"People ask me what `American Pie' means" says Don, mid-way through his enviably well-attended show. "It means I don't have to work any more if I don't want to." Therein, perhaps, lies the problem. Here is an artist who really doesn't seem to want to be out doing it - and while that means a fun, relaxed sort of show packed full of quirky little covers of songs they happen to like, it inevitably means a blunting of the artistic hunger that made them great in the first place. With bass and keyboard accompanists - the keyboardist with a penchant for a truly horrible "wedding band" string sound, but excellent when he stuck to piano - McLean rattled through goodtime covers of Hank Williams and Buddy Holly songs and a couple of schmaltzy recent originals.
The second half shifted up a gear, with some surprisingly good Appalachian flat-picking instruments and Tony Bennett-esque arrangements of more unfamiliar songs but it was the quality of McLean's older material - not only the hits but the album tracks that stood out. One forgets how many he's had: "Castles In The Air", "And I Love Her So", "Mountains Of Mourne", "Vincent" and so forth. The voice as good as ever, the melodies strong enough to drown out an irritating keyboard. Nobody went home disappointed.
