After a great introduction from Kathy Wagner of WMGK (but deliberately without his name being mentioned), Kasim came on stage (to great applause), with a great new haircut and announced that he wasn't Kasim because "Kasim" was stuck in traffic so that he would sing instead!

The set started with the strong "I gave no promise or guarantee" from Don't Hold Me Back, before launching into Jason Falkner's great Afraid Himself To Be. Tonight Kasim sang the "Drop your gun and your guard" part deeper and slightly slower than he has before which gave it greater emphasis.

Kasim's intro into Sometimes Love is A Dangerous Thing was to tell us the story of his writing day with Tommy Hambridge and added that hilarious (newer) punch-line which bought a load of laughter and applause!

Next, we were treated to Kasim saying that he'd seen a programme on television about Billy Idol who was also doing some acoustic work and that he even did an acoustic version of White Wedding! At that point some young child in the audience piped up that that was "silly" which made the crowd laugh! Kasim then did a great impersonation of Billy Idol's rough English accent before he joked about singing an acoustic version of Rebel Yell!

This part of America is obviously a Utopia stronghold as Alone and then Set Me Free were greeted with massive enthusiasm! Kasim then told us the hilarious story of how for the first two years that he was in Utopia, Todd didn't speak to him other than to give him instructions as he didn't originally want Kasim in the band! He recalled his first trip to Woodstock with Todd and not once during the three hour car journey did Todd speak to Kasim! Thankfully they're good friends nowadays.

Tonight Kasim sang Just A Little Bit and then led it straight into The Beatles Ticket To Ride which was stunning as none of the audience were expecting it! Unfortunately he messed up the chords after the "She ought to do right by me" part of the song so he played it a couple of times until he got it correct!

Kasim's amusing Gulf War analogy of why men shouldn't argue with women led into his unreleased song Before She Was Gone before singing Utopia's There Goes My Inspiration and Todd Rundgren's It Wouldn't Have Made Any Difference (Kasim sings that particular song deeper and his voice always sounds so rich!

Across The Universe was preceded tonight by Kasim telling a hilarious story about him meeting Paul McCartney at Knebworth in 1976 and his misadventure when he was asked to get him a drink! The way that Kasim told the story would never come across as well if I typed it in as Kasim just has perfect timing and did some great mimes!

All too soon, it was the end of the set and Kasim made his way back to his dressing room with the room full of applause and cheers! I think that this was the best set that I've seen so far on Kasim's Solo Acoustic tour as his voice sounded perfect, his guitar playing was faultless and his chat between the songs was simply amazing!

Click here for 12 great photos of Kasim Sulton taken at The Point by Frank Ciapanna

Review by Sue
Only about ninety minutes since he left the stage and Kasim was back for his second set! It was a slightly smaller crowd than the first set but they were just as receptive - obviously a lot of people chose to see both sets! Unfortunately by the end of the second set, Kasim's voice was only at about 95% but it didn't detract from another great show!

Although, apart from a couple of changes, the second set was the same as the first, most of Kasim's chat was different which made it really entertaining! Tonight, for the first time on the tour, Kasim told us about when he recorded Don't Hold Me Back at his parent's house. He also stated that Sometimes Love Is A Dangerous Thing was offered to Meat Loaf for his new album - thank goodness he rejected it as it suits Kasim singing it acoustically so well!

After Kasim sang Alone (he couldn't remember off-hand which Beatles song it was a parody of), he said that he didn't like the photo of himself on Deface The Music. However, he continued that it was still better than having to wear a dress on RA! He said that ever since he was nine years old he'd wanted to play music and then at nineteen and a half, he records his first ever album with Utopia and has to wear a dress in the photo on the front of it!

Again he played the effective Just A Little Bit / Ticket To Ride but this time when he came to the chords after the "She ought to do right by me" part of the song, he played them perfectly which the audience applauded!

I think that when this tour is (sadly) over, one of the things that I'll remember more than anything else is how natural Kasim appears talking to an audience - he seems to do it with such ease that his personality comes across so well! Kasim also has this amazing knack of being able to even make a joke out of his mistakes! Talking about Todd Rundgren, he said that he felt lucky as he'd had the opportunity to work with one of the best songwriters of the second half of the nineteenth century! When some members of the audience corrected him that he really meant the twentieth century, he turned it into that he meant that he'd worked with Liszt or Wagner!

Kasim said that he only had one more song to sing but then on the spur of the moment, he decided to sing All The Right Reasons which delighted the audience!

I really like Kasim's rich full bodied version of The Beatles song Across The Universes but I dread hearing it as it means that it's the end of the set. However, I could hardly complain tonight as we had been treated to two simply amazing sets!

Video Clips
Due to server size restrictions the video clips have been temporarily removed. To view them please either e-mail SueW@KasimInfo.com or visit the Video Of The Week section of the site.

Kasim Sulton Solo Acoustic Tour 2001