Nearfest->Sunday : Pure Reason Revolution

There is at least one group every festival where I ask myself, “What are they doing here?” Despite the hype that was given Pure Reason Revolution, I quickly deflated. Just basic drums and guitars, very muddled vocals, and some electronic whizzing in the background. No virtuosity to be found anywhere. I gave them three songs, and then ducked out to catch an early dinner at Sal’s.

[Opinionated Rant On] Q magazine might believe this group is a missing link between Floyd and the 21th century. But then, since the late seventies, mainstream rock has only degenerated and regressed, going from punk to hair metal to grunge, from bad to ugly to unlistenable. Mainstream rock isn’t so much dead as undead, that is in zombie-land. So, perhaps Pure Reason is a missing link between Floyd and the zombie-zone, along with nominally prog groups like Porcupine Tree and Radiohead, but it’s not my cup of tea at all. If I wanted to listen to this type of stuff, I’d go to a mainstream or alt fest.[/Opinionated Rant Off]

Nearfest->Sunday : Indukti

I was hoping Poland’s Indukti would change my mind toward Prog Metal. In fact, I was open to it. And, at their best, they were reminiscent of an instrumental Anekdoten, but much crunchier.

Wawrzyniec Dramowicz’s drumming was this groups best feature, verging on the melodic. Piotr Kocimski and Maciej Jaskiewicz crunched away on guitar, providing power-chord rhythms, but little melody or dexterous soling. The violin provided for atmosphere, but Ewa Jablonska just gave one good solo toward the end of the set.

In the end, they did not change my mind toward prog metal. They just left my ears buzzing and my blood pumping with adrenaline. But then, any decent alarm clock can do that.

Nearfest->Saturday : Bob Drake

Bob Drake is part of the State's progressive prog movement(that is to say avant prog), descendents of Europe's Rock In Opposition legacy. He's been part of many groups I dig, such as Thinking Plague. He was joined by David Campbell on bass and drum master Dave Kerman.

To be honest, I wasn’t familiar with Bob Drake’s solo efforts. While he played guitar and briefly a purposely out-of-tune violin, I believe this was mostly a tongue-in-cheek experiment. Drake’s voice at times is a high alto, and often (like in 5uu’s) reminds me of what might have happened if Chris Cutler invited Jon Anderson to join Henry Cow instead of Dagmar Krause(like that would've happened!). Unfortunately, Drake's vocals seemed to have been mixed below the music and were very muddled.

Dave Kerman (whom I’ve seen drum many a time with both Present and Thinking Plague) stole the show. He had what looked to be a basic beginner’s drum kit, at least, to my untrained eyes. But he put IZZ’s two drummers to shame! But what else can you expect from someone called on to fill Daniel Dennis’s role as he did while touring with Present? When he drummed, it was amazing. To be frank, it was the only thing musically I enjoyed about the set.

Yes, Dave Kerman will fool you, with rinky-dink drums and coming out in a bathrobe and a pillow, sleeping on his kit through half the set. But when he turned his lamp on, it was time for business! Underneath the veneer of humor and the act of not taking oneself too seriously, is a fierce musician. A lesser drummer couldn’t get away with it.