HW: Brighton/Walthamstow

[Henderson Keith]

Hi Everyone...

Well...what a strange 48 hours it's been.

Seemed like such a good plan.  A mere 160 Swiss Franks for airfare, and only
had to spend a measly 18 quid on a room in a B&B just a short walk from the
gig (thanks to Arin and Eric for sending along housing suggestions, based on
their 2001 experience) in Brighton.  Flying home at 6 AM from Gatwick after
the London/Walt. gig seemed like a good idea at the *time*.  But then I met
this devious Belgian chick named Stella Artois in Brighton who proceeded to
follow me all the way to Walthamstow and made my final journey home a total
hell.  :)  To use the local slang, I was just a bit knackered at 5-something
AM when I was riding the Gatwick Express from Victoria, afraid I would nod
off again and wake up back in Brighton once more (to the sound of bloody
seagulls)!  Luckily, I got on the right plane and ended up back in the
Zurich Flughafen and more familiar territory.  The last few hours of this
trip still seem like a distant dream.

So, hey to everyone I met up with at the shows - I was very impressed with
the after-show party for those of us lucky list-folk and other 'insiders.'
Thanks to Arin and Co. for arranging this event.  And yes, I guess only us
lucky folk were able to buy the Canterbury discs there (not on sale at the
gig itself)...I'm listening to it now as I type.  Quite good so far, and
it's surprising to now see how much different the set list was just a year
ago.

My thoughts are that Brighton was the better of the two gigs, but that might
just be because it was the first of the two.  And I thought Walthamstow
would have both Simon House and Huw perhaps back on lead guitar, and so I
was a bit disappointed that it was virtually the same.  For instance, Spiral
Galaxy was on the Walth. set-list, but was skipped since Si didn't show.
But then I got to see Litmus play (who were really good I thought...rather
Quimby-like...and they had three guys on keyboards/electronics) and then the
extra-special surprise was the addition of Spirit of the Age as 2nd encore.
Brighton-Concorde 2 was a tiny, cramped place (same as seeing Hawkwind in
the USA!) and so the volume level was pretty much maxed out no matter where
you chose to view the show.  As I always do in such GA shows, I experimented
with different spots on the floor until I found the best place, and so I had
great sound where I was and could even hear Tim at times that he was
normally drowned out (at Walth. he was less audible).  Alan's bass was
punchy and high in the mix, and with Dave playing all the guitar, it was
really more 'rock' than 'space' like the trio lineup was.  I would say that
this gig was as good as it could possibly have been with a setlist that
contained very few of my favorites.  That said, it had a lot of interesting
and different stuff...I liked Arthur's Time Captives/Captain and liked
Arthur as frontman 100%.  Aerospaceage Inferno was an excellent opener,
essentially another 'split tune' with an extra bridge section in the middle
making it a good 8 minutes long or so.  Dave should again get a load of
credit for putting together such a solidly 'arranged' 90-minute set (the
later shows were obviously a bit longer than earlier gigs).  The band may be
criticized fairly for presenting no new material in several years, but for
old poems put to different old music (Mike, are you going to start the poll
now?).  :)  But I think it's underappreciated how important it is to work up
a coherent live set, especially when they always present the old music in
new ways.  Yeah, AofA/Palestine needs retiring, but it was again a little
different this time out as others have already mentioned.

I don't know what to say about Huw's absence.  Maybe if what others have
alluded to is really true (I dunno...I've only seen him at Hawkestra and he
was noticeably off-form then, but I can't say anything about a trend of
course), then perhaps it made the band relax to not have him there the final
two nights.  I haven't seen anyone mention that his guitar was stolen from
the bus several nights earlier!  (And is the rumour true that it was seen
posted somewhere on an auction site, such that there might be a way to
retrieve it and catch the bastard?)  But I guess that wasn't the cause of
his absence, in that they were able to drum up a 'spare' in short order.  I
only heard that he was still down with the flu or something, and no mention
of quitting for any other reason were suggested, not that I talked with
anyone official about such matters.

As far as 'official word' goes though, as usual you can never depend on
anything being 100% certain.  Like the idea of the poster/t-shirt artist
being there to sign posters and such never materialized.  In fact, they sold
no posters at either gig.  And of course, Simon House was 'expected.'  But I
won't complain...we all know with HW nothing's ever certain.  Looking
forward now to Summer Camp, praying that it happens too.  And War of the
Worlds maybe too.  One cool thing is that I've found that travelling to
London by budget air is cheaper than travelling to Frankfurt by train!

That's all...Grakkl (FAA)