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Nick Mason’s Saucerful of Secrets: The Echoes Tour (The Met Philadelphia, Philadelphia, PA, September 23, 2022)

September 23, 2022 by Paul Debraski

[ATTENDED: September 23, 2022] Nick Mason’s Saucerful of Secrets [rescheduled from January 25, 2021]

Back in 2019 I saw Nick Mason’s Saucerful of Secrets play old, obscure and unpopular Pink Floyd songs.  And it was awesome.

When he first came up with the idea:

Mason says he wished to revisit songs that were staples of early Pink Floyd shows from 1969–1972, as well as other songs that were never performed live by Pink Floyd during this era. Mason said the group was not a tribute band, but that they wanted to “capture the spirit” of the era.  And they were going to play some of “Atom Heart Mother,” my personal favorite.

The band would consist of (and still does) Dom Beken on keys, Lee Harris and Gary Kemp on guitars and vocals, and long time Pink Floyd collaborator Guy Pratt (man, he has played with EVERYBODY) on bass and vocals.

I enjoyed the Met Philly’s experience.  But this time the show was going to be at the Miller Theater, part of the Kimmel Music Center complex.  Although I was quite far back and I said

I didn’t get a close seat because I didn’t really think it would be worthwhile.  But if he tours this show again (maybe with one or two different songs?) I would see them again, but I’d be much closer.

But this time, I decided to get even further away (sort of).  I grabbed a seat in the top tier (4th balcony), but in the front row.  I had a GREAT view!  Until I realized that the metal safety bar was EXACTLY at my eye line when I sat back.  So I had to lean up or down to see the whole stage. Continue Reading »

Posted in Full show video, Guy Pratt, Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts, Miller Theater, Nick Mason, Nick Mason's Saucerful of Secrets, Philadelphia, PA, Pink Floyd, Richard Wright, Spandau Ballet | Leave a Comment »

Spiritualized (White Eagle Hall, Jersey City, NJ, September 23, 2022) [CANCELLED]

September 23, 2022 by Paul Debraski

[CANCELLED: September 23, 2022] Spiritualized (moved to November 6, 2023)

I wasn’t planning on going to this show in Jersey City (I was going to Union Transfer) because this show was on the same night at the Saucerful of Secrets show.

However, it was worth noting that this show was cancelled too

Spiritualized have canceled tonight’s show at Jersey City’s White Eagle Hall. No explanation has been given, but Thursday night’s show at Philadelphia’s Union Transfer was also canceled — less than an hour before it was supposed to start — and the venue sent messages to ticket holders, writing, “We are incredibly sorry but tonight’s Spiritualized show will NOT take place tonight. There is an medical emergency w/ a member of the touring party. We’ll send out more details asap but tonight’s show is 100% not happening. – UT”

We don’t know who that member of the touring party is but we’re hoping everyone is ok.

Posted in Cancelled, Jersey City, NJ, Spiritualized, White Eagle Hall | Leave a Comment »

Andrew W.K./Uncle Dan (TLA, Philadelphia, PA, September 23, 2022) [CANCELLED]

September 23, 2022 by Paul Debraski

[CANCELLED: September 23, 2022] Andrew W.K./Uncle Dan [moved from September 24, 2021]

Andrew W.K. had this show rescheduled pretty quickly after cancelling his 2021 tour.

But then it was also cancelled.  I don’t really keep up with his goings on, but as far as I can tell he has maintained complete media silence.  No idea what’s going on with the guy.  Hope all is well and that he and his new wife and baby are doing well.

Continue Reading »

Posted in Andrew WK, Cancelled, Philadelphia, PA, Postponed, Theatre of Living Arts | Leave a Comment »

Matt Sucich (SOPAC, South Orange, NJ, September 22, 2022) [KATHLEEN EDWARDS]

September 22, 2022 by Paul Debraski

[ATTENDED: September 22, 2022] Matt Sucich

I thought that Matt Sucich was going to open for Kathleen Edwards in Haddon Heights.  But he joined her tour right after that show.  And so we saw him for this SOPAC show.

