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ROSfest 2006
Ephemeral Sun, John Young, NEO
Mirthrandir, Hamadryad, Karmakanic, Satellite
Magic Pie, Pineapple Thief, Pallas, The Watch
28th, 29th & 30th April 2006
Colonial Theatre, Phoenixville, Pennysylvania.
By
John Morley
A very welcome return visit across the pond for the third annual Rites Of
Spring Festival. It's fair to say that the event is now well established in
the progressive calendar, and looks set to be a permenant fixture.
Friday is traditionally a preview day, and usually kicks off in the early
evening. It's a sort of taster for the events of the weekend to come, but
still manages to showcase some quality music.
First up on Friday were Ephemeral Sun. Having heard their Broken Door album,
which is a somewhat dark slice of neo-gothic prog though very enjoyable, I
have to say their appearance belied their music somewhat - a very young
group of musicians indeed though extremely capable and professional. I
enjoyed their set, though occasionally lead singer Laurie Ann Haus operatic
vocals could be a little samey and indistinct. I would say also they would
benefit from concentrating on their stage appearance a little more.
Unfortunately Peter Banks could not make the trip due to a visa mix up,
therefore Harmony In Diversity were unable to appear. However, replacement
John Young was a more than capable replacement. I have seen John live a
couple of times, both solo and with various bands. An excellent keyboard
player, singer and songwriter John here played a solo set of his songs with
a single keyboard and his usual backing band contained in a minidisc player.
Though John does have a more commercial sensibility in his songwriting, he
does have a very strong progressive element in his music which he treated us
to in the shape of Childhood's End. His in-between song banter also helped to
endear him to the Rosfest crowd, and considering he stepped in at short
notice he did very well indeed.
Headliners for Friday were NEO, a project put together recently comprising
of Clive Nolan, John Jowitt, Andy Edwards on drums and Mark Westwood on
guitar. This was to be their debut performance, and they were joined by Alan
Reed of Pallas, Nick Barrett, and would have also been joined by Peter Banks
had he been able to make the trip. For this performance the band would give
us material by the various bands that they were all involved in, so we got a
few Arena numbers (sung very capably by John Jowitt), Pallas songs such as
Crown Of Thorns and Arrive Alive, and even a few Shadowlands numbers. Nick
Barret treated us to some Pendragon songs, The highlight of which being the
rousing singalong Stargazing - the sheer sense of fun that was evident
between the band members on stage was ably communicated to the audience,
making a perfect end to the evening.
Though that was not quite the end as it turned out...an extra performance
has been arranged in a bar across the street after the main event for a
local band called Divided Sky, who were launching their new album. Things
were not looking too good at first, the band did not actually start playing
until after midnight, and on the first number they blew the power out twice.
But once they got started they turned out to be a superbly talented bunch of
guys, playing a very powerful combination of metal and jazz fusion. And
there were a couple of bonuses for the Rosfest crowd in the shape of covers
of Porcupine Tree's Blackest Eyes and Yes' Heart Of The Sunrise.
Saturday's opener Mirthrandir were something of a coup - this was a band
that had first formed in 1973, released a single album (For You The Old
Woman) and disbanded shortly afterwards. So here they were on the Rosfest
stage after 30 years. And considering the hiatus they were extremely tight
and professional, playing a somewhat quirky style of prog with echoes of
Crimson, Yes, and Gentle Giant. Lead singer John Vislocky III was a very
striking, charismatic frontman, with a very powerful range that took in
falsetto on occasions, and also proved himself a very capable trumpet
player. The crowd loved them, and I was impressed enough to invest in their
CD as soon as the performance was over.
Hamadryad were one of the highlights of the festival for me, they took a
little while to warm up but were very impressive when they did. Lead singer
and bass player Jean-Francois Desilets was a dead ringer for Geddy Lee from
Rush, though despite also hailing from Canada I would not say they had any
particuarly overt Rush influences. They could be very heavy and yet very
proggy at the same time, and to sign off with gave us a pretty good version
of Firth Of Fifth.
I had been reacquanting myself with Karmakanics two CD's in preperation for
their performance, and initially was very impressed - a tight and
extremeley talented group of musicians indeed. When they stuck to playing
the main songs they were excellent, but after a while the dreaded solo spots
kicked in. Now for me, with a band that is already comprised of some of the
best musicians around and who get the chance to strut their stuff and solo
during the songs themselves, I cannot understand why you would want to stop
the show and risk losing the momentum by having seperate bass, drum and
keyboard solos.
The last band on Saturday were Satellite, another much anticipated band for
me. Initially things looked promising, with the drummer kicking up a storm
and even the guitarist Sarhan Kubeisi joining in on a second drumkit. But
when they started to get going, something was not quite right. Some of the
band members seemed distracted and were either fiddling with their
amplifiers or gesturing and having conversations with the backstage crew. To
me they sounded ok, so I could not understand what the issue was - but they
also looked uncomfortable and slightly uneasy. This proved to be a little
distracting for the audience, and a further caveat was that they appeared to
be using backing tapes in places. From vocalist/bass player Robert
Amirian's occasional talks between songs it was clear they were very happy
to be there, and his sincerity and emotion was evident even through his
limited use of English. A shame, because when they were on form they were
very enjoyable indeed.
Saturday night is the traditional Rosfest 'meet and greet' party which takes
place at the Sheraton hotel. The idea of the party is for people to relax
and have a drink afterwards, and the function room also has a small stage
with drums, bass and a keyboard so that any musicians who want to get up and
have fun, jam etc are welcome to do so. This year we were treated to "Deep
Pallas", a familiar group of Scottish musicians essaying rousing versions of
Black Night and Highway Star, with their own Arrive Alive thrown in as a
bonus. John Young also treated us to a couple of numbers, as did Karmakanic,
though Jonas Reingold and guitarist Krister Jonsson did outstay their
welcome a little and got somewhat indulgent. Thankfully Alan Reed came to
the rescue and got the NEO guys up on stage to give us an interesting
version of Yes' Time And A Word, which is one of the numbers they would have
played in NEO's set had Peter Banks been able to make the trip.
