Review and Photos by Fred Kuhlman
Promoter: Danny Zelisko Presents (https://www.dannyzeliskopresents.com/ )
Venue: Celebrity Theatre (https://celebritytheatre.com/ )
Date: Friday February 4th, 2022
Tour: The 50th Anniversary of Dark Side of the Moon: A Piece for Assorted Lunatics
Unless you are over 45 you probably never got to see Pink Floyd live in concert. I was lucky enough to have seen Pink Floyd twice, the 1974 Dark Side of the Moon Tour and 1980 The Wall Tour in Los Angeles, California (1 of only 2 stops of US tour, the other was NY, NY). Today you might be lucky enough to see Roger Waters tour or David Gilmour or Mick Mason tour, but even they don’t tour that much anymore.
However, there are a few tribute bands that do tour and perform the classic Pink Floyd music. It has also become popular lately for a group of extremely talented musicians to tour promoting another band’s music. In the past few years, I have seen Jason Bonham tour performing Led Zeppelin music, Dweezil Zappa tour performing his dad’s music and Todd Rundgren, Mike Dolzen, Christopher Cross and others perform the 50th Anniversary of The Beatle’s White Album.
I can now add The Gilmour Project to that list of talented artists. The band consists of historic musicians Jeff Pevar (lead guitar with CSN, David Crosby, Phil Lesh, Ray Charles), Kasim Sulton (bass and vocals with Todd Rundgren’s Utopia, Meatloaf, Blue Oyster Cult, Hall & Oates, Cheap Trick, Patti Smith), Prairie Prince (co-founder of The Tubes, and drums with Todd Rundgren, Jefferson Starship, Phil Lesh), Mark Karan (guitar and vocals with Bob Weir, RatDog, The Other Ones), and Scott Guberman (keyboard and vocals with Phil Lesh).
It’s hard to believe that this is almost the 50th anniversary of one of the most iconic progressive rock albums of all times, Pink Floyd’s The Dark Side Of The Moon. It was recorded over 8 months from May of 1972 to January of 1973 and finally released in March of 1973. In the 70s this was a mainstay of almost all rock enthusiasts and progressive rock fans. It was so popular that it charted on Billboard’s Top LPs & Tapes for 961 weeks, almost 18.5 years. Personally, I have owned numerous copies of the LPs and CDs.
Pink Floyd employed multitrack recording, tape loops, and analogue synthesisers when it created The Dark Side Of The Moon. It was recorded at the Abbey Road Studios in London and engineered by the legionary Alan Parsons. Due to the massive multitrack and tape loops, whenever Pink Floyd would perform this in concert, David Gilmour always had to have a second guitar player just to perform the rhythm section while he did the lead guitar work. That is why you always see 2 guitarists in any band attempting to perform any Pink Floyd music.
The show was broken up into 2 parts. The first part was The Dark Side Of The Moon in its entirety. After a short intermission, the band came back out to perform a number of Pink Floyd songs include “Echoes”, “Set The Controls for the Heart of the Sun” and “Have a Cigar”. If you have ever attempted to perform any of Pink Floyd’s music, then you understand that it is not always the easiest to play let alone master. The musicians in The Gilmour Project were awesome. If you every saw or watch a Pink Floyd concert, you see that in true progressive music fashion, they at times embellish the music from its original studio sound. So, hearing a tribute band do a similar reenactment is not unusual.
Both Jeff Pevar and Mark Karan were spectacular as they performed the different parts of David Gilmour’s studio guitar work. Scott Guberman was probably the least dramatic of all of the musicians, but he provided a lot of the critical music and sounds for each of the songs with his synthesizer and keyboards that are critical for the overall performance. Kasim Sulton and Prairie Prince provided the bassline and drumming that pulled all of the music together. Prairie performed all of Nick Mason’s drum work without a flaw including the parts in “Set The Controls for the Heart of the Sun”.
You always hear about the great opening guitar riffs of a song. But for me one of the most iconic opening riffs for a song is Roger Waters’ opening bass riff for “Money”. It opens with the sound of money in a cash draw and then sides into Roger’s bassline riff. As soon as you hear those first few notes, it pulls at our lizard brain and drags you into the song. You become emersed and then the rest of the band joins in and it totally encompasses you. Kasim Sulton performed this bassline incredibly. At tonight’s performance, the only thing missing was the female vocals and saxophone parts of the songs.
If you get the opportunity to see The Gilmour Project, I highly recommend it. This group of marvelous musicians were a delight to listen to and personally you can’t go wrong hearing Pink Floyd music performed live. It is an experience that resonates through every part of your body and just makes you feel relaxed and happier.
You can check out more about The Gilmour Project and their upcoming tour dates and locations on their Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/thegilmourproject/ .
Photos by Fred Kuhlman, All Rights Reserved
The Gilmour Project Setlist:
Dark Side Of The Moon
Speak to Me
Breathe
On the Run
Time
Breathe (Reprise)
The Great Gig in the Sky
Money
The New Travel Sequence
Us and Them
Any Colour You Like
Brain Damage
Eclipse
Intermission:
Echoes
There’s No Way Out Of Here
Set The Controls for the Heart of the Sun
One of These Days
Fat Old Sun
Have a Cigar
Dogs
Encore:
Shine On You Crazy Diamond (Parts I-V)