Despite how easy it is to get to SOAPC, the parking area was nuts, so we walked in in the middle of his first or second song.

We also had the terrible realization that the seats (which were moveable and placed in specifically for this show were REALLY close to us.  It made for a remarkably uncomfortable set in the otherwise normally really comfy SOPAC.

Sucich has a really pleasant folksinger style with a soothing deep-ish voice and a simple playing and lyrical style.

Midway through the set as I was enjoying him quite a bit he said one of the few things that will turn me against a singer.  he said that his new album had backing vocals by Adam Duritz and that he had just been on tour with Counting Crows.  There may be no band that I hate across the board as much as Counting Crows (mostly because of Duritz’ voice).  So this was not good news to me.  Although since Duritz didn’t appear, it wasn’t the disaster it could have been.

At some point he had made a joke about himself and the audience applauded and it became a regular thing that he would say this same thing about himself and we would all applaud.  It made for a warm and fun set.  Later on when he sang with Kathleen, he really won me over and all memory of Duritz was forgotten.

Posted in Kathleen Edwards, Matt Sucich, SOPAC, South Orange, NJ | Leave a Comment »

Spiritualized (Union Transfer, Philadelphia, PA, September 22, 2022) [CANCELLED]

September 22, 2022 by Paul Debraski

[CANCELLED: September, 22, 2022] Spiritualized

I wasn’t entirely sure that I wanted to see Spiritualized live.  I really like their album Ladies and gentlemen We Are Floating in Space.  But I wasn’t sure how well they would translate live.  But I read some rave reviews of their live show, so I grabbed a ticket.

But it turned out that on that night Kathleen Edwards was playing at SOPAC.  I had seen her recently, but I had purchased two SOPAC tickets for my wife and I to see her, so Kathleen won out.

Interestingly, at 12:30 this afternoon, Union Transfer sent is this message

Hello! Thank you for purchasing a ticket to see Spiritualized this evening. We want to send this quick heads up, the band will go on right at 8pm and will finish just before 10pm. No opener this evening. One long set.

An hour before showtime, however, the show was cancelled because of a “medical emergency.”  They also cancelled the final two shows of the tour (in New Jersey and New York).

So I made the right choice–I would have been really mad to find out that while I Was driving to Philly, the show was cancelled and I therefore missed both shows.

Posted in Cancelled, Philadelphia, PA, Spiritualized, Union Transfer | Leave a Comment »

My Chemical Romance: MCRXX (Prudential Center, Newark, NJ, September 20, 2022) [rescheduled date, rescheduled again]

September 21, 2022 by Paul Debraski

[ATTENDED: September 20, 2022] My Chemical Romance [rescheduled from September 22, 2020 and September 21, 2021]

I bought tickets to this show for myself, my son and his friend on January 31, 2020,  The boys were freshmen at the time.  Now, after two rescheduled shows, the boys are seniors and were still excited about this reunion.  (Even though they were too young to know about them the last time MCR played in NJ).

The crowd was super excited and buzzing,  We had floor seats right after the pit–wish they were closer, but the boys didn’t want to be in the standing section.

It seemed to take forever to get the show going.  They started playing some loud static, which lit the room. And afte ra few minutes, the static slowly morphed into the new MCR song “The Foundations of Decay.”  We all agreed we weren’t going to see what songs they were playing, but it became clear talking to other people that every show was different but every one opened with this song.

I don’t really know the song, but that’s okay because it was an excellent warmup for the next song, the fantastic “I’m Not Okay (I Promise)” which had the whole crowd singing along.

Turns out that this song is from Three Cheers for Sweet Revenge, their second album (and the first that sounds like MCR really sounds.  It’s also the album I know the least. And its the one they played the most songs from.

