Photo © Roger Allen
Islington O2 Academy saw the final night of the “Prog 2.0 tour” come to London, with rising stars Touchstone topping the bill.
On record at least, openers Enochian Theory are a prog-metal act with a nice line in atmospherics, and have been compared with the mighty Opeth. But tonight’s performance suffered from a very poor mix, with overpoweringly loud drums drowning out the guitar and bass, losing a lot of the subtlety. While they’re clearly talented musicians, their songwriting and compositional skills have yet to reach the level where their music can survive that sort of treatment from the soundman. Saying that, I certainly wouldn’t write them off, and there’s a lot of potential for the future.
Jurojin were a very different beast. They started as a straightforward four-piece prog-metal act, up to the last few numbers when they were joined first by a tabla player, then by virtuoso violinist Anna Phoebe. At that point they morphed into a kind of folk-metal-world music fusion that sounded like an utterly different band from what we’d heard at the beginning of the set. Like one or two other prog bands at an early point in their careers, their music goes off in many different directions, and they need to pick one and run with it. The last part of the set was genuinely exciting, and that feels to me like the direction in which they ought to go.
As for Touchstone, well, they were the band everyone came to see, and their tight high-energy performance delivered in spades. Their hugely melodic mix of progressive rock influences with a powerful hard rock sound has been steadily gaining them a following over the past three or four years. As for most of the last year and a half, the setlist drew heavily from their second album Wintercoast with a few selected songs from their earlier Discordant Dreams, including a great version of “Being Hannah”, a song I don’t think I’ve heard live for a while. As always, Kim Seviour makes a great frontwoman and visual focus for the band, completely transformed from the shy girl I first saw supporting The Reasoning four years ago.
Without wanting to downplay the importance of the rest of the band, the one thing that was