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Date: Mon 26 Aug, 2002 at 23:00
Headline: Inspiration & Perspiration
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Greetings and Salutations!
Ok, time for a little update....
We are now just over a week away from the next FloydShow, and getting down to the wire
for putting all of the light & sound tech together, as well as working
out the tunes. We've chopped out about 45 minutes of material from our
earlier set list, then added another hour of new stuff and shuffled
around the running order a bit, so if you happened to catch the show
back in May, fear not -- you'll be gettng more bang for your buck and
definitely won't be seeing the same show twice!
Daryn and I played a short set with Jupiter last
Saturday, at a block party for the friends and neighbors of our bassist Ray Opheikens. We hadn't played together since May (and this was our first
performance with Daryn on drums), so it was good to shake the cobwebs
off and try to get back into the groove. I had to use another keyboard
player's gear -- well, I didn't have to, but it seemed like an
easier course of action (ha!) at the time -- and was consequently
fumbling around with patches and pedals for the most part. Good energy
level, though, and the crowd seemed to dig us. Ray and I had both seen RUSH
last Friday night at the Delta Center, and I could tell that it got him highly
motivated to play - he was much more animated than usual. The band
that played before us did mostly Beatles tunes, and honestly did them
quite well - they even had the Liverpudlian accents down. Our set was
a little sloppier, which was OK considering
the circumstances but reminded us of just how rusty we have become. I
personally haven't seriously practiced anything on keyboards
for a few months (that's the hazzard of having someone as good as Matt
Meldrum at your disposal), and I'm sure it showed. The whole band will
be putting in some real woodshedding over the next few weeks to
tighten things up, but before long we'll back to work. I'm
looking forward to having my "day gig" back.
The aforementioned RUSH concert was stupendous on many
levels. I loved the choice of material (even though I wish we could have
heard more songs from the new album), loved the playing, loved the
staging, loved the visuals. It was deeply inspiring, and a reminder of
how important this band has been not only to me personally and my own
development as a musician and writer, but to the world of rock'n'roll
in general (critics and fashionmongers be damned). I was touched by how
genuinely thrilled Alex Lifeson seemed to be back on stage, and
the great interaction between him and Geddy Lee, especially during the
acoustic rendition of 'Resist'. Alex was playing with more fire and
passion than I have ever seen, and his "rant" during La Villa
Strangiato' was priceless. Geddy, for his part, nailed all the high
notes and showboated around quite a bit more than usual, which was fun
to watch. As for Neil Peart...right now I am engrossed in his book
Ghost Rider, chronicling the travels he undertook (both
geographical and emotional) in the latter part of the 90's after the
tragic deaths of his wife and daughter. It amazes me, considering the
contents of said book, that the performance I saw last Friday was even
possible, but one thing's for sure: I will never take the existence
of this band for granted again.
That's all for now. I'll be back with another FloydShow progress report soon.
your humble correspondent
Thom Bowers
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