.
Robin, who left the group in 1969 to pursue a solo career and later
reunited with the band in 1970, has continued to follow the call of the
music. Two years after the release of his solo album, Magnet (2003), he
hit the road for a tour concert. Then he released a tour CD and DVD called
Robin Gibb Live with the Neue Philharmonic Frankfurt Orchestra, which was
what the audience here was expecting. The concert, however, appeared in
stark contrast to the DVD, which featured more energy from the crooner and
greater intimacy with the cheering crowd.
He began with Emotion. He sang a bit inconsistently, sometimes almost
uttering the lyrics. It was the same with two other songs from the early
days of the Bee Gees, I've Gotta Get a Message To You and How Deep Is Your
Love? The message here was like, "I have to get going to end the
night as soon as possible." Especially on How Deep Is Your Love _ he
sounded like he was doing a karaoke version of his brother's greatest hit.
Whether he noticed this or not is anyone's guess. He switched to his
signature song, I Started A Joke, in which he showed off his best side _
it was the finest moment indeed. Robin's vocals became articulate and
lively, and he managed to get the almost 4,000 audience members in hand.
He did a great job also on Love Hurts from his solo album.
Oh well, I thought, the first few songs might have been a time for
acclimatisation with the new audience at BEC-Tero, a shoddy venue for
concerts as it's packed with movable chairs laid intermittently
back-to-back on the same level, with a rickety platform in the far back.
But as Gibb took us down memory lane with Bee Gees' No. 1 chart-toppers
like Massachusetts (the band's first No. 1 hit in 1967), and How Can You
Mend a Broken Heart (the first No.1 single hit in the US in 1971), the
mood began to drop.
Filling the air was probably the sadness of being alone on the stage,
without his two brothers, especially Barry.
Switching from melancholic ballads, he took the audience back to the disco
age, singing all the greatest hits from Saturday Night Fever, which earned
the British band a Grammy Album of the Year in 1979. His Night Fever
spiced up the atmosphere a wee bit. And he could have continued with
Staying Alive, Tragedy, Jive Talkin', and You Should Be Dancing to
continue heating up the night. Instead, he scattered those songs
throughout the concert, using these highlights as if to rescue his other
low-profile songs.
Robin should have began with Staying Alive, instead of making it an
encore. Why save the best for last when the song can quite naturally
spellbind the audience? And it did, during the encore, getting many
audience members moving and dancing while some even approached the stage
to get up close and personal with the shy singer. If only he had started
with this upbeat song first, then followed with a series of
heart-rendering ballads, it would have made this concert more focused and
intriguing, rather than taking the audience through a random,
mood-swinging song arrangement.
The night went on with other Bee Gees hits like To Love Somebody, Words,
You Win Again, most of which were popularised by up-tempo Barry Gibb.
Robin was superb when he performed his very own music, such as Saved by
the Bell from his first solo album (1969) and Juliet off the How Old Are
You? OST (1983). Some audience members, especially those of his
contemporaries, seemed to enjoy the concert, as if it reminded them of the
good old days. It could have been a fine chance to hear Robin's finest
solo work live. As it was, it was a Bee Gees greatest hits tour, not Robin
Gibb songs with a few old Bee Gees classics thrown in for good measure.
