Here’s some impressions of the 10 band weekend, met lots of fellow music nuts and heard scads of great stuff, in the venue and from the parking lot car concerts. Had a choice seat 50 feet from the stage, just behind the soundboard + Annie Haslam was 5 chairs to my right! She was there promoting her artwork, cosmic scenery styled stuff. As I’m presently unemployed, I held myself to 9 CD’s and a subscription to a prog newsletter ‘Expose`’. Picked up two idea’s I got from D’s latest mp3 sampler- Daniel Gauthier ‘above the storm’ and Nice Beaver ‘on dry land’.
Others scores were Seven Reizh ‘strinkadenn’ , Fields ‘S/t’ , Djam Karet ‘a night for baku’, Hidria Spacefolk ‘symbiosis’ , Anekdoten ‘gravity’(thanks for clueing me in DPM), Univers Zero ‘ceux du dehors’ and Yeada Urfa ‘sacred baboon’.
I would rate this years lineup in last place compared to the previous 3 years I’ve attended. Not that it was bad by any means, but other years had more highpoints. Can’t say I understand the huge preference for Bethlehem over Trenton, the immediate venue neighborhood was better, but the town is somewhat rundown and you had to hike 10-15 blocks for the eatery’s. Trenton’s theatre had better acoustics, seat comfort and parking would be a tie. On to the bands. Yezda Urfa opened, I’d describe their sound as Echolyn with James LaBrie singing. So many good bands ruin it with their choice of vocalists for me, pity. I did enjoy them as they do lots of instumental songs, and a coupla times the singer sang instead of shouted which I liked. Grade B minus, I bought the CD.
Pallas followed, and the wankery toned down several notches. **continued***