Barbra

Me and the wife went to go see the Barbra Streisand show at Madison Square Garden on Monday night. Oh-mah-gawd! Let me just say it was worth every penny of the $425 (a piece!) we paid for those tix. I have never been to a show as great as hers, and she is true showbiz royalty in this shallow world of pretenders like Pink and Nelly Furtado.

I had never seen a Babs concert live before, but since I have all her albums and DVDs, I wasn't going to let this opportunity pass me by. So, Barbra comes out in this smock-like number -- oozing classy -- and starts belting out "Woman in Love." We all let out a geschrei -- me, the wife, and all the 60-year-old gay couples sitting around us. After that, Barbra just kills "Evergreen," and it was off to the races from there. Without stopping for air, she gave us "People," "The Way We Were," "Owner of a Lonely Heart," "Aqualung," "Carry On My Wayward Son," "Master of Puppets," "Pump Up the Volume," and "Rapper's Delight." Rapper's-effin'-Delight, people! There is nothing she can't do!

After she sang a medley of Digital Underground and Exposé tunes, some grips came out and attached jumper cables to her earrings and shut the power in the Garden off. Babs started into the first few bars of a cover of Snow's "Informer," and the lights started to flicker on. Barbra was powering the entire fucking Garden with her sheer charisma! It boggled the mind, as well as thermodynamic principle.

Later, Babs cames out on a unicycle and sings "Second Hand Rose" while trick-throwing knives at diminutive 70s singer-songwriter Paul WilIiams, who had been affixed to a spinning disk. She never missed once! Her aim is true. After four-and-a-half hours, she finally starts bringing the show to a conclusion, where's she's joined onstage by John Kerry, Liza Minelli, Elmo, John Cameron Mitchell, Sylvester Stallone, Harry Nilsson (I know!) and LeVar Burton for a rollicking version of Ini Kamoze's "Here Comes the Hotstepper." The audience was moved to tears, in waves and waves.

I pray that this was, indeed, her last show, because I don't think the old ticker could stand another go-around with Babs. Put me down for "I Can Die a Happy Man Now."