Despite having partied into the early hours, I was determined to be up in
tome for Magic Pie's set on Sunday morning. The omens were good for this
band - I have been playing their Motions Of Desire CD a lot over the last 6
months or so, there was a buzz about them at the festival among the fans and
they had the same slot that Cryptic Vision had last year, and they proved to
be one of the highlights of the festival.
True enough, they did not disappoint. A tighter, more disciplined and
accomplished group of musicians you would be hard pressed to find. They
basically gave us all of the Motions Of Desire album plus one new epic track
called Welcome To The Circus. Standouts were the title track from Motions Of Desire, and
the epic Changes, but in truth every single track was exemplary and was met
with a standing ovation by the whole crowd. Honourable mentions to Alan
Olsen for his extremely powerful voice, Kim Stenberg's effortless guitar
pyrotechnics, and top marks to see a band with almost every member bar the
drummer able to sing backing vocals too. The band had huge grins on their
faces throughout the set, they really appreciated the audience reaction and
it was certainly well deserved.
Pineapple Thief were a band I had seen live a few times in the UK, and to be
honest they really do not do very much for me. I did stay for about 30 mins
of their set, but I am still not sure they were a suitable band for this
festival. They have kind of a more indie/simplistic sensibility to them, and
there is very little that is progressive about them. No doubting the
commitment and musicianship of Bruce Soord and his band, and they did have a
lot of fans there who enjoyed them so fair play to them.
Pallas were certainly the liveliest and probably loudest band of the weekend
- Alan Reed was determined to see if he could get the normally seated
Rosfest audience on their feet, and he did succeed up to a point. (I will
digress here slightly, as there have been many discussions on the cultural
differences between European audiences preferring and being used to standing
venues as opposed to the US being mostly seated. I think a standing venue
can help to generate more atmosphere and get a crowd dancing, clapping etc
and Pallas are certainly a band that would prefer that sort of reaction,
however at Rosfest when you are there from 11.00am until often gone
midnight, you really do appreciate that seat, so it's a compromise I guess).
There is certainly nothing sedate about the band, they usually give a very
lively, energetic and powerful live show and this was certainly no
exception. As a special treat for Rosfest, they had brought original singer
Euan Lowson across to do a few numbers, and he got quite a bit of stage time
with the the epic Atlantis Suite being handed over to him, as well as Queen
of the Deep and The Ripper. I think it says a lot for frontman Alan Reed
that he was magnanimous enough to give up the stage for a lengthy period of
time in this way. Mind you, I would like to have heard more from their
latest album The Dreams Of Men - we did get the Bringer of Dreams,
Ghostdancers, Invincible and Warriors plus Niall Mathewson's short but
welcome guitar piece Northern Star, so should not complain really. Talking
of The Ripper, that is certainly one dark, disturbing slice of prog and had
Euan Lowson on stage dressed in an all-over white boiler suit with a face
mask on, and usually culminates in him disfiguring himself at the end of the
track, though on this occasion the stage props did not quite work as well as
they should have - which was probably a relief to the first few rows! A
stunning performance, and only slightly marred by the inconsistency and
technical problems with the slide show on the back screen, rather comically
bringing up the standard Microsoft "Do you want to escape?" warning at one
point!
A chance for a bite to eat and a beer or two and then is was back for the
final band of the day, Italy's The Watch. I cannot say I was much impressed
with their Vacuum album, it straight away shouted 'Genesis clone" at me, and
I was not sure how I would react to them. Mind you the bands keyboard set-up
caused some interest before the show even started, with a vintage mellotron
and what looked like an original Hammond organ complete with the Leslie
speaker cabinet. Sure enough, when the band took the stage the early Genesis
comparisons were obvious, and the singers voice was a dead ringer for
Gabriel's. Despite this, had the songs been interesting and not sounded like
every Genesis record you have ever heard I might have took to them more.
They did seem to polarise the audience, some found their sound appealingly
nostalgic and got a kick out of it, other like myself just thought what's
the point of it? They were very good at what they did though, and I kind of
wondered why they did not go all the way and become a Genesis tribute band,
frankly. I did not stay for all of their set, but I hear they did a decent
version of Get 'Em Out By Friday for the encore.
Overall I probably did not enjoy the event quite as much as last year, but
only because some of the bands did not live up to my personal expectations.
But once again I have to praise the organisation of the event, it seemed
much smoother this year, less waiting around for the bands, and a much
needed new bar/restaurant that has opened a couple of doors away from the
venue called Jesters that had the friendliest and most accommodating staff,
and were geared up for the festival crowd too. Another advantage of this
venue was the large room upstairs which held the merchandise stalls, a vast
improvement on the tiny shop the stalls had to squeeze into last year. This
bar basically became the official meet-up place for the festival, was open
all hours and negated the need to trudge up and down the street to see what
other places were open as per last year.
It really cannot be stressed enough the sense of camaraderie that permeates
Rosfest, the ability to be able to hang out, talk prog and relax with
like-minded people from all over the world is just as important as the music
itself. I made many new friends last year and have a few more to add to that
list this year too. The icing on the cake is the ability to be able to book
into the same hotel as the bands and chat to the band members over a drink
or two.
Once again major thanks must go to festival organisers George Roldan and Tom
Smith for putting the whole thing together.
So, 3 days of solid prog, good food, cheap beer, a chance to hang out with
like-minded people and chat to band members...put me down for a ticket for
next year!
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