Cher bids adieu with career-spanning spectacle

Marian Liu
Mercury News

During her Farewell Tour, Cher promised the ``Cher-est show on earth,'' and Saturday's concert at a packed Oakland Coliseum Arena was just that -- over the top in every single way.

She kept senses scintillating with exuberant extravagance: 10 costume changes and 20 songs in two hours. Like her four-decade-long career, this diva left nothing to the imagination.

And, instead of relinquishing her throne, Cher challenged the ``young girls that come after'' her to ``follow this.''

At 56, she was poised and polished, with no trace of aging. Her deep voice was the same as always, and when she changed to fit the decade of the song, she matched what she looked like years ago. With her looking this good, a farewell seemed out of the question.

``Give me a break,'' said Cher, mimicking Dr. Evil from the Austin Powers movies. ``I have been a friggin' evil diva for 40 friggin' years. I have to go somewhere and get some.''

Like a self-proclaimed goddess, she descended to the stage, belting out U2's ``I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For.'' She then went from silver snow queen to blue-veiled Indian princess riding in a puppet elephant to an Amazon queen in black and red feathers and leather.

While she changed, Cirque du Soleil-like dancers and kaleidoscopic video screens provided ample eye candy. Her harem of dancers tumbled and twirled from strings and hoops attached to the ceiling. They also donned everything from barbaric leather and fur to pink disco suits.

It was the revamped ``Cher Show,'' except on her terms. She ran footage from her past in a streaming video scrapbook, with movie and music video excerpts. And, she cut in with cool shtick.

``So what did you think of my descent?'' asked Cher. ``It has worked every time except Cleveland. The thing went down, but I was still hanging up there like some kind of drag queen piñata. It was like a hysterectomy before my time.''

And time was on her side. She seamlessly skipped through the generations of her career like her own version of VH1's ``Behind The Music'' show. Cher started with the early '70s with a Sonny & Cher show tribute, with screens broadcasting past versions of ``I Got You Babe.'' She donned a fur vest, a purple shirt and her signature of the time: striped bell-bottoms. You couldn't help thinking Sonny was there in spirit.

Then she went off to a full showcase of her accomplishments, a résumé repertoire with clips of past interviews and her Oscar acceptance. She flipped to the late '70s with ``Take Me Home'' in a dark pink version of her see-through silver glimmer dress. Next she fast-forwarded to the present style, blond and peasant top, singing ``Just Like Jesse James,'' ``Heart of Stone'' and ``The Shoop Shoop Song (It's in His Kiss).''

If anyone in the audience was uncertain who Cher was, she didn't leave a stone unturned. The '80s came with her poofy permed hair and skimpy black nylons in ``Strong Enough'' and ``If I Could Turn Back Time.'' And she descended once more, this time from the future, in a silver fringed spacesuit, ending with ``Believe.''

``She's the only performer that three generations can come to,'' said Sharrell Michaud, 40, who brought her 63-year-old mother and her 14-year-old daughter, Melissa.

The women from Roseville traveled to see history that night. And for Melissa, Cher was even better than the Backstreet Boys and 'N Sync.

For others, as outlandish and titillating as she was, Cher lacked the intimacy of opener Cyndi Lauper, who wrapped a bejeweled rainbow flag around herself while singing ``True Colors.'' She stood, fist outstretched, while most of the audience gave a standing ovation, standing and screaming.

``Cyndi was more personal,'' said Craig Brown, a 30-year-old Cher fan and property manager from San Francisco. ``What she did for gay pride really touched everybody.''

But one thing was sure: These two women proved they were stars time after time.

And a farewell may be premature, especially for a woman who claimed that ``after a nuclear holocaust, there will be cockroaches and Cher.''