Miércoles 21 Feb 2007, 17:09

This was the third and final gig of the short Finnish tour from KTU, which includes Pat Mastelotto and Trey Gunn, my favourite King Crimson rhythm section (also known as the duo TU) and Kimmo Pohjonen and Samuli Kosminen (who form the duo Kluster in their own right), although Samuli is inactive until summer.

I dubbed the KTU gig of Tavastia the best gig I'd ever been to. Was this gig good? Yes it was good, good, good!

Setlist was the same as the previous nights. The boombastic opener began it's buildup through blue lights and smoke. When it locked on an ethereal groove I experienced a few minutes of the best music that's ever come across me. I was shaking and moved not far from tears - sorry for being corny! Seriously, this one is a powerful piece of music.

As the tune shifted gears into a more earthly groove, however, I must say that this time the transition didn't have the kick that it had in Tavastia. The first three tunes had their share of flaky moments: equipment not working, players out of synch, and other sort of fumbles. When it was good, it was really good. When it was flaky, it was rather flaky.

Sometimes both happened: during Absinthe Trey's gear botched his solo: for the first bars all he could get out of the upper register of his Warr guitar was a screeching sound and it sounded the same regardless of what notes he played on the fretboard. I thought it sounded pretty good, although it didn't seem intentional! Trey looked at Pat and Kimmo, they went "oh well" and Kimmo took the reins, going absolutely apeshit with his solo. Wonderful recovery, I'd say!

Animus next didn't start all that smoothly either, but somewhere along the way the music came together and it was complete bliss once again. From here on the gig was consistently good. While the playing wasn't always 100% accurate, the mistakes started turning into happy accidents: There was a bit of silence in the middle of Optikus after a buildup, which I think was supposed to be followed by the main percussion loop starting up again, but Pat only struck the pad after a bar or two of silence/applause - this was fun and good. The players started to communicate more and have more fun.. this gig was perhaps a bit more relaxed than Tavastia, actually a bit more wild!

The circular-saw lines by Trey in the intro to "30th Century Agent Film Theme" or "Matka" were as powerful in Lutakko as they were in Tavastia. Next piece, the doubletapped merry-go-round theme seemed to me really different from Tavastia! I thought the guys were really jamming there a bit. Especially Kimmo I recall shined on this one. Personally the naked doubletapped line which began the piece sounds a little anachronisticly Typical 80's Stick Line when played alone, but some really really great music emerges in this piece! And it's pleasantly different from the other material.

Next piece ("Vienna") was began with a heavy STAB "interlude" and the construction of the rhythmic loop, along with evocative accordion lines from Kimmo (for a while I thought they'd changed the set list and would play the beautiful encore piece here). This was a lovely transition. I seem to recall in Tavastia the transition was different, with Trey playing soundscapey looping, nearly solo - or maybe it was in some other part of the set, anyhow it didn't occur in Lutakko. The piece it self was one of the high points of the evening. Beautiful, beautiful.

Voima this time held together, altough the later half still isn't one of my favourites. :) The sound was a notch too loud, I managed without earplugs but it was slightly uncomfortable during one or two pieces.

Before the first improv Pat had to do a bit of stand-up comedy because "Kimmo needed to hydrate because of consuming so much alcohol". Then they went on to perform the beatiful piece, which I'm happy was indeed a solid new piece (or who knows, became such). It was really unashamedly beautiful and melodic, and a great contrast to some of the darker more muscular pieces.

Unbelievable Untamed Chicken followed. It was played with a crazy energy (great red and white lights too!) and really relaxed: there was a lot of communication between the three where to go with the riffing and in the STABSTABSTABbing section Pat was again suggesting numbers to the other guys, which was funny in itself but when he struck the chicken samples into the mix it was hilarious - a thought/image struck my head: the man was selling chickens! There was a lot of laughter from the audience too in this bit, which was really, really wonderful. I love this side of the band which has really come up during this tour!

Roaring, roaring applause and good vibes. They did indeed come back for a second encore and Kimmo this time announced that Trey wanted to do a little speech. As you probably can guess this was Kimmo being mischievious again. He said that we should really be quiet now, since Trey didn't have a microphone and his voice was "really soft and feminine".. Well, Trey was up to the challenge, didn't blink and decided he would speak into Kimmo's microphone (which is one of those types that you wear on your head a'la Britney Spears), so things got a little intimate.. in fact I can't remember what Trey did announce in his soft voice while staring into Kimmo's eyes!

I was rather hyped for the evening and it wasn't for nought! People I stayed with have noticed it also and Valquis even let himself be persuaded to join me and Sanxion to the gig, although he at least so far hasn't been into this kind of music. We watched Absinthe and Optikus from Youtube and he thought that the music had an intresting atmosphere and had potential.. He rather enjoyed it and thought Mastelotto was The Man, and that Kimmo was quite crazy, jumping up and down and not deciding whether to sit or stand..

Hope to see these guys reasonably soon again. This tour was a real boon.

First posted at http://www.projekction.net