We can all agree on two things. First, there is nothing better than live music. Second, when he was in his touring prime, no one put on a better show for adoring fans than Neil Diamond. Neil could strut his way through Forever in Blue Jeans; he could preach salvation in Brother Love’s revival tent; he could raise the flag while saluting immigrants and immigration in Coming to America. And every show felt like a party. I know, I was at about twenty of them.

Most of you know that Neil stopped touring a few years ago. The progression of Parkinson’s Disease prevents him from performing the way he would want to perform.

So what’s a Diamond fan to do to hear his music live? Barb and I have explored two options in the last few months.

Last November we celebrated our wedding anniversary with fantastic seats for a preview performance of A Beautiful Noise, the Broadway jukebox musical based on Neil’s life. And this past weekend, we took a much shorter journey, to the recently renovated Des Plaines Theatre for the review I Am He Said, featuring Matt Vee and The Killer Vees.

Two very different approaches to the Diamond songbook. I am glad to say Barb and I left both shows serenading each other with Neil’s tunes. But which approach was better?

A Beautiful Noise follows in the footsteps of other bio-musicals such as Jersey Boys and Beautiful but has a unique twist. The chronology of his rise to the top of the music world is interspersed with scenes of therapy sessions between a reluctant Diamond and the psychiatrist his family insists he sees. Through the sessions, we learn how a quiet introverted young man has converted himself into an exuberant performer, while never fully conquering his internal anxieties. And as the story unfolds we experience the havoc the life of a performer may reek on their personal life.

The result is a well-performed see-saw of a musical. The music and choreography are great, but the story, while not quite a Shakespearean tragedy, competes with August, Osage County on the dysfunctional family scale. Only at the end of the show does the house really rock.

I Am He Said is a very different type of show in a different type of theatre. The Des Plaines is the love child of Ron Onesti. The theatre specializes in 60s bands (Tommy James and the Shondells, Herman’s Hermits) and tribute bands (all female versions of Aerosmith and Black Sabbath, anyone?) Barb and I usually avoid that type of tribute show like we would avoid a pandemic-causing airborne virus. But I heard an ad for the show on the radio, we had nothing planned for that Saturday night, and so we convinced good friends to join us for dinner and Neil.

In contrast to the Broadway production, I Am He Said doesn’t bother with Neil’s psychology or motivation. The 11-piece band, half of whose members are related to the 1960s pop icon Bobby Vee, get into a groove and never get out of it. Lead singer/frontman Matt Vee (who sounds more like Diamond than Broadway’s Will Swenson) gives the band some short breaks by telling a few Diamond (and Bobby Vee) anecdotes. If the stories aren’t totally accurate (The Monkees TV show debuted in 1966, not the 1970s, Neil and Barbra Streisand did go to the same high school, but they weren’t smoking buddies on the school playground) at least they are blessedly short. They needed to be short–the audience wanted to hear more music and get back to dancing in the aisles.

A few things I might have changed with the show. The performances were tight replicas of Diamond’s studio albums. It would have been cool to follow some of the arrangements from Hot August Night or other live albums. Finally, does the sing-along Sweet Caroline HAVE to be the encore? So cliche, so cliche, so cliche.

Both A Beautiful Noise and I Am He Said remind us of the joy in Neil Diamond’s music and how much we miss his live performances. Noise is a well-crafted and performed Broadway musical, I Am is a wave-your-arms and dance-in-your-seat experience. I won’t tell you which show I thought was better, but I think you can guess where I had the most fun!

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