March 13, 2008

The entirety of this European tour the band seemed to feel like it needed to play more digital, electronic, etc. Abraxas begins this show with a heavily digital jam. I enjoyed this, though it’s fairly safe, inside-the-box play. Commercial Amen has no jam. The 42 jam is again, e-drum heavy, but otherwise this had virtually no impact on me one way or the other. The Lunar Pursuit jam is again, e-drum heavy (thirst quenchers galore). Again, this isn’t bad, but doesn’t feel like it has a ton of direction either. The Buddha jam has some neat stuff going on. This is essentially a Buddha ending jam for the overwhelming majority of it, but very nice nonetheless. Highwire has an extended dance jam coming out of it for the return to 42. This has some really unique aspects, and Magner is on full display with an array of textural noises and sound effects (though not a ton in the way of melodic play). Magner eventually comes in with some melodic leads near the end of the Highwire track as the band preps to transition back into 42. This develops in a slow-evolving way, with some fantastic melodic work from Magner. I felt like this was begging for some chord movement rather than a vamp in a single key, which I felt like held this back from escalating to the next level. That’s not to say chord movement is always necessary, but this just felt stagnant to me near the end, despite how cool some of it was. The encore is jamless, obviously.

Highlights: Abraxas, Buddha, Highwire*