Dave2112
Level of Cherry Feather
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- Apr 17, 2001
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Back in 1982, when I was a musically impressionable young teenager immersing himself in the progressive sounds of ELP, Yes, Genesis, Rush and the like, along came an album that changed the way I looked at music forever. The album, and band, was Asia. A "supergroup" made up of former members of Yes, King Crimson, ELP and The Buggles, Asia managed to do something no prog band had ever really accomplished. They made progressive rock radio-friendly. The musician in me was enthralled by the craftsmanship of the players and the structure of the songs, from Steve Howe's eccletic guitar riffs and Geoff Downes' majestic keyboards to Carl Palmer's thunderous drums and John Wetton's solid bass playing and tenor voice. The teenage wanna-be rock star in me was simply happy rocking out to the powerful tunes. Asia managed to satisfy both kinds of fans.
They recorded two albums of legendary material, followed by a third that saw the departure of Steve Howe and the band's attempt at Top 40 writing, a greatest hits package with four new songs with guest guitarists and then Asia disbanded. In essence, anyway. For many years, the band still recorded and toured the UK and Europe with Geoff Downes remaining as the only original member of Asia, but it was "Asia" in name only. While the music was good, it was a completely different animal and they never re-captured the magic of the original line-up.
Now, 25 years after the initial release of their self-titled album, Asia has reunited to pay tribute to the album that to this day holds a special place in rock history. "Fantasia" finds all four original members in Tokyo, Japan for a concert to celebrate the anniversary of their strongest piece of work. And celebrate, they do. All nine track from Asia are played at some point in the show, including a tenth, the sublime Ride Easy, which never made it onto the album, but was released as the B-Side to Heat of the Moment. It had not been played live before, and appears here in a reconfigured arrangement of acoustic guitars, piano, strings and bongos.
Also included in the setlist are three songs from Asia's second album, Alpha. The only song to be performed in its original form is the classic The Heat Goes On, with in-song drum solo by Carl Palmer. The other two are performed acoustically, with Geoff Downs on MIDI piano, Wetton on acoustic guitar and Steve Howe playing mandolin. The Smile Has Left Your Eyes comes across beautifully in this format, being a ballad to begin with...but the 1984 hit Don't Cry is treated the same way. At first, I said to myself "This is not gonna work," but I was pleasantly surprised. It becomes a soulfully powerful piece in this format.
Rounding out the setlist are four separate tributes to the individual members' careers prior to Asia. The most ambitious is the classic Yes song Roundabout. Surprisingly, the song is not played in an alternate key to accomodate Wetton's tenor voice, simply sung a powerful octave lower than Jon Anderson's original soprano. Also surprisingly, the usually solid Wetton does an admirable job of handling Chris Squier's wild basslines. In tribute to Carl Palmer's ELP career, the band plays an inspired version of Fanfare for the Common Man, and John Wetton's years with King Crimson are remembered with a perfect rendering of The Court of the Crimson King. The real show-stopper, however, is a phenomenal performance of the song that was the first video ever played on MTV all those many years back (of which this reviewer was witness), The Buggles' Video Killed the Radio Star, complete with Wetton singing the intro into a megaphone to emulate the low-fi radio sound and Geoff Downs singing the chorus into a synthesizer vocorder, producing a sound that I just can't describe here. It's easily one of the disc's unexpected highlights.
The show itself does suffer from a slight lack of energy. This is a Japanese audience, famous for their "polite" reactions to performers and the members are either in or approaching their 60's. It lacks the energy and "oomph" of Asia's 1990 concert in the Soviet Union, but makes up for it with superb musicianship. The aforementioned concert was performed with the latest in a long string of "guest guitarists", the forgettable Pat Thrall who basically power-chorded and metal-soloed his way through the show, obviously unfamiliar with the intracacies of Asia's music. Steve Howe is a welcome return to the original line-up. All the classic Asia riffs, all the fills, all of the inimitable style that made Asia unique in the first place. He does, however, have the potential to scare young children cathing up with Asia with their parents...his half-bald head, long grey hair, goofy glasses and manner of dress make one instantly think of someone mixing chemicals in an underground lab while lightning flashes and a young girl struggles, strapped to an operating table. He really does look like he died three days ago and no one told him. However, the playing is sublime and untouched by time.
The real star of the show is the original album itself, however. All of the songs are reproduced here true to their original sound. Wetton's voice is still as powerful and emotive as ever, Geoff Downes remains one of rock's truly gifted keyboardists (and has yet to give in to the trend of scaling down the stage "rack" in the light of new technology...the nine boards that surround him bring you back to the time of "big" arena music) and Carl Palmer has the chops, style and energy lacking in drummers half his age.
Also included are interviews with each member about the history of the band, the downfalls that broke it apart, the individual histories of four of rock's most unique performers and the trials and triumphs of reuniting after all these years.
