Carl Palmer's ELP Legacy
Hall 2
The Sage
Gateshead, UK
2017-11-27

Back in the day, bands had free reign, infinite creativity and were allowed time to develop into something totally unique. Progressive rock pushed a lot of boundaries (and patience, at times), and consequently a number of bands were spawned that truely sounded like no other.
These days, for any number of reasons we've only the embers of once great bands from yester-year to warm our hands on and scratch our chins to, with Carl Palmer (sadly) the last survivor of one of progressive rock's finest.
It's a slightly different twist on the "old trio". Carl has enlisted two ridiculously good guitarists with whom to celebrate ELP's canon of works, one "lead" and one "bass". However, both adopt a "Stanley Jordanesque", two-handed tapping style and can effectively play two parts at once.
The trio got a warm welcome and a hot reception throughout, kicking off in traditional ELP style with the Peter Gunn Theme. They boldly and successfully negotiated some of ELP's bigger works, although tempered the set with relatively simple (but wonderful) pieces such as "Lucky Man".
No vocals, but a surprisingly enjoyable wander down memory lane nevertheless, the highlight (for me, at least) being Pictures at an Exhibition in its entirity.
Never seen Carl Palmer before this night. He is phenomenally good. A more competent, inventive, entertaining drummer you'll be hard pushed to find.
The smiles leaving the hall said it all.
As it turns out, Carl's kit was about 10 feet away from me at head hight. There's a lot of...drums on this recording, at times at the cost of the "lead" guitar. I've done what I can to balance it out a bit but, it is what it is...
Carl got out from behind the kit to tell a few anecdotes between numbers.

For all its flaws, here's what I got...

01 Intro/Peter Gunn Theme/Hoedown
02 Karn Evil 9: 1st Impression, Part 2
03 Barbarian
04 Trilogy
05 America
06 Knife Edge
07 21st Century Schizoid Man
08 Bass Solo-Take A Pebble
09 Lucky Man
10 Guitar Solo-Claire de Lune
11 O Fortuna
12 Pictures At An Exhibition
13 Encore Break
14 Fanfare For The Common Man/Drum Solo

Carl Palmer - percussion
Paul Bielatowicz - guitar
Simon Fitzpatrick - bass, Chapman stick

Lineage :

SP-CMC-4U >
TASCAM DR-40 >
Sound Forge Pro 10 >
Trader's Little Helper (level 8) >
Torrent Site

Enjoy the embers while we all still can, and perhaps buy the odd re-issue?