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Thursday, April 16, 2009

Bright Ambassadors Of Morning stole my trebles

Pure Reason Revoluton, I like them mainly because of the clever vocal-arrangements.
When they cancelled their gig at Progpower Europe I was quite disappointed, but now I had the chance to see them at a local venue. Knowing not much more than their debut album, I didn't expect much, as the cd sounds rather plain and sort of easy listening, and I did not expect them to pull off the same vocal work as on disc.

The bigger surprise it became!
Starting the gig with some early to mid 80's sounding keybards and keyboard bass, the show seemed to be something like a positve and 'happy' version of Depeche Mode. Soon the guitar came to a more prominent place in the music, more agressive parts got played like Steve Wilson does in Porcupine Tree, the vocals raising to their full power, all the fine harmonies and canon style achived live, wow! 20 minutes after the show started I realized that I got tears in my eyes, couldn't stand still, had to groove all the way through. The show started quite solid and increased to full power in about 35 minutes to full fire works, volume at 10 (11 would be too much, I prefer to still hear the drums...), then they switched back one gear and played tunes with more complex sound structures. One should mention that the band is sort of a gathering of multi-instrumentalists, lead singer-keyboardist-guitarist, female vocalist-bassist-keyboardist, guitarist-vocalist and drummer.
In the meantime the guitarist plays his solos kneeing on the floor for adjusting the knobs of the many effect processors live. Again, like Steve Wilson did back in the days.
I'm not annoyed that, including encores, the gig was only 90 minutes long, knowing how young the band is, and the few people in the audience. however, I felt like a Shikansen hit me and took me to Berlin, sticking on its very front, in that time. All those landscapes flying by at lightspeed...

They truly have the potential to become big! A formula like: {positive depeche Mode x Porcupine Tree + self}  comes to mind.

Back home I wanted to end the night with one more beer and a bit of the most recent PT recordings. I gave up. No trebles, it has been gone. I didn't notice what an earbleeder the gig was.... ok, one beer, no music anymore.

wishes for the band:

1. a second microphone for the lead vocalist. It simply is a time-waster to always adjust the tripod when switching from keys to guitar and back.

2. a better stage clothing for him. Complaining about that warm lamp while wearing the most tasteless leather jacket is stupid.

3. Bring that dynamics of your live sound to disc! Whenever somebody says it is too exhausting for the common listener, tell him you're not about to do easy listening.

7 comments :

Sean Gill said...

Interesting. I've been on the fence about PRR since I first heard them on Progulus. I picked up the Dark Third and I was kinda disappointed. It seems, to me, like the music just sits there. They do have a live cd. I wonder if that would have the same impact that an in person show would have.

T-Bo said...

I dunno about you two, but PRR have been my latest obsession. I do think they could use a few more dynamics, but the ones they have are simply amazing. They've really kicked the Pink Floyd-gene back in me lately...

BG said...

"The Dark third" is one of my absolute favorites. I am still trying to make up my mind about their latest effort...which is DIFFERENT.

Sean Gill said...

I will definitely give the Dark Third another spin. There are many cds in my collection that didn't get to me right away. I just have to listen when I'm in the right mood sometimes.

Sean Gill said...

Wow, I gave it another spin just now and I love it! I guess the time was right and now I get it. And I totally hear your comments about the dynamics. Songwriting-wise I can see where they are going, but something is kinda flat. I wonder if it's a "loudness war" thing. It's like the mellow parts are the same volume as the heavier parts, thus they lose contrast.

And every time I read the title of this post I think it says "tribbles"

T-Bo said...

I think it's that there are just too many layers. I love their sound and it couldn't work any other way, but it's all so dense and compact. I can barely understand the lyrics at all.

stringray said...

It's like Sean said: the loudness is equal throughout the entire mix. That's good for airplay, but in total it makes the sound more plain, the idea of producing some tension is lost. Also, the distorted guitars have been calmed down in the mix. If the original sound would have been mainained, they would sound quite more agressive. A couple of frequencies have been filtered for a more plesant sound. (He has them on stage, so I assume it has been there in the studio as well)