Caught the show last night (4/5) at Radio City Music Hall in NYC...it was awesome! No warm-up and David started right on time. The place was mobbed.
As I bought on-line from a Ticket Broker (i.e, Legal Scalper), I was forced to wait up until YESTERDAY morning to get my tix via Fed-Ex priority overnight. They WEREN'T the tix I bought (3rd Mezz), but since they are guaranteed equivalent or better, I got ORCHESTRA 2(floor, in-front of stage right, 10 rows back!!!).
Weird show...not quite what I was expecting. I was under the impression that it would be a cross-section of ALL DG's solo stuff, with a heapin' helpin' of Pink Floyd thrown in. Instead, the first set was ONLY songs off of On An Island and the second set/encores were ONLY Pink Floyd!!!
The live sound was a mixed-bag: boomy overblown bass marred what was an otherwise fine performance by Guy Pratt (and John Carin's left hand, LOL!). Volume, during solo's especially, was uneven. Apparently, it was the soundman's first rodeo (I'm being sarcastic). Ah! The foibles and follies of rental sound companies, especially in the land of the Labor Union aka NYC, LOL! I expected much more from the sound considering it was Radio City...anybody that's seen a show there usually effuses with praise for the sound/acoustics there, myself included.
The stage show was not standard PF fair. It was very toned-down: No fancy stage set or multi-media screens, etc. Just a standard (for anyone) stage set-up...the light show was very nice though, with some lasers a la Floyd tours of the past, albeit on a more modest scale.
The band was pretty much the same Pink Floyd we've seen since '87 (a la Momentary Lapse Of Reason and Division Bell tours), sans Nick Mason: Richard Wright on keys, Guy Pratt on bass, and Jon Carin on keys/lap steel. OAI's producer/DG's neighbor Phil Manzanera manned guitars behind DG and Dick Parry was excellent on various saxophones (the drummer's name eludes me at the moment).
DG played acoustic/electric guitars, acoustic/electric steel guitars, banjo, and saxophone! As is usual, his playing was sublime! Tons of DG's signature sound, despite the unorthodox (for him, live anyway) switching amongst many diffferent guitars (Gretsch Duo-Jet, black non-EMG Strat, red EMG Strat, etc.) instruments He was in fine form both musically and vocally. He appeared to really be enjoying himself, with both frequent bouts of smiling and voluntary engaging in crowd banter (both of which are NOT usual for him, LOL!).
He had David Crosby and Graham Nash (!) on hand for both NYC shows to sing back-up on On An Island. They also sang on a few other tunes, including Shine On You Crazy Diamond, Part (?) (the band cuts out halfway thru and David does his Meltdown 2002 solo thing with the looped guitar background...this time Crosby/Nash sang along). He also brought them out near they end so the three of them could do an a cappella version of Find The Cost Of Freedom. Very nice... they're all old and physically more than a fair bit worse-for-wear, but close your eyes and it's still the same magic! Graham can still hiot those high notes!
If you can manage the RIDICULOUS tix prices, HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!
FWIW, here's the set-list with commentary and equipment notes from Bjorn Riis's Gilmourish.com RE: the Amsterdam shows (essentially the same as NYC's show, without most of the problems):
http://www.gilmourish.com/gilmourishblog/index.html Scroll-down for the goods, including lot's of pix and Enjoy!
Cheers,
Kevin
P.S., even the PF/DG-ignorant girlfriend enjoyed the show!