For those of you old enough to remember the debut of Asia (which remains as the #1 selling debut band album of all time), this DVD is something you really do have to have in your collection. Asia's one negative in their heyday was a lack of consistant touring and I know how lucky I am to have actually even seen them live back then. This disc serves as a defacto experience for the many fans who never got to experience the live Asia show. And, if you weren't around back then and are growing weary of the same-old-same-old of today's copy-and-paste music, do yourself a favor and pick this disc up. It just might do for you what the original album did for me in 1982. Smart enough to appreciate and cool enough to rock out to.
They recorded two albums of legendary material, followed by a third that saw the departure of Steve Howe and the band's attempt at Top 40 writing, a greatest hits package with four new songs with guest guitarists and then Asia disbanded. In essence, anyway. For many years, the band still recorded and toured the UK and Europe with Geoff Downes remaining as the only original member of Asia, but it was "Asia" in name only. While the music was good, it was a completely different animal and they never re-captured the magic of the original line-up.
Now, 25 years after the initial release of their self-titled album, Asia has reunited to pay tribute to the album that to this day holds a special place in rock history. "Fantasia" finds all four original members in Tokyo, Japan for a concert to celebrate the anniversary of their strongest piece of work. And celebrate, they do. All nine track from Asia are played at some point in the show, including a tenth, the sublime Ride Easy, which never made it onto the album, but was released as the B-Side to Heat of the Moment. It had not been played live before, and appears here in a reconfigured arrangement of acoustic guitars, piano, strings and bongos.
Also included in the setlist are three songs from Asia's second album, Alpha. The only song to be performed in its original form is the classic The Heat Goes On, with in-song drum solo by Carl Palmer. The other two are performed acoustically, with Geoff Downs on MIDI piano, Wetton on acoustic guitar and Steve Howe playing mandolin. The Smile Has Left Your Eyes comes across beautifully in this format, being a ballad to begin with...but the 1984 hit Don't Cry is treated the same way. At first, I said to myself "This is not gonna work," but I was pleasantly surprised. It becomes a soulfully powerful piece in this format.
Rounding out the setlist are four separate tributes to the individual members' careers prior to Asia. The most ambitious is the classic Yes song Roundabout. Surprisingly, the song is not played in an alternate key to accomodate Wetton's tenor voice, simply sung a powerful octave lower than Jon Anderson's original soprano. Also surprisingly, the usually solid Wetton does an admirable job of handling Chris Squier's wild basslines. In tribute to Carl Palmer's ELP career, the band plays an inspired version of Fanfare for the Common Man, and John Wetton's years with King Crimson are remembered with a perfect rendering of The Court of the Crimson King. The real show-stopper, however, is a phenomenal performance of the song that was the first video ever played on MTV all those many years back (of which this reviewer was witness), The Buggles' Video Killed the Radio Star, complete with Wetton singing the intro into a megaphone to emulate the low-fi radio sound and Geoff Downs singing the chorus into a synthesizer vocorder, producing a sound that I just can't describe here. It's easily one of the disc's unexpected highlights.
The show itself does suffer from a slight lack of energy. This is a Japanese audience, famous for their "polite" reactions to performers and the members are either in or approaching their 60's. It lacks the energy and "oomph" of Asia's 1990 concert in the Soviet Union, but makes up for it with superb musicianship. The aforementioned concert was performed with the latest in a long string of "guest guitarists", the forgettable Pat Thrall who basically power-chorded and metal-soloed his way through the show, obviously unfamiliar with the intracacies of Asia's music. Steve Howe is a welcome return to the original line-up. All the classic Asia riffs, all the fills, all of the inimitable style that made Asia unique in the first place. He does, however, have the potential to scare young children cathing up with Asia with their parents...his half-bald head, long grey hair, goofy glasses and manner of dress make one instantly think of someone mixing chemicals in an underground lab while lightning flashes and a young girl struggles, strapped to an operating table. He really does look like he died three days ago and no one told him. However, the playing is sublime and untouched by time.
The real star of the show is the original album itself, however. All of the songs are reproduced here true to their original sound. Wetton's voice is still as powerful and emotive as ever, Geoff Downes remains one of rock's truly gifted keyboardists (and has yet to give in to the trend of scaling down the stage "rack" in the light of new technology...the nine boards that surround him bring you back to the time of "big" arena music) and Carl Palmer has the chops, style and energy lacking in drummers half his age.
Also included are interviews with each member about the history of the band, the downfalls that broke it apart, the individual histories of four of rock's most unique performers and the trials and triumphs of reuniting after all these years.
For those of you old enough to remember the debut of Asia (which remains as the #1 selling debut band album of all time), this DVD is something you really do have to have in your collection. Asia's one negative in their heyday was a lack of consistant touring and I know how lucky I am to have actually even seen them live back then. This disc serves as a defacto experience for the many fans who never got to experience the live Asia show. And, if you weren't around back then and are growing weary of the same-old-same-old of today's copy-and-paste music, do yourself a favor and pick this disc up. It just might do for you what the original album did for me in 1982. Smart enough to appreciate and cool enough to rock out to.
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