They added a second show the following night (I’m not sure when this was added, but I feel like we might have wanted to go to both shows if I’d really thought about it).  And that second show played a lot more songs from the albums I know better.  So I think this first night was for the old-school die-hards. Continue Reading »

Posted in My Chemical Romance, Newark, NJ, Prudential Center, Set in New Jersey! | Leave a Comment »

Thursday (Prudential Center, Newark, NJ, September 20, 2022) [MY CHEMICAL ROMANCE] [rescheduled date, rescheduled again]

September 20, 2022 by Paul Debraski

[ATTENDED: September 20, 2022] Thursday [rescheduled from September 22, 2020 and September 21, 2021]

I bought tickets to this show for myself, my son and his friend on January 31, 2020,  The boys were freshmen at the time.  Now, after two rescheduled shows, the boys are seniors and were still excited about this reunion.  (Even though they were too young to know about them the last time MCR played in NJ).

There were two opening bands, but our parking nightmares (oh Newark) made us miss The Homeless Gospel Choir, a folk/punk band from Pittsburgh who I was interested in checking out.

For our show (a second show was later added with a different opening band) Thursday opened.  Thursday is a band from New Brunswick, NJ.  They are an emo band that predates My Chemical Romance and somehow I had never heard of them.

I’m surprised I’d never heard of them.  Turns out they broke up in 2012.  They got back together in 2016 and toured a bunch then.  They started touring again after COVID.

It was interesting hearing their earlier stuff is far more emo.  “Cross Out the Eyes” had a soaring emo chorus and also some screamed backing vocals. Continue Reading »

Posted in My Chemical Romance, Newark, NJ, Prudential Center, Set in New Jersey!, The Homeless Gospel Choir, Thursday | Leave a Comment »

Enter Shikari / Trash Boat / Aviva (Union Transfer, Philadelphia, PA, September 18, 2022) [DID NOT ATTEND]

September 18, 2022 by Paul Debraski

[DID NOT ATTEND: September 18, 2022] Enter: Shikari / Trash Boat / Aviva

We’re almost entering into an area of bands that I considering seeing based on very little.

Sometimes, when a venue promotes a band pretty heavily it’s easy to get caught up in the hype.  There’s also a lot of bands that have been around for fifteen or twenty years that I completely missed when they had their popular surge.

Enter: Shikari (I think that I just like the colon in their name) has been around since 1999 and originally were kind of a screamo band that was really heavy but had lots of synth and electronic elements too.  It’s the kind of think I want to like but I tend to not, really.

It’s probably the kind of show I would go to where everyone is a diehard fan and I’d enjoy the songs but not know any of the songs.

I also didn’t realize they were British.

Trash Boat is from the same town as Enter: Shikari (St. Albans).  They are a heavy punk band with pop elements (although the vocals are more metal).  I wouldn’t have enjoyed this band as much–although I may have once.

AViVA is an Australian singer (and more–for a hilariously over the top hagiography, check out her fan wiki page).  Although this blurb is interesting:

Aviva Anastasia Payne, also known professonally as AViVA is Australian singer, songwriter, High School Teacher, and writer.

Her songs seem a little too poppy for this show, but she does include some heavier elements.  She’s probably be pretty interesting live.

Posted in AViVA, Enter: Shikari, Philadelphia, PA, Trash Boat, Union Transfer | Leave a Comment »

Daði Freyr: The Fabulous, Wonderful & Nice Tour (Theatre of Living Arts [TLA], Philadelphia, PA, September 17, 2022)

September 18, 2022 by Paul Debraski

[ATTENDED: September 17, 2022] Daði Freyr

Daði Freyr has been in Eurovision twice and that’s how I know him.  He hasn’t won, but he won the hearts of many.  He was the leader of Daði & Gagnamagnið and was due to represent Iceland in Eurovision in 2020 with the song “Think About Things.”  But the event was cancelled and he was invited to represent them again in 2021 with the song “10 Years.”  They came in fourth place.

