Rosfest 2006

Surprised to see no threads on this so far, or am I just not looking hard enough?

 

Anyway, just a few words...

 

Friday -

 

Ephemeral Sun - kind of gothic prog-metal, but they looked nothing like the typical prog metal band, all dressed in jeans and T shirts along with the female lead singer. Was a bit disconcerting as we are used to seeing our prog metal ladies in silky gowns and such Not bad, but her voice was a bit too operatic and samey for me, and her constant hand waving got on my nerves. Musically ok, but nothing stunning.

John Young - he replaced Harmony In Diversity (Saw them in London a few weeks back and I don't think they would have gone down well at all - very jazzy, improvisational, meandering stuff stuff) , as Peter Banks had visa problems and could not make it. He's pretty good, some of his stuff is very poppy, but he does have a proggy side too. Helluva nice guy too.

Neo - a lot of fun as expected, Barret, Nolan, Jowitt, Reed and a few other musicians. Interesting to see Jowitt doing lead vocals on some of the Arena numbers, and odd to hear Alan Reed doing IQ songs like Enemy Smacks. A bit haphazard, but they were having a good time and got the audience going.

 

Saturday -

Mirthrandir - old 70's prog band reformed recently, very eccentric, lead singer plays trumpet and sings falsetto. Kind of divided the crowd but I liked them.

Hamadryad - excellent band from Quebec, quite heavy with occasional hints of Rush. Very young bunch, not what I was expecting, and they did a great version of Firth Of Fifth too.

Karmakanic - liked them early on when they stuck to the songs, but then they started doing drum, bass, keyboard solo's etc and they lost me. Bailed out early on that one. When your songs contain solos for all of the band anyway what on earth do you want seperate solo's for?

Satellite - major disappointment for most of us, I guess. Liked their albums, but the band on stage bore no relation to what I had heard. I think they may have been missing a member, and used backing tapes on occasions, even for the bass which seemed odd considering there was a bass player there! Had some sound issues, kept stopping and asking the techies to tweak things, and that was very distracting to me and others I am sure. OK, the singer/bass player was genuiinely emotional and through his limited use of the language tried his best to describe how pleased they were to be asked to play there, but they also seemed very unsure of themselves and had that "deer-in-the-headlights look about them. Shame, because when they got it together they showed great promise.

 

Sunday -


Magic Pie - the band of the weekend, no question. Played all of their Motions Of Desire album plus a new epic track. Very upbeat, accessible prog with a Spocks Beard/Flower Kings influence.

Pineapple Thief - seen them a few times in UK and have never been keen, they seemed out of place here too. Gave them about 30 mins and that was enough.

Pallas - very good, a strong set (though a few though they were too loud??? It's called progressive ROCK fercrissakes!), and very good of them to give Euan Lowson a large portion of the set ; he did the whole of Atlantis Suite, The Ripper, Queen of The Deep and a few more I think. Alan Reed basically just sang the newer material. Worked for me. 3rd performance of the week for Alan, if you count the party on Sat. The Pallas guys were around most of the weekend and were very accessible and friendly, seemed to get a much better reception than at Nearfest and I was very pleased for them.

The Watch - their CD made it clear they were very much a Genesis clone, and that's exactly what they were, came across as a Genesis tribute band playing non-Genesis songs to me. I didn't find their own material that strong, just kept reminding me of verious Genesis songs. Not my cup of tea really, lasted about 6 songs and that was enough. Didn't that keyboard player have some genuine antique stuff though? An old Mellotron, and what looked like an original Hammond with the original Leslie speaker cabinet.

Gotta give a mention to Divided Sky too, who played upstairs at Jesters on Friday - unfortunately I don't think many people went, which is a shame as once they got going (after blowing the lights in the venue twice!)they were pretty darn good, and what a bass player - this guy looked about 15 but had some serious chops on him, even Jowitt was checking him out. Kind of metal with touches of prog, and they did play 1st half of Heart of The Sunrise and also P Tree's Blackest Eyes. Listened to the CD's on the way home, well worth checking out.

And Saturdays party was better than the previous year, Pallas went for it and did Purple's Black Night and Highway Star, and NEO came back later and played Time And A Word, which is what they would have played with Banks had he been there. John Young did a few pieces as well, as did some of the Karmakanic guys, but Jonas and Krister kind of lingered a little too long and were playing some sort of old 60's standard on guitar and bass for ages - dunno if George R would agree, but for me the Saturday night party should be about having fun and rocking out, not nescessarily for people to play solo's and jam on and on - it does not even have to be about prog. But then again I guess whoever wants to get up and do what they want is free to do so.

Kudos to the staff at Jesters over the road too, I think we spent as much time in there as we did watching the bands. Yes, they were caught out a couple of times in-between bands, but they were very apologetic and understanding (it certainly wasn't the waitress' fault) and made good in the end. Decent food, cheap beer, a much bigger and better merch area upstairs and a bar there too. Great stuff.

For me, I had a few more disappointments this year with the bands than the previous year, but you really never can tell that going in - I expected to like Satellite and Karmakanic a lot more, but it just didn't work for me. No reflection on the organisers at all, on paper all of these bands looked a very good line-up.

Still enjoyed the overall weekend a lot, just maybe not quite as much as the previous year.

And of course a large part of the whole experience is meeting other prog fans and hanging out, and with the musicians too. Cannot put a price on that at all.

 

I seriously recommend this festival, because like I said the opportunity to hang out and talk prog with so many people is worth the admission fee alone, the bands are almost just the icing on the cake.

 

Pendragon are the only ones announced so far, but Nick Barrett was there anyway, did some Pendragon songs with Neo and also some more at the Saturday night party...in a somewhat inebriated state it has to be said, but it was all good fun, and it's not like he was the only one..hic!

 

I have always had a problem with the concept of stopping the show for a member to do a solo, especially in prog music where the musicianship is usually very prominent anyway and most members get to flex their muscles in the songs themselves.

 

For me, Jonas does not need to do a solo because his expertise on the bass is evident throughout the set.

 

The only time I think solo's work is when you extend a song slightly and give every member a minute or so within the song to do something, and that way you don't lose momentum. Solo's often have the effect of stopping the show dead in my opinion, though I do realise from a practical point of view in a long set it does give the other members a breather.