SHE'S the grandmammy of them all, the original raunchy rock chick against whom every brat girl and pop tart is measured. At the well ripened age of 56, Tina Turner still has the sass and the sauce, and she flaunted it in front of 40,000 delighted fans at Dublin's Croke Park last night.
Pop music's own honey in the rock came on stage at just after 8 p.m. under cloudy and windy skies, but every now and then a charge of sunlight burst through and glinted off Tina's sequins, or maybe that was just the dazzling light show which pierced the fading daylight.
The lady looked older than when we last saw her six years ago, but the pearl of R & B still shone with enduring brilliance.
The Hogan stand was almost entirely hidden by Tina's vast stage - 250 ft wide, 70 ft long and 65 ft high. A giant Goldeneye formed the backdrop and, when she performed the theme song from the current James Bond movie, she could be seen in silhouette inside the flaming pupil.
During River Deep, Mountain High old black and white footage of Ike and Tina Turner in 1966 shared the screen with the live Tina, circa 1996. The eye was, in effect, looking across 30 years of one of pop's biggest and brashest success stories.
Private Dancer was punctuated by some sensual dancing from the three backing vocalists, but all eyes were on Tina's still supple legs, which moved gracefully to the tune.
The show's climax saw Ms Turner take a trip in the Tinamobile, providing a suitable hydraulic finale.
During her stay in Dublin, Tina Turner has maintained a fairly private profile, granting no interviews, and not even a meet and greet for record company execs. She has taken a penthouse suite in the refurbished Clarence Hotel, the first customer for this part of the Temple Bar premises.
On Wednesday night she attends a dinner party with Bono and The Edge, the composers of her recent hit Golden eye. Alas, the former didn't join her on stage last night as had been hoped. She also contacted many of her other Irish friends, including Paul Brady, who wrote Steel Claw for her.
On this visit, Tina Turner has brought an entourage of 52 people, including musicians and crew. During a two hour show, she performs tracks from her new album Wildest Dreams, which features songs written by Massive Attack, Pet Shop Boys and Sheryl Crow, and also guest vocals by Sting.
At her show in Paris, she was joined on stage by Mr Diehard himself Bruce Willis, and, as she sails smoothly into her fifth decade as a recording artist, it looks like Tina Turner is still a bona fide blockbuster.
