Concert Review: Murder, Mayhem and Major Key Transitions

Dream Theater returns to Metropolis at the Beacon.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Dream Theater: (l.-r. Jordan Rudess, Mike Mangini (on drums) John Myung,
James LaBrie, John Petrucci) returned to the Beacon Theater on Friday night. Photo by the author.

(This review is respectfully dedicated to my friend and colleague Peter Danish, who got us the tickets. Thanks again, man.)

The progressive rock band Dream Theater has enjoyed its long existence by following two rules: doing what they want to do as musicians and ignoring sniffing rock critics. (Critics have responded to this indifference by pretty much ignoring the band: their reputation rests on word of mouth.) Since I'm a classical music critic, I went to see them (for the sixteenth time since 1993) at the Beacon Theater on a night when the band was celebrating its return to its hometown of New York and I was celebrating my forty-sixth spin around the sun.

Concert Review: The Return Rate of Sequels

U2 return to Madison Square Garden
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Just a small band from Dublin: Adam Clayton (right) Bono (center) and The Edge (right) rock Madison Square Garden
Photo by Susan Weinstein, who also got us the tickets.

Most giant rock tours don't get a sequel. An exception is the epic stage production by the Irish band U2, who brought their new "Experience and Innocence" tour to Madison Square Garden on Monday night. This tour is a follow-up to the band's "Innocence and Experience" trek of 2015, and is in support of their new (and thirteenth) studio record Songs of Experience. (Warning, review contains major set list spoilers.)

Concert Review: Evil Never Dies

Judas Priest, Saxon, Black Star Riders rock Newark.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

The mighty Judas Priest (l.r. Richie Faulkner, Scott Travis, Rob Halford, Andy Sneap, Ian Hill)
sacked New Jersey on Tuesday night. Photo by the author. 

Last week, I excitedly told a colleague who works in PR for Carnegie Hall that I had tickets for Tuesday night's Judas Priest concert at the Prudential Center in Newark, New Jersey. "Really? Judas Priest." I said, "yeah! I get to be 17 again!"

"Why do you like that stuff?" someone asked.

"Because," I answered with a straight face, "they write opera for teenaged boys!"

Concert Review: Owner of a Lonely Heart's Club Band

A second Yes rocks Newark.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Yes featuring Jon Anderson (center left) Travor Rabin (far right) and Rick Wakeman (far right) at NJPAC.
Photo by the author.

What's in a name? For Jon Anderson, Trevor Rabin and Rick Wakeman, an awful lot. The three musicians banded together last year as "ARW" and started touring playing Yes music. Following the induction of eight band members into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, the boys are now calling themselves "Yes featuring ARW", putting their band in direct competition with the "official" version of the band led by Steve Howe. Their version of the band rocked NJPAC in Newark last night with a show featuring different eras of the venerable English prog rock band's 49-year history.

Concert Review: Naked Crunch

Apocalyptica celebrate 20 years of Metallica covers--on cellos. 
by Paul J. Pelkonen

The gentlemen of Apocalyptica: (l.r.) Eicca Toppinen, Perttu Kivilaasko, Paavo Lötjönen and Antero Manninen
in their video for "Battery." Image © 2017 Apocalyptica.

Twenty years ago, I was in the Record Factory in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn on a Saturday afternoon. The clerk, Fred showed me something "new and weird" that had just come in. It was by a band called Apocalyptica and was titled Plays Metallica for Four Cellos. Skeptical, I flipped it over. And that was when I recognized Eicca Toppinen, the Finnish cellist who is the band's leader and who I had met when he was playing in New York with the new music ensemble Avanti! the year before. Anyway, I bought it.

Concert Review: It's All About the Oils

The triumphant New York return of Australia's greatest band.

by Paul J. Pelkonen

In the valley he walks: Midnight Oil's Peter Garrett.
Photo from YouTube.

If you're a reader expecting today's edition of Superconductor to be a roundup of the recently ended Metropolitan Opera season or a CD review, this is not that column. (Rest assured, those are coming.) No I'm here to talk about Saturday night at Webster Hall and the first Midnight Oil show in New York show since the band’s 2002 tour supporting their last record, Capricornia. Since then, “The Oils” have been on hiatus, as lead singer and political firebrand Peter Garrett served in the Parliament of the bands native Australia, putting his energies into politics instead of rock and roll.

Concert Review: Astounded and Surrounded

Dream Theater plays The Astonishing in Newark.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Surrounded...by drums. Dream Theater lead singer James LaBrie sings The Astonishing.
Photo from the video of "Our New World" © 2016 Dream Theater/Roadrunner Records.

The gulf  between grand opera and heavy metal seems vast. These two genres of music commanding different audiences that are equally passionate about their artists. And yet, some intrepid bands have thrown bridges across that gulf, writing astounding rock operas that swell and surge with orchestral power and epic, complex storylines as convoluted as the grandest opera. On Wednesday night, the veteran progressive metal band Dream Theater brought their touring version of their new record The Astonishing to Prudential Hall at the New Jersey Center for Performing Arts.

Concert Review: Jukebox Heroes From Outer Space

Jeff Lynne's E.L.O. and the Attacca Quartet rock Radio City Music Hall.

by Paul J. Pelkonen

Jeff Lynne (center, to the drummer's right) and E.L.O. perform "Telephone Line"
last night at Radio City Music Hall. Photo by the author.

Forty years ago, Electric Light Orchestra were one of the biggest bands on the planet. The group, brainchild of singer-songwriter Jeff Lynne conquered the world with brilliant pop songs and a sound that mixed the British psychedelic-baroque pop of The Beatles with actual orchestral instruments: violin and cellos that chugged along with the band onstage. In the '80s, they ditched the strings for synths, calling it a day in the middle of the "me" decade. This led to Mr. Lynne taking a 25-year break from the rigors of concert touring. In the late '80s and '90s, he applied his producer's touch to projects by Tom Petty, Roy Orbison and George Harrison, ultimately founding the five-piece supergroup The Traveling Wilburys with Bob Dylan.

Concert Review: Cherry Moon Rising

Burnt Sugar Arkestra throws a Parade at Lincoln Center.
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Members of Burnt Sugar the Arkestra Chamber paint Lincoln Center purple.
Photo anonymous, from the group's Facebook page. © 2016 Burnt Sugar Arkestra.

It was a wake, a gospel revival, and a celebration of the life of an American musical genius. Last night, Burnt Sugar the Arkestra Chamber played a free concert in the David Rubenstein Atrium at Lincoln Center, with all sixteen musicians and singers delivering a smoking and soulful tribute to one Prince Rogers Nelson, the Minneapolis singer, songwriter, composer and multi-instrumentalist whose death earlier this year rocked an already reeling and shuddering world.

Hold On, Changes Can Happen

Is Yes' 90125 a "concept album"?
by Paul J. Pelkonen

Yes, circa 1983 in the video for "Leave It" from the album 90125.
L-R: Trevor Rabin, Jon Anderson, Alan White, Tony Kaye, Chris Squire.
Image © 1983 Atlantic/Atco Records.

The international community of Yes fans is mourning the passing of bassist and band founder Chris Squire, who succumbed to leukemia at his Arizona home on June 28. In the wake of his passing, the home stereo at Superconductor's Brooklyn headquarters has been playing a lot of Yes, from the airy harmonies of Close to the Edge to the wild experimentation of Tales from Topographic Oceans. Today, the record was the band's 1981 comeback album 90125. This prompted the question: is 90125 a concept album that tells a specific story?