Cologne - Amsterdam - Antwerp
The Cologne gig went well. I remember the venue from Steven's last tour. A big hall and it was more full this time than last. Particularly memorable was the great catering backstage! Some kind of vegetarian parcel was amazing and the desert was a sort of creamy strawberry tiramisu goo with dark chocolate bits in. Nice. My guest was Luc from the Gong family who enjoyed it and hung out afterwards. Thomas from Inside Out records was also there and after the gig was hanging with the band talking Prog...Inside Out is the label the Tangent is signed to, and I have amazingly played on 7 Tangent albums on the label since 2005 as well as a couple of other independent releases. They are a very effective niche label and Thomas knows his stuff. The gig itself went well and had a large audience. For the first time on this tour, I played the gig without any notes to remind me of things I might forget. There is a lot to remember on a two hour set when you are playing complex music (and six different instruments). So that felt like an achievement. Marco threw in a couple of particularly memorable moments when he started throwing in a disco back beat in the middle of some wild keyboard solo in Luminol. Very cool.
Woke up in a freezing cold and snow covered Amsterdam outside the Melkveg venue. The band 'Living colour' were also playing in another room in the same venue on the same night. I last played at the Melkveg in November 2006 at the amazing Gong 'Unconvention' which featured about 10 Gong related bands. About 40 musicians and others had piled onto a big bus in London and driven to the ferry and then to Amsterdam. The weekend of gigs culminated with the first concert by the Steve Hillage Band in about 25 years and the first set of him back with Gong in about 29 years. I remember looking out from the stage and seeing people crying with happiness! A DVD was made of the gigs which was fine but it did not capture the magic that was in the air in that room that night. It was quite special.
Before the gig I met up with my friend Steve Hubback who is a percussionist and ace Gong maker. I had not seen him in some time so we caught up over a pizza near the venue. Steve showed me this great conch shaped Gong he had made which sounded amazing. Actually Marco bought it off Steve after the gig when they met.
The Amsterdam gig itself was a big one. About 1500 people and the most smiley audience of the tour so far. I don' t know if it was the dope in Amsterdam or if people we just happy, but definitely more smiling all around the audience than previously. It was the second gig of the tour where the audience was standing and that may have contributed to the excited atmosphere. I thought the band played great and after packing up and relaxing a bit after the gig, off into the night towards Antwerp.
Antwerp
So this was an interesting gig. A great theatre in the same building complex where I had played at a small festival of experimental music a couple of years ago called the International Festival of Looping. The theatre was all seated, and smaller than last night's gig in Amsterdam. Just before we went on, Steven said that he had read on Facebook that several people said they could not come to the gig because of the bad weather. He was worried the room might be half empty which would be bad as all gigs so far have been full. As it turned out it was fine, and the room looked pretty full to me. This was a relief and the fact that the venue was smaller than previous gigs and was seated made it feel quite relaxed. He said jokingly before we went on 'explore the space, explore the space, man' meaning reach out a bit further musically and 'fill' all the corners of the room. I think it is actually a quote from a film, but not sure which one. So with such encouragement, we tried some different things, and did do a bit of musical exploration. Some really different things were played and improvisations went in new directions. It felt really good, refreshing and fun. Marco also set up his new mini gong in his kit which he bought yesterday from my friend Steve Hubback. He used it in a few choice places (making sure he did not overdo it) and we all agreed it sounded fab! Thanks Steve. Also before we went on, Adam was playing Tale Spinnin' by Weather Report in the dressing room, which is wonderful and quite inspiring too.
At the end of the gig we did a different encore, segueing two of Steven's songs into one in a really cool way. I won't say which ones, but I think it worked.
Theo TravisThe album available from StevenWilsonHQ
