Ian Anderson at DPAC, Durham, NC, USA
Oct 5, 2014 14:35:04 GMT
maddogfagin, bunkerfan, and 2 more like this
Post by winemaker81 on Oct 5, 2014 14:35:04 GMT
I had the pleasure of seeing Ian's show in Durham last night, going with a friend and my two teenage sons. Overall evaluation? Excellent show! We all enjoyed it.
High point of the show? The encore, Locomotive Breath. As we were leaving the show my younger son commented that when the show appeared to be over he was really disappointed as they didn't play Locomotive Breath. He missed Ian's last trip to Durham 2 years ago, so the rest of us were fairly confident that would be the encore. Needless to say the encore rocked the house!
Next highest point? The second half of the show. The first hour was Homo Erraticus followed by 15 minutes of older tunes, and the second half was all older tunes. The main screen displayed a analog date-time list which riffled to when a particular track was released, Ian generally provided a commentary, and then they rocked. The selection of tunes was spot on. [I'm not fond of A Passion Play, so that excerpt was my least favorite. This is personal taste, nothing wrong with the performance.] Concert footage from original performances was cool. I've seen most of it, but it was a good touch to show the younger and current Ian's together.
None of us enjoyed Homo Erraticus as much. Those tunes didn't rock us the way the older tunes did. Nothing wrong with the performance, just personal taste.
The low point was a couple of duets with Ian and Ryan. They were not in sync and it produced a discord. Ian's vocal style is a bit different these days and Ryan didn't mesh. I think for those few spots they both need to meet in the middle, but that is my uneducated opinion. In general both sang well, it was that couple of spots that sounded off. In contrast, the places they sang alternating lines produced a good effect.
I was surprised at the value of the secondary screens. Although we were in Row T in the main section, I found that at times the close-ups of the camera, displayed on a large screen on the left (we were on the right) provided a nice perspective. When Locomotive Breath started, the close-up on the keyboardist was great! I found myself looking between the screen and stage.
One thing to note is that the arrangement of the older tunes are different from the original performances. Nothing sounded quite like what I expected from my own ~35 year history of listening to Tull. Anyone expecting the songs to sound exactly like the original performances will be disappointed. Personally, that's foolish -- the band is different, Ryan is a (positive) part of the ensemble, and Ian has changed and developed over the years. Things are different -- accept it or move on.
Bottom line is Ian and Company rocked the house. The show was energetic, Ian played a LOT of flute and did a lot of it standing on one leg, the band meshed well, and I received value for my money (tickets for me and the sons was not cheap). When Ian comes back to the area, I'll be in the audience again.
BTW: The demographics of the audience was interesting. There were a few teenagers or lower 20's, but 90% of the people I saw were greyhairs .... or dyed to hide the grey.
Me? I am NOT a greyhair! [my temples are silver and my beard is WHITE, not grey. ;-) ]
High point of the show? The encore, Locomotive Breath. As we were leaving the show my younger son commented that when the show appeared to be over he was really disappointed as they didn't play Locomotive Breath. He missed Ian's last trip to Durham 2 years ago, so the rest of us were fairly confident that would be the encore. Needless to say the encore rocked the house!
Next highest point? The second half of the show. The first hour was Homo Erraticus followed by 15 minutes of older tunes, and the second half was all older tunes. The main screen displayed a analog date-time list which riffled to when a particular track was released, Ian generally provided a commentary, and then they rocked. The selection of tunes was spot on. [I'm not fond of A Passion Play, so that excerpt was my least favorite. This is personal taste, nothing wrong with the performance.] Concert footage from original performances was cool. I've seen most of it, but it was a good touch to show the younger and current Ian's together.
None of us enjoyed Homo Erraticus as much. Those tunes didn't rock us the way the older tunes did. Nothing wrong with the performance, just personal taste.
The low point was a couple of duets with Ian and Ryan. They were not in sync and it produced a discord. Ian's vocal style is a bit different these days and Ryan didn't mesh. I think for those few spots they both need to meet in the middle, but that is my uneducated opinion. In general both sang well, it was that couple of spots that sounded off. In contrast, the places they sang alternating lines produced a good effect.
I was surprised at the value of the secondary screens. Although we were in Row T in the main section, I found that at times the close-ups of the camera, displayed on a large screen on the left (we were on the right) provided a nice perspective. When Locomotive Breath started, the close-up on the keyboardist was great! I found myself looking between the screen and stage.
One thing to note is that the arrangement of the older tunes are different from the original performances. Nothing sounded quite like what I expected from my own ~35 year history of listening to Tull. Anyone expecting the songs to sound exactly like the original performances will be disappointed. Personally, that's foolish -- the band is different, Ryan is a (positive) part of the ensemble, and Ian has changed and developed over the years. Things are different -- accept it or move on.
Bottom line is Ian and Company rocked the house. The show was energetic, Ian played a LOT of flute and did a lot of it standing on one leg, the band meshed well, and I received value for my money (tickets for me and the sons was not cheap). When Ian comes back to the area, I'll be in the audience again.
BTW: The demographics of the audience was interesting. There were a few teenagers or lower 20's, but 90% of the people I saw were greyhairs .... or dyed to hide the grey.
Me? I am NOT a greyhair! [my temples are silver and my beard is WHITE, not grey. ;-) ]