Rebel Robbie a better man 25 years on . . .

Robbie Williams on stage at the Mission Concert, Taradale Napier. Photographer Paul Taylor Hawke's Bay Today 11th November 2023

The irony wasn’t lost on some when Robbie Williams told the crowd at his Mission concert on Sunday that he had been sober for 24 years.

A cheer erupted from thousands of adoring fans as they tipsily thrust their pinot gris, rose and shiraz-filled glasses and beer cans into the air en route to the very drunkenness that played a co-starring role in the mega-star’s descent.

Robbie 2023 is a vastly different character to the rebel who was turfed out of boy band Take That, thrust his middle-finger at pretty much everything, bedded a Kiwi model while on tour to the drooling delight of the British tabloids and had an album appropriately named The Ego Has Landed.

And to the masses luxuriating on the lush, green Mission hills — in stark contrast to the war zone-like scenes of Cyclone Gabrielle-obliterated Esk Valley a short drive away — to those perched in their deckchairs chomping on $18 burgers and slurping drinks like calves on teats; to the VIP exclusive dressed to the Melbourne  Cup nines post three-figure hair salon sessions, Robbie wanted to talk. And talk. And talk.

You see, Robbie had a message. He’s happy. He’s travelled to hell and back through drug and alcohol addiction and depression that plummeted him to suicidal  depths and — thanks largely to wife Ayda Field he stresses — emerged scarred but alive.

A husband. A father. A better man.

You wonder as the words stream out of Robbie to a predominantly captivated audience if this tour is the final part of his rehabilitative process.

That happy in his skin, he wants to convey his thoughts, feelings, experiences and Dr Phil-like advice after dancing with the devil.

This is as much a sharing session as it is a concert . . . the biggest therapy group in history.

Or is it just part of the show?

Because that is what Robbie Williams ultimately is. The consummate showman. The consummate entertainer.

“Let Me Entertain You,” he belts out when not bestowing words of wisdom or chatting to an overwhelmed fan who would have shagged him there and then regardless of hubby standing behind her.

And entertain he does.

The name of his tour is Robbie Wiliams XXV Tour 2023 — 25 Years of Hits.

There is a tasteful nude image of him (the cover to his latest album) emulating Rodin’s sculpture The Thinker — the statue of a man deep in contemplation which was the central figure in Rodin’s commissioned work The Gates of Hell.

Heavy stuff but clearly reflective of where he is today.

On stage, Robbie sports the human hairstyle  version of Sonic the Hedgehog, is dressed in shiny black with a white scarf and while no longer The World’s Most Handsome Man, is still a good-looking lad at age 49.

The volume to a sound system you could bungee jump from is on full tilt.

Dancers showing more cheek than Robbie’s smile, stunning lighting and back-up singers who hit the high notes when Robbie isn’t regularly pointing his microphone at a full-voiced audience are all part of a package slicker than the cast of Ocean’s Eleven.

The crowd and venue  play their role. The sight of thousands of phones with flashlights on being waved in the air in unison at one stage is as breathtaking as what greets you when walking into Mission Estate for the first time.

But as the night wears on, copious amounts of alcohol transform Jekylls into Hydes.

“You got a doobie,” a young Englishwoman slurs beside me —  clearly stereotyping someone wearing a Warriors hoodie, State Highway 35 cap  and denim shorts.

Timberrrrr, yell amused onlookers as a  lurching couple try to make their way down a steep bank, but eventually give in to their inebriation and let gravity take its course.

After a couple of encores, Robbie ends the night appropriately with his most iconic song. Angels.

And as he prepares to exit stage left, he looks back, smiles that Robbie smile, points his mic at his legion of fans and lets them sing the last line that perhaps perfectly sums up where he is now.

“I’m loving angels instead.”