Barclays books Neil Young, Harlem Globetrotters, Pat Benatar

June 19, 2012 Brooklyn Eagle Staff

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By Raanan Geberer

Brooklyn Daily Eagle

With three months to go before it opens, the Barclays Center is aleady established as one of the country’s premier entertainment venues.

As promoters announced one big-name booking after another — Barbra Streisand, Justin Bieber, Jay-Z, Rush, Andrea Bocelli, Leonard Cohen and more — the Brooklyn Nets might have appeared, to some Brooklynites, as an afterthought.

And the hits just keep on comin’.

Yesterday, Barclays announced a Dec. 3 concert date by Neil Young, and a first-ever appearance in Brooklyn by the Harlem Globetrotters, on Oct. 7.

A few days earlier, Barclays announced an Oct. 30 concert by ’70s and ’80s rock superstars Journey that will feature appearances by Greenpoint-born singer-songwriter Pat Benatar and Canadian rockers Loverboy.

Neil Young has been familiar to generations of music fans as a member of Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young and as the hard-edged, high-tenored electric guitarist with Crazy Horse, his longtime backup band. Since debuting with Buffalo Springfield in the 1960s, Young’s songs, like “Cinnamon Girl,” “Cowgirl in the Sand” and “Southern Man,” have become Brooklyn-born rock vocalist Pat Benatar performs in Cohasset, Mass., in 2004. AP Photo classics.

At Barclays, Young and Crazy Horse will perform such traditional American folk songs as “Clementine” and “She’ll Be Coming ’Round the Mountain” from their new CD, “Americana.”

Tickets will go on sale on Monday, June 25, at 10 a.m. Nets All-Access season-ticket-holders will have the opportunity to buy them starting on June 21.

The Globetrotters’ appearance will be the first time the team, which has performed in 120 countries during the past 86 years, has performed in Brooklyn, according to Barclays.

The predominantly African-American Globetrotters started in the 1930s as a competitive basketball team, winning several nationwide tournaments. But as they were eclipsed by National Basketball Assocation teams, they began incorporating comedy and tricky ball-handling routines into their appearances.

Such NBA greats as Wilt “The Stilt” Chamberlain and Brooklyn-born Connie Hawkins played for the Globetrotters before reaching the pros.

Globetrotters tickets go on sale on June 27 at 10 a.m., with pre-sale beginning June 20.

Journey, formed in San Francisco in 1974, has recorded 19 Top 40 singles and 25 gold and platinum albums. Benatar, who will perform as Journey’s special guest, had 19 Top 40 singles, most notably “Hit Me with Your Best Shot” and “Love Is a Battlefield.” (She also played with Blondie at the Seaside Concert Series in Coney Island in 2009.)

Loverboy’s hits included “Turn Me Loose” and “Working for the Weekend.”

Tickets for the Journey/Pat Benatar/Loverboy show went on sale Friday, June 15.

Concert seating at Barclays is approximately 19,000 seats, and the Globetrotters event will have 18,200 seats.

For tickets and more information, log onto www.barclayscenter.com or www.ticketmaster.com, or call (800) 745-3000.