Grand Bahama Island

Mike Portnoy

Transatlantic

Jon Anderson, ex of YES singing with Transatlantic

Day 4 Friday, February 21, 2014

Awoke up with a start at 7:00 from my internal clock. Mustering time for my excursion today (catamaran cruise to a reef for snorkeling) was at 8:40, so I had to get up and hurry. Off to the buffet for breakfast. The usual stuff, grapefruit, orange, porridge with berries and a yogurt. Back to the room to gather my stuff and found a note on my door that my excursion had been cancelled due to windy weather and rough seas. Disappointed but decided I should see something of Freeport, so I went to the excursion desk and booked the “Highlights, shopping and beach tour.” Shouldn't have bothered. The tour aboard a coach was guided by a man who told us everything we passed, from mildly interesting stuff, an oil refinery and airport, to the sublime, gas stations, insurance companies and banks, to the ridiculous, KFC, Burger King and Wendy's. We stopped at a candle making place, a small tourist market, a beach and then a large tourist shopping market. There was nothing of any interest to buy. The same tourist shit all over the Caribbean. The highlight for me was meeting an Italian traveller. He was trying to take a selfie on the beach while I was doing the same thing. I asked if he would like me to take one for him and we fell into an easy one hour conversation. His name is Bagon and he is a thirty-ish year old policeman. We talked about the cruise, the bands, traveling alone, the political climate of Italy, and lots of other things. The best laugh was when he went for the morning worship with Neal Morse (of Transatlantic and a devoutly religious man), not knowing what worship meant.

Back on the ship I watched part of the second period of the Olympic men's hockey final with three Americans, which we were leading 1-0(Canada vs US). Then I went to my room to drop off my stuff and lay down and had a two hour nap. So much for watching the rest of the game.

At 6:00 pm I headed up to the buffet for dinner before heading to the Pool Deck to see Portnoy, Sheenen, MacAlpine and Sherinian. They were again very impressive. They brought out Devin Townsend to sing a song. He was dressed in shorts and wore glasses, both seemingly very out of character. He said he knew nothing about prog 'and frankly I don't give a shit'. He says good music is just good music. He was very entertaining and funny and both sang and screamed his way through the number. At the end he said 'I don't mean any disrespect to this music I just never listened to it'.

At 7:00 pm I headed to the Spinnaker Lounge to see Haken. I was worried about the venue because if a group of people stood at the front then no one else could see. However, everyone was encouraged to sit on the floor. So I sat at the front of the stage. It was good to see the band and watch the guitarist Charles Griffiths and the drummer Raymond Hearne who I had met on the beach. They were very good, and played 'Cockroach' again. At  one point the keyboards fell off the stand and just missed Diego Tejeida's foot. As this was half way through the set and they were taking a long time to fix it, I left and went to the Star Dust Theatre to see Anathema, because I wanted to see if John Wesley was going to play with them. He didn't, but they were very good too.

At 9:00 pm back to Spinnaker to see Riverside, the band I originally came to see. I had to choose between them and Spock's Beard, but decided on them also because their first set was marred by equipment problems and as a result I don't think it was their best show. This time they were incredible. While they were doing their sound check I sat on the floor at the front again, beside two women from the Netherlands. The one was traveling with her husband but the other tagged along with them because she loves this kind of music and her husband doesn't, so she left him at home. I'd say that is a definite role reversal! She was very interesting to talk to and had seen Riverside numerous times before in Europe. The band was really tight and having fun. They played only material from the last two albums and it was great. I definitely need to revisit them. The bass player said that a fan came up to him while he was eating and politely asked 'Are you Steven Wilson?' 'No' he said, to which the fan responded 'Do you know Steven Wilson?' to which he replied 'Better than you apparently because he is this tall (shorter apparently) and he wears no shoes!'

11:00 pm The final concert was on the Pool Deck with Transatlantic and 'friends'. They played material off their first three albums, all excellent and it was obvious they were having a ton of fun. Adrian Belew came on and played one song, a King Crimson cover, off the bonus disc of Kaleidoscope. After Transatlantic finished they brought on Jon Anderson and played for another hour. They played: Tales of Topographic Oceans, Long Distance Roundaround, And You and I, and Star Ship Trooper. Anderson seemed flattered, thankful, and old but he was in good voice. Really an excellent way to end the cruise by paying respect to one of the original bands. Really impressed with the respect Transatlantic gave him. They had learned a lot of material and just played it, Portnoy was subdued and not flamboyant The show was about Jon Anderson. At the end of Starship, many other musicians came on the stage to dance and sing, Al Morse, Jimmy Keegan, Beardfish among others. At the very end Portnoy thanked all of us for coming, asked if we would be interested again next year, and said it was the best week of his life. You could tell all week that he was having a blast. Concert ended at 1:30!

As I was leaving and heading back to my room I met the couple from Kansas City, and then the two Finnish guys. We all agreed it was a night and a trip to remember. We are all sorry it is over.

Backed up my photos. Bed by 2:00.