Prince Rocks the Penultimate Jay Leno Show
50-Year-Old Megastar Performs Somewhere Here on Earth
Like his predecessor, Johnny Carson, Jay Leno has been calling in the big guns as his show winds down to a close. Prince turns 51 on June 7th, and he displayed more energy, style and charisma than most performers half his age.
The former Purple One closed the show with “Somewhere Here on Earth,” from his 2007 Planet Earth CD. His segment featured one of the best stage sets ever to grace the talk show – he created a cool and cozy jazz club, replete with bar and bartender, tall tables and stools, potted palms, and a bevy of hip-looking live human beings (including his current flame Bria Valente). Prince approached the microphone wearing a silver lame jacket, black slacks and sparkly custom-made Marty Magic ear cuffs.
Shades of The Stylistics and Joni Mitchell
Last night’s arrangement of the song straddled the soul and jazz genres, and Prince the Crooner spent most of it in his soaring falsetto, recalling as he often has in recent years, Russell Thomkins Jr. of The Stylistics. Backing him were Rhonda Smith on electric upright bass, Renato Neto on piano and a woodwind section that reminded one of Joni Mitchell’s Court and Spark and Hissing of Summer Lawns LPs (the latter being one of Prince’s favourite albums.)
In “Somewhere Here on Earth,” Prince addresses the downside of interpersonal communication in the age of Facebook and Twitter (as he did before the advent of either “My Computer” from 1996’s Emancipation CD): “In this digital age, you could just page me/I know it’s all the rage, but it just don’t engage me/Like the face-to-face.”
Prince the Visual Artist
During Neto’s jazzy piano solo, Prince ran over to the bar, appearing to order a drink, and then raced to side of the “club” where he began “drawing” on an easel. (Had the songmeister honed his skills as a sketch artist – maybe a Skype-sketch artist – in his free time? Viewers would find out later.)
At the song’s end, host Leno came over to greet Prince, at which time the singer ran over to the easel and tore off the paper on which he’d been doodling. Turns out he wasn’t drawing at all, but writing a large-format autograph for the outgoing Leno. His note read: “Jay is the best. Even Paul Shaffer knows.”
This is What 50 Looks Like
Before the credits rolled, Leno called guest Billy Crystal to join them. Both Crystal and Leno moved to shake Prince’s hand at the same time. Ever the multi-tasker, Prince shook Crystal’s hand with his right and Leno’s with his left. When Crystal withdrew his hand first, he left Prince and Leno holding hands like two schoolboys who’d been buddied-up on a class outing. They separated their hands with dispatch, but you just know that that image is going to pop up in the media over the next several days.
Prince on Leno was a memorable performance -- one befitting a veteran talk-show host’s exit. If Prince is what 50 looks like, maybe it’s time for a societal paradigm shift. And the man still rocks lip gloss, eye shadow and false eyelashes like few men can.
Here's the video, while it lasts.
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