The Ikon
Open My Eyes
World Wide Epiphany
This concert was held in the Grand Ballroom at the luxurious Woodlands Inn and Resort and was another great FREE concert! It was the 20th birthday party bash for a local Wilkes Barre radio station called Rock 107, complete with free food and a wonderful massive birthday cake!
We arrived promptly at 7.30 as it said that there was limited seating but it turned out that there were no seats at all. There were two stages at either end of the hall. The opening act was a band called "Houssie Daddy?" who played some good cover songs. Next we had virtually the whole of the radio station introduced to us before The Clarkes came on stage. As they were very loud (and not very tuneful) we went back to my room (four doors down from one of our band!) to rest our feet before we returned in time to hear a duo who were "special guests" but fortunately they only played three tracks!
Kasim, Todd and Trey came on at 10.15 to an over-packed room (no doubt breaking the fire regulations!) and boy was it hot both on stage and in the crowd! The PA system was very good (although the "f**king lights" went out once) but was very loud! At one stage I stood near some speakers in order to be able to see better and it really hurt my ears, whereas usually loud music at concerts doesn't bother me!
After the usual opening three songs (they haven't played Play This Game as the second song yet on this leg of the tour so far), they got LCD out of the way. They then sang Love in Action and we had Todd's usual speech about testing your assumptions before starting Yer Fast. As soon as they finished that they did a reprise of Love in Action which makes me think that they've been rehearsing that particular link as it sounded so clean. It was during this part of the gig that Todd caught Kasim looking at his watch and asked him if he had somewhere that he had to go after the show!
We then had a great Utopia selection as they sang There Goes My Inspiration, Play This Game and the wonderful Trapped!
Continuing his habit of appearing to play a different song each show on this leg, Todd sang Got to Hide Your Love Away before Bang The Drum.
When Kasim and Trey returned to the stgae, Jessie Gresse came on with them again! Todd explained that Jessie's previous tour has ended so maybe he'll be at the rest of the concerts(?). They played Black and White, Secret Society (Todd hardly played guitar in this track!) and Hammer in My Heart before the great Buffalo Grass and One World ending, complete with hand punch and the line "From Wilkes Barre to Tokyo"!
When the Power Trio (Power Quartet!) returned to the stage they did a great performance of The Ikon with a fair amount of talking beforehand to decide in which order to take the spotlight! They played it as Todd, Kasim, Jessie and then Trey. I know I'm biased but Kasim played some amazing notes tonight - how he got his guitar to go SO deep really surprised me!
They then went into the usual Open My Eyes and World Wide Epiphany before leaving to massive applause after another brilliant concert!