He is a goofy guy for sure–he is super tall (6 ft 9.9 in) with quite a deep voice.  In the performances his band was quite humorous dressing in identical sweaters with pixilated images of themselves.  Back then the group was his sister Sigrún Birna Pétursdóttir (backing vocalist), wife Árný Fjóla Ásmundsdóttir (dancer), and friends Hulda Kristín Kolbrúnardóttir (backing vocalist), Stefán Hannesson (dancer), and Jóhann Sigurður Jóhannsson (dancer)—known as “Gagnamagnið”. Gagnamagnið, while translated to English as “the Data”, literally means “the amount of data”, and is the Icelandic word for “data plan”.

But for this tour it was a trio–he is on synths, with percussionist Ylva Øyen and guitarist Pétur Karl rounding out the trio.

His videos are exceptional-he really has the visual side of things down perfectly.  I wasn’t sure how he would translate live, but I had to take the opportunity to see him.  He was not only a great, engaging frontman, he was very funny as well.  He told us that he has to stop moving his microphone stand so much, so if he did we should yell Hey!  But not in a mean way.

He started with “Thank You,” a classic synth pop song.  His voice is surprisingly deep and yet very warm at the same time.

He stood between two small synth rigs and sang “thank you for being fabulous, wonderful, and nice.” It was earnest and catchy.  But he immediately started joking with us since the next song was called “Shut Up” (nothing personal, he assured us).  “Shut Up” had a disco feel with the slinky guitars.  The song ended with him pointing to everyone pretty much individually and quickly singing Shut up shut up shut up shut up shut up. Continue Reading »

Posted in Ásdís, Band-Maid, Blær, Daði Freyr, Daði og Gagnamagnið, Eurovision, Iceland, Króli, Philadelphia, PA, Theatre of Living Arts | Leave a Comment »

Meet the Bug (Theatre of Living Arts [TLA], Philadelphia, PA, September 17, 2022) [DAÐI FREYR]

September 17, 2022 by Paul Debraski

[ATTENDED: September 17, 2022] Meet the Bug

When Daði Freyr announced his U.S. tour, I grabbed a ticket right away.  i wasn’t sure if there would be an opening act.  And it wasn’t until a few days before the show that it was announced that Meet the Bug would open.  Who is Meet the Bug?  We’ll let their bio explain:

Meet the Bug is the solo endeavor of Philadelphia-based bedroom pop polymath Cariahbel Azemar. Her latest EP Beet The Mug is “a vibey meditation on keys and glimmery vocals that tackles heavy childhood trauma from the perspective of an emerging artist realizing the power of her voice.” Azemar uses her songs as a sort of diary, cataloging the highs and lows of coming into adulthood as someone who is both on the spectrum and ADHD.

Born in Port au Prince, Haiti and raised in the Georgia suburbs, Azemar began taking classical piano lessons at the age of four. … While at a performance by one of her primary inspirations, Cavetown, Azemar noticed someone she knew in the opening band – meaning, to her, that maybe she could do this, and so she shall. Thus Meet The Bug was born. Coinciding with the start of the pandemic, Meet The Bug’s early focus was her YouTube channel, where she mostly posts covers and originals. Now an active member of the Philly DIY community, Azemar can be found performing in house venues, bars, and cafe’s about town. Most recently, she played support for Daði Freyr at the Theatre of the Living Arts in Philadelphia.

Clearly this went up after I saw her.

Her set was delightful.  Lyrically the songs might have been a little dark, but they were more angsty and hopeful.  But she sang with a gentle voice and, best of all, nearly all of her songs were played on a ukulele–a fairly large ukulele (maybe a small guitar? but i think it had four strings).  This gave her songs a kind of sunny vibe. Continue Reading »

Posted in Band-Maid, Cavetown, Daði Freyr, Daði og Gagnamagnið, Meet the Bug, Philadelphia, PA, Theatre of Living Arts | Leave a Comment »

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