The Australian Pink Floyd Show - www.aussiefloyd.com 

One Sunday afternoon, whilst listening to the radio, I hear of this band, the Aussie Pink Floyd Show, which is scheduled to show at the Providence Civic Center (now known as the Dunkin Donuts Center, or more friendly, The Dunk) the very next Saturday night at 7:30pm. So, naturally, being a Floydian, and having not heard live Floyd in a rather long time (the last was The Machine at Lupo's Heartbreak Hotel on 06/23/02) I was good to go.

I checked Ticketbastard but it looked as though, from the layout of The Dunk, that the only decent seats left were the in the far-away, bottom tier areas. I prefer being seated at the bottom tier, but closer to the band. I do NOT like being seated on the floor, as you can be sure that there's always some group of stupid, drunk guys, standing in front of you who won't sit down and actually listen to the music; who think they need to make the "rock-n-roll" sign (or whatever the heck that is) with their fingers, and point to the band during every song, assuring them and the audience that they indeed rock. These are not Floydians, they're just idiots. As God is my witness, I actually had a hard time enjoying the concert for a good part of the show because I felt bad for the folks who were stuck behind these very aforementioned assholes. They were asked politely to sit down by the nice and orderly patrons seated behind them, but they refused. These are the kind of people who always shout in a drunken stupor, "Play FREEBIRD!" at practically any rock show, and I'm surprised they didn't ask this band to follow suit. They need to be sterilized. But I digress ...

Once I got to The Dunk, I discovered that the set up was only "half stadium", so every seat was actually a really good seat! I think the "Dunk" holds about 11K people with full stadium, so it appears that about 5500 seats were available for the Aussie Floyd show. I'd have to guess that about 3/4 of those seats were sold, which made it nice for the poor folks who were stuck behind "you know who", who, once they figured they could move unencumbered, chose to move to a different location. Good for them! And may the miscreants who made the first part of their show miserable not remember even a moment of the show!

I was actually cautioned by another Floydian (who will remain nameless for now) at the mention of this band, that their show was, in his opinion "sterile". I basically knew what he meant when he said it, but I think I understood better once I experienced it.

Technically speaking, musically speaking, Aussie Floyd was fabulous: along with well executed music, there was plenty of eye candy, consisting in computer generated versions of some of the usual Pink Floyd cartoons, and images projected onto the Floydian circular movie screen behind the band, along with some original conceptual computer animated video, incorporating Pink Floyd imagery from album covers and record sleeves, into a sort of loosely connected story. Throughout these videos were appearances of a not-so-well-rendered computer generated pink kangaroo (whose name I'd imagine is Pink?) playing one humorous role or another; sometimes appearing as an Egyptian hieroglyph, sometimes a guitar bestowing demigod, sometimes a patient in a mental ward, etc. But the overall effect of these videos was rather pleasing. I liked the fact that AF actually had more video footage than a real Floyd show would.

There were lights, smoke, and lasers-a-plenty; rumbling bass chords and drum beats penetrating deep into the soul, giving one a sense of euphoria; a three girl back-up singing trio,  and let's not forget the really fine musicianship. One of the young ladies from the trio took the role of Clare Torry during THE GREAT GIG IN THE SKY, and did a superb job! The vocals of Waters and Wright were passed around between two guitarists and one bass player, while the Gilmour vocals were done by the guitarist to the right of the stage. The drummer was flawless, and the keyboard player did one of the best interpretations of Richard Wright's work that I've ever heard in a Floyd tribute band -- all the wavers in the right place and for the right length of time. And the saxophone man! Oh, the saxophone man! I do believe that at the end of each sax solo, the only word that came out of anyone's mouth was "Woooooooo!"

If you've noticed, I've not mentioned the name of a single member of Aussie Floyd. Why? Because they never told us their names. Only one guy, the bald guitarist who stood in the middle of the stage, ever said a word to the audience. Other than saying that he and the band were happy to be in Providence at one point, and "Let's hear it for the road crew!" near the close of the show, there was no other communication between the band and the audience, other than "Good night". I'd bought a program (only $5.00!) and I believe upon a quick scan of it, that I'd noticed their names listed in the back of it (though not associated with a photograph), but since they were too lazy to mention their names to us, I'll return the favour and not take the trouble to look it up.

The biggest regret I have is that with the exception of CAREFUL WITH THAT AXE EUGENE, everything played was the usual faire. There was nothing from the Barrett years, and no deep cuts -- just the radio friendly stuff. I did find it odd that Sorrow (in my opinion a horribly long and boring song) was played from A MOMENTARY LAPSE OF REASON, rather than Learning To Fly, and from THE DIVISION BELL, they played Keep Talking (again, in my opinion, another wretched song) rather than High Hopes, which is a much better and more Floydian sounding song.

So, back to the "sterile" notion about this band. Sadly I rather have to agree. Though technically accurate in nearly everything musically (I did notice a few mistakes in the guitar work, though one could even expect that from David Gilmour), the sterility I believe lies in it's contrivity. That is, the whole show was contrived from beginning to end, without the possibility of improvisation. No one in the audience was asked "Hey, what song do you want to hear? Which most likely would have gotten the response "Dogs!" or "Astronomy Domine!" from a large number of Floydians. One might possibly expect this sort of behaviour from the real Pink Floyd, since there's an agenda to be met (to promote whatever new album may be out, and play some of the mass favourites), but not from a tribute band.

Supposedly Aussie Floyd played a gig at one of David Gilmour's birthday celebrations, by his invitation, because he was so impressed with their work. Good for them! I think they need to lighten up first, and then they need to think about to whom are they playing. With the exception of your usual drunk rocker jackasses, the majority of the folks who'll buy tickets to Aussiefloyd shows are FLOYDIANS. These are people who have most (if not all) of Pink Floyd's albums, and they like just about everything from those albums. How about some Julia Dream, or Nile Song, or Fat Old Sun? Playing THE DARK SIDE OF THE MOON in its entirety is admirable, even desirable, but let's move on shall we?

Even though I'm complaining alot, I have to say that all in all, I had a pretty good time. The tickets were only $37.50 or $27.50, which is not bad for a big production, when you think about it -- at least comparatively speaking. Thankfully, either the music wasn't too loud or I was far enough from the speakers to where I didn't end up with ringing in my ears all night long. I do look forward to seeing this band again, but only with the hopes that they've gotten the word that Floydians are about more than just the "hits".

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