Review: RINGO STARR AND HIS ALL-STARR BAND at Mershon Auditorium

During his concert at Mershon Auditorium on Oct. 10, former Beatle drummer Ringo Starr was handed a backhanded compliment by one of the members of his All-Starr band. Edgar Winter introduced Starr as “the world’s greatest drummer in the world’s greatest band.”

That is without argument: Starr was the best drummer in the Beatles. but the consummate showman revealed he is much more than that during his nearly 90-minute show.

Starr crooned his way through an eclectic list of five Fab Four songs, two songs that the Beatles covered, and four of his own songs.

When a husky-voiced fan shouted out, “I love you, Ringo,” Starr laughed. “When I started out, it sounded like this ‘I love you, Ringo’ (imitating a teenage girl’s squeal),” he mused. “Now it’s more like this (dropping his voice into a gravelly rasp) ‘I love you, Ringo.’”

Starr opened the show with a cover of Carl Perkins’ “Matchbox,” his own “It Don’t Come Easy,” and the Beatles’ “What Goes On.”

Starr introduced the latter as “the only song written by Lennon and McCartney … and Starkey.” “I always thought it would sound better the other way around,” he said with a smirk.

In the middle of the set, he rolled off The Shirelles’ “Boys,” his own “I’m the Greatest” and the Beatles’ “Yellow Submarine.” After taking a “juice break” while the band continued to play, Starr came back for the Beatles’ “Octopus’ Garden” and his solo effort, “Back Off Boogaloo.”

Starr then closed off the night with stirring renditions of his hit, “Photograph,” followed by the Beatles/Johnny Russell cover of “Act Naturally,” and then he closed with the Beatles standard, “With a Little Help From My Friends.”

Starr’s friends helped the drummer win the night. Starr allowed each of his All-Starrs – Edgar Winter, Colin Hay (Men at Work), Hamish Stuart (Average White Band), Steve Lukather (Toto), multi-instrumentalist Warren Ham and drummer Gregg Bissonette (ELO)  -- their time in the spotlight. Winter, Stuart, and Hay made the most of the three songs they were allotted.

“I guarantee everyone will know at least two songs,” Starr said. “Each one of these guys is a star in their own right.”

Starr has followed this formula on 14 previous tours, with All-Starr alumni including Starr’s brother-in-law Joe Walsh, Beatle collaborator Billy Preston, the Band’s Rich Danko and Levon Helm, Bruce Springsteen’s saxophone player Clarence Clemons, the Who’s John Entwistle, Emerson, Lake and Palmer’s Greg Lake, and Cream’s Jack Bruce.

• With his lengthy with alliteration introductions of the band members, Winter could have been a cheesy game show host, but fortunately he decided to focus on his music. Looking like an Albino version of Willie Nelson, he dusted off the poppy “Free Ride” and dedicated his cover of Chuck Berry’s “Johnny B. Goode” to his late brother Johnny. The highlight of Winter’s set was, however, the extended version of his monster hit “Frankenstein.” The song ended with a dueling drum solo between Winter and Bissonette with the two performing bits of Queen’s “We Will Rock You,” the Rolling Stones’ “Honky Tonk Woman,” Van Halen’s “Hot for the Teacher,” Led Zeppelin’s “Rock and Roll” and “The Immigrant’s Song,” as well as the Beatles’ “Come Together” among them.
• Winter allowed himself a Dad Joke while introducing Lukather, saying the guitarist was so good Winter “was pale in comparison.” Bissonette supplied the rimshot.

In addition to playing guitar on the other performers’ songs, Lukather had a sterling set of Toto tunes, “Rosanna,” “Africa,” and the often overlooked “Hold The Line.” Ham (“Rosanna”) and Hay (“Africa”) mimicked Toto singer Bobby Kimball’s higher range parts of the songs.

• Hay’s distinctive voice put a new spin on “Africa.” Hay joked about going from being the heralded pop star in the 1980s to being often unrecognized these days. “I don’t mind it so much, but every once in a while, when I am waiting in line to pick up my pills at CVS … and one of my songs is playing.”

While he may look a little older, Hay still sounds as strong as he did 40 years ago. His hook friendly “Who Can It Be Now?” and “Down Under” were well received by the crowd. However, having seen him as a solo performer, I preferred the stripped down acoustic version of “Overkill” to the fully orchestrated adaptation on Oct. 10.

• Stuart is one of a handful of musicians who can say he toured with the two surviving Beatles, Paul McCartney and Starr. Stuart rocked through Average White Band standards, “Picking Up the Pieces” and “Cut the Cake” as well as a cover of the Isley Brother’s “Work to Do.”

But the Starr of the night was Ringo, who at 83 is older than McCartney (81), the Stones’ Mick Jagger (80) and Keith Richards (79), and the Who’s Pete Townshend (78) and Roger Daltrey (79) and yet looks decades younger than all of them.

Clearly Starr enjoys what he is doing, inviting three fans on stage for a hug and joking with a sign-holding fan, “Surely you can’t expect me to read that from back there.”

One of Starr’s best bit was saying at this point in the show he lets a fan pick out the next song. Lukather then went into the opening chords of “Day Tripper” as the audience roared in approval. Starr then waved Lukather off, saying “We’re not doing that.”

Over the years, Starr has been the unappreciated Beatle. In a Saturday Night Live sketch, Loren Michaels offered $100 for the Beatles to reunite on SNL. “You can split the money any way you want … Give Ringo less if you want to.”

While Starr might not top Rush’s Neil Peart or the Who’s Keith Moon for drumming gymnastics, the Mershon show proved at 83, he can still perform with the best of them.

In “I Am The Greatest,” a song John Lennon wrote for Ringo, there is a line that reads “I was in the greatest show on earth/For what it was worth.”

To the fans that packed Mershon Auditorium, it is worth a great deal.

  Photo credit: David Heasley/Mershon Auditorium

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