Diana Ross - Wembley Arena, London
(Thursday March 25, 2004 5:38 PM)
Gig played on 18/03/2004

It has, she declares, with atypical understatement, been "a difficult year". Arrested for drunk driving in December. Sentenced to serve two days in jail and then called back to the Connecticut facility in question after it emerged she only served 47 of her 48 hours (and was allowed to leave custody several times – her longest consecutive stint was 22 hours!). The death of her ex-husband Arne Naess in a mountain accident in South Africa. And worst of all, having to return to the UK and its over zealous customs officials. There was, you imagine, a warm hand on her entrance when she arrived at Heathrow earlier in the week.

But if there’s a motto that every diva worth their diamante collection is bound to hold dear it’s that old chestnut: "I will survive". That’s what makes a great diva, after all. The ability to soldier on no matter what, holding your head up high with only ten dozen white roses, several developing nations’ GNPs worth of glittery trinkets and an adoring entourage of several thousand to help you through it. The screams that greet Diana Ross as she walks through the crowd to the central stage are as much for the effort she’s put into her outrageously fabulous outfit than the fact she’s about to belt out some classics. She is uber-diva. She will not suffer defeat.

You can witter on about your J-Los and your Beyonces, but truly they don’t make superstars like this any more. Watching Ross in any one of a number of spectacular outfits – she starts out wearing a giant white headdress that makes her look like a cross between a 'Star Trek' alien and a sea anemone and progresses through a dazzling array of glittering frocks and fake furs, simply because she can – you’re struck by just how otherworldly she is. This isn’t just a very rich woman with a flare for showmanship. She carries herself as if she’s from another universe, of another class, truly not of this world.

She performs on a central round stage, with her band and backing singers a few respectful feet below her on the venue floor. For the first three songs, a gaggle of photographers prostrate themselves before her goddessness. Whenever she turns to face a particular section of the crowd, everyone in that segment waves at her frantically. She continues to turn, leaving flailing limbs in her wake. She descends from her stage to mingle with her audience, even sitting on one guy’s lap, but it’s all carefully stage-managed, bouncers hovering. Certain, clearly pre-arranged, fans are allowed to run onstage and boogie with her for a moment. All are male. Whenever a woman tries the same, she’s restrained by security.

But this all pales in comparison, seems mere conversation, when set alongside the brilliance of the songs. After the initial opening run of "My World Is Empty Without You", "Where Did Our Love Go?", "Baby Love", "Stop In The Name Of Love" and "You Can’t Hurry Love", dotmusic's critical faculties are reduced to misty eyes and screams of delight.

While others have been worshipping at the feet of David Axelrod this week, this is our motherload: the genius of Berry Gordy and Holland-Dozier-Holland (amongst others), tied to one of the greatest female voices of all time. And, despite all of her "difficulties" and the fact that she’s a few weeks away from her sixtieth birthday, Diana Ross is still in powerful vocal form, cut glass high notes and emotional depths with just a swish of her hemline.

Most people are here for the disco hits of course. It’s office parties a go-go in Wembley tonight, hand jiving fiftysomethings and Essex mums in tiaras, and "Chain Reaction", "I’m Coming Out", the inevitable "I Will Survive", and even the hideous Eighties rock efforts, all slap bass and bold synth stabs, keep everyone happy.

But it’s The Supremes material that stops you in your tracks, keeps you gulping for air, aware that you’re in the presence of true greatness, history and emotion in motion. Give me the phosphorescent perfection of Diana Ross over hairy dullards like Neil Young and Bob Dylan any day, any decade.

"Thank you," she says. "You’ve been very magnificent."

Not just magnificent, you see. But very magnificent.

by Ian Watson

=====

Hope Diana does a 'farewell' tour (or something similar) before she hits 65. The Supremes reunion tour was a complete joke, but it sounds as if she's still got 'it' live.

Give me the phosphorescent perfection of Diana Ross over hairy dullards like Neil Young and Bob Dylan...
There goes that Dylan thing again.

I don't know, ever since she left the Supremes, there's something about her that's just not my kinda party.


Tribal Disorder