Boyzone singer at his best crooning mainstream hits

ronan keating mudhouse review 8th February 2010 - Reviewed by Vicki Anderson c/o The Press
REVIEW: A Day on the Green, featuring Ronan Keating, Mud House Winery
and Restaurant, Waipara, Friday, February 5.

If talking to your plants makes them grow, what does playing Ronan Keating songs do to them?

At the picturesque venue of the Mud House Winery, Ireland's blond boy wonder of Boyzone fame is every inch the pin-up in crisp white shirt, black vest and accessories including a crucifix, and chains on his hip.

The crowd was split into three - those sandwiched into the seated area, the devoted pit of hardcore dancers (more mush pit than mosh pit) and some who were happily frolicking on the grass at the back beside picnic baskets.

Ninety per cent of the crowd were women, the rest were uneasy, although I did see Jason Gunn singing along with Keating with gusto and there were couples slow-dancing among the vines.

Some of Keating's song choices were odd. Covers of Cyndi Lauper's Time After Time and Simon and Garfunkel's Homeward Bound were tolerable, but his version of Midnight Oil's Beds Are Burning made me cringe.

He was at his best crooning his mainstream hits such as The Way You Make Me Feel, If Tomorrow Never Comes, a highlight being his duet with Jo Garland on We've Got Tonight, with Keating adding the line: "look at the stars, they're not even out now".

Between songs, banter included shouts to Hayley Westenra in the crowd, Callum's mum, thanks to fans for support offered over the death of fellow Boyzone singer Stephen Gately, remembrances of his mother, and more name dropping than you'd find on television channel E. It was Elton John this, Bryan Adams that.

Mate, you say it best when you say nothing at all.

After declaring the crowd to be the best audience on his tour, Keating commented that Boyzone would likely tour New Zealand at the end of the year with their new album, Brother, dedicated to Gately.

Then a costume change to a white jacket and Keating was back for an encore.

The show ended aptly with The Long Goodbye.