Full Day At Sea

Day 2, Wednesday, February 19, 2014.

I woke up about 8 and had a lazy morning. Read for a bit, then went for breakfast at the buffet. Had fruit and cereal, what else is knew? Okay I had a yogurt too. Then I went and booked a couple of excursions for the next two days on the islands where we land.

The first concert of the day was at noon. The band was called Eumeria, from England. They were one of three new bands that Mike Portnoy selected from tapes that were sent to him for a chance to play on this cruise. Really good metal type band with a very strong singer.

1 pm: Haken also from England on the pool deck. An excellent band with heavy metal parts and some musical and vocal parts that are very reminiscent of Gentle Giant. The performed their singe 'Cockroach' which has multi-part harmonies like GG's On Reflection. On the way to the next show I visited the merchandise store and bought all 3 discs by Haken, Transatlantic's new triple disc set called Kaleidoscope, Spock's Beard lastest, Mammoth and Void by Beardfish and a ProgressiveNationAtSea T-shirt.

2 pm: Felix Martin. He was another of the three bands that won their way on the cruise via Portnoy's contest. He is an amazing musician from South America. Double necked guitar which he played with both hands at the same time. He had an Asian bass player with him who played a double necked bass the same way and an incredible drummer. Really a tight group. But, again it becomes tedious and repetitive after a couple of numbers because there are no melodies or lyrics. It is more about showing off, kind of a musical masturbation.

3 pm: Beardfish Really a wonderful surprise! Really excellent. Charismatic, fun and the songs they played were from a variety of albums and were all excellent. One was about Wilbert who wanted to learn ballroom dancing. Going to revisit them at home for sure.

4 pm: Bad Salad  The third band to win their way on board. From Brazil and they are a fast metal band with a lot of support on board from South Americans with yellow t-shirts.

5 pm: Riverside  I stood at the front of the stage and got some great shots. Unfortunately they had a lot of equipment problems. The singer's mic didn't work properly, then the guitar needed a new cable and the keyboards were hard to hear. It was easy to see they were very frustrated. The singer did an extended bass solo while waiting for repairs. They played mainly material from the last two discs, which have not been my favourites, but I think I have gained a new appreciation for them. The crowd was really behind them.

7 pm: Pain Of Salvation This band's lead singer couldn't come because he had flesh eating disease! They are another tight heavy band with some interesting sections. I might go to hear them again if possible.

8 pm: Spock's Beard  Really glad to finally see them. They were excellent. Amazing bass player and they were really tight. Jimmy Keegan the drummer was fantastic. They have lots in common with Gentle Giant as well.

9:30 pm: King's X  Lots of interest and fans of this band on board. They have been around for years. But I found them pretty mundane. Three piece and the leader is a black bass player with incredibly long arms. They were a straight up rock act, nothing that interested me much. His bass playing sounded much the same on every track.

10:30 pm: Flower Kings are from Sweden as well as Beardfish. Good band but like their records, they leave me a bit cold. Not enough to grasp my interest, they sound like lots of other bands from the last few decades.

11:30 pm: Portnoy, Sheehan, MacAlpine, Sherinian Excellent musicians, really incredible and unbelievably fast. At the end of the first song Portnoy said “is that enough notes for you? There are plenty more where they came from.” Ultimately though, it becomes all about the notes and speed, not about music or melody and becomes boring. It is not something I would chose to listen to at home.

I met John Wesley twice more today and had a really good talk with him about Steven Wilson. He told me that Porcupine Tree hopes to record a new album in 2016. He said that Wilson is a workaholic and confirmed that he is not married. We talked about motorcycle riding and other bands on board.