The Concerts of My Livetime

Ok, so a friend of mine asked me what concerts I've attended. It set me thinking for a good day and since I was a little unoccupied, here goes. The most memorable concerts I’ve attended:

Uriah Heep - Chennai (this was in 1983 at IIT-M) and more recently in 2006 in Mumbai (review here)   Rush (30th Anniversary Tour) - Darien Lake PAC, NY (see ticket here and review here)  Eric Clapton - 2001, Los Angeles, CA   Iron Maiden - 2003, Madison Square Garden, NYC and more recently in Bangalore, IN in 2007 (the one I saw in Bangalore sucked a bit and I was saddened but well hey, "we will live to fight another day", eh)  Judas Priest - 2005, Darien Lake PAC, NY (review here)  Phish - 1998, Worcester, MA  Dream Theater - 2004, Madison Square Garden, NYC (review here)  Black Sabbath (1999 Reunion Tour with Ozzy Osbourne) - 1999, San Bernadino, CA  Dave Brubeck - 2005, Rochester, NY (review here)  Ozzy Osbourne and Korn - Ozzfest 2003 (Korn was pretty F-all)  Metallica - March 2004, San Francisco, CA  Queensryche - 2005, Darien Lake PAC, NY  John Lee Hooker - 1997, Chicago, IL  Buddy Guy - 1998, Chicago, IL and more recently Mumbai, IN (Good concert. Wifey and I loved it!!!)  Jean Luc Ponty - Bangalore, IN (forget year, played with LS)  Deep Purple - Bangalore, IN (forget year)  Pink Floyd - Bangalore, IN (forget year, smoked up at the show)  Scorpions - 2001, Bangalore, IN  Jethro Tull - 1998, Hammersmith Odeon, UK  Yes - 2002, Prague, CR  G3 - 2004, NYC (Joe Satriani, Steve Vai, Yngwie Malmsteen, John Petrucci and Neal Schon) (review here)  Ted Nugent - 2004, Rochester, NY  Journey/Foreigner (back to back) - 1997, Austin, TX  Doobie Brothers, Stevie Nicks - 2000, San Francisco, CA (This was a private party hosted by BankAm and the performance was a blast!!!)   Chick Corea - 2005, Rochester, NY   John Scofield - 2005, Rochester, NY   Zappa Plays Zappa - 2006, Royal Albert Hall, London (review here)   Remember Shakti - 2006, Mumbai, IN (complete and total balls up without parachutes is how I summarise this one - saving grace were Ustad Zakir Hussain and John McLaughlin. Selva Ganesh, welcome addition as was Mandolin Srinivas. Shankar Mahadevan was a disaster vocally, why oh why?)   Alan Parsons Project, 2007, Mumbai IN (review here)   Walter Trout and the Radicals - 2007, Mumbai, IN (review here)   Ustad Zakir Hussain and Ustad Sultan Khan - 2007, Mumbai (review here).   I enjoyed every one of these but the ones that stand out are Zappa, Rush, Clapton, Phish, Sabbath, Dream Theater, Brubeck and Hooker (in no order).

An Evening With Slain: HRC Hyderabad

Last evening found me at the Hard Rock Cafe, Hyderabad out for a late evening of fun. When I got there I did not expect to find a live gig slated for performance. The band was Bangalore-based Slain and you can find more about them here.

I ordered my customary evening drink when I am at a low-mid budget place - Vodka with soda and sprite (yeah I know, but except for the Dublin at the ITC Kakatiya and the Seasons Bar at the Taj Krishna, the rest of the places serve absolute swill in the name of single malt, I mean I would not even serve house guests some of the stuff that they carry on their shelves) together with an order of plain olives and the HRC bruschetta.

The bartender excitedly gave me a rundown about Slain and their opening for Maiden last year in Bangalore and I was like - yeah, ok we may have a show here. First track started off at 9.30 PM, accompanied by the yells and catcalls of the (under-the -circumstances) "mosh pit" crowd - a few dozen teeangers, some of whom were of indeterminate sex (and no, I was not drunk by then!!)

My impressions: Terrific fucking bass - I could not hear the hear it at first and then I sent a message across to the console to have them check the audio. The bassist, Naresh I think his name was, rocked - both on Slain's own compositions and on the covers (usual Bon Jovi, couple of Metallica and some other group I cannot remember). Loved the bass on Metallica's Enter Sandman (that has now got to be among the most ass-whipped song for today's metal bands, toppling GnR's Sweet Child o' Mine ;-) ). Anyways, not to digress, tight bass - I loved it.

Vocals: Bad. Come on man, you are influenced by several metal leads and trying to play catch up. And please do not try (what sounded to me like) a Dee Snyder-Bruce Dickenson combo, it failed to impress.

Percussion: I liked the solo bit with the keyboards accompanying it (well, admittedly, it was a very very pale version of Portnoy-Rudess, but wtf some musicians having fun, am only to happy to play along), which gave me an opportunity to appreciate the drummer. My sole gripe was on the main tracks, he was playing a laid out structure from the album track. Come on guys, that's the whole fucking point of a live gig, you are not bound by studio rules or time-to-track and all that shit. Improv a little, explore a bit - do a double hand ride or a cymbal ride or experiment a bit more with the time signatures - don't just stick with a thrash version of the ādi tālam or staccatto beats that only sound good when Lar Ulrich or Tico Torres play them.

Leads: Twin leads and both quite decent. I briefly chatted with one of the leads, Manek at half time and asked him if they would consider playing Dream Theater (after all they had the line up - leads, bass, keyboard and percussion) but he was like hmmm, lotta effort man, we play the usual covers y'know. Hmm, Ok. Just see what I said to the drummer - "improv man, improv on a live gig. You have all licence."

Keyboard: Not much to say, kept tinkling in the background and I could only hear one full piece on the accompaniment with the drum solo.

All in all, a performance garnering five and a half to six points (including a point and three quarters for onstage energy), on a ten scale. Slain are releasing a debut album sometime in August. Decent talent but a long way to go.

Cheers
S

Runner's Log - 14 July 2010

It's been almost over a month.  The last fortnight was not upto my liking.  I was ill for the most part and travelling severally so I could not keep to a schedule.  I did manage to run one long distance (25 plus km) in Bangalore which I quite enjoyed - all the way from the Forum Mall in Whitefield to Cubbon Park, off MG Road in the heart of the city.  It is one straight road (well, almost - if you were to excuse the mild curvature off Old Airport Road through to Trinity Circle).  I also bumped into a friend I had not met for almost 6-7 years during the run (he was coming opposite ways) and reconnected with him just today.  Felt good.

Recovered just two days ago from a week long spell of indigestion and general lethargy.  At the gym on Monday, struggled with the exercises and was feeling a bit giddy so I sort of took it easy.  I have a practice run coming up later this evening, roughly 12-15km so let's see what that does for me.

This week promises to be exciting - two long runs  and some fascinating yoga exercises.  Hmmm!!!

More later
S