Yer Fast (And I Like It)
Open My Eyes
World Wide Epiphany
It was a seven hour, 400 mile drive from Long Island to Pittsburgh (the only city on this tour to be honoured with two concerts). This concert was held at the massive Three Rivers Regatta festival in Point State Park and was easily the largest crowd they've played this tour as there were possibly ten thousand or more people there!
Unfortunately it was a ridiculous set-up as in front of the stage there was a twenty or thirty foot long area of flora and then a VIP enclosure in front of where us normal mortals were allowed to stand! Todd immediately picked up on this anomaly and on the fact that the VIP area was only half full! Fortunately for me I was by the fence at the front of the general area so I could see fine and had an amusing time watching loads of people trying to sweet talk their way into the VIP part! Short skirts seem to work quite well!<> The Power Trio came on stage at about 8.20 and Todd immediately remarked on how far away the audience was from the stage! There were a load of Todd fans around me who joined in with the songs which made a great atmosphere!
I think the concert only lasted about ninety minutes but we had the usual great selection of songs with all the Utopia tracks going down really well.
The sound was loud, very loud but they had horrendous problems with the lighting that had worked perfectly all afternoon! For the first couple of songs there were no lights on stage (but fortunately it was still daylight) and then we had about one track with full stage lights before the lights went out again! They next managed to just put the stage backlights on (which gave an unusual perspective) but during Todd's solo part those failed too so Todd was totally in the dark! This prompted one of the guitar techs to stand near him with a torch shining on him! Eventually, by the end of the concert they managed to get the lights working okay!
Kasim was sensibly wearing a long sleeved jumper tonight (as there were lots of flying bugs around) and some trousers that fitted him properly tonight. His pearl coloured guitar (I think it's a Specter bass) still has it's "acne" problem. Unfortuantely there was a tall bush in the floral display in front of Kasim so that when he was at his mike, all we could see was his head!
After the concert there was an impressive laser show (we were allowed into the VIP section for that). Next there was a skydiving stunt by three guys dressed as Elvis Presley (but, of course, we couldn't see that as they were up in the sky!) which went slightly wrong as one missed the target and ended up in hospital with cuts. The regatta ended with a massive firework display that lasted almost half an hour!
A chance to see Kasim, a great concert and all that entertainment for free - that's my kind of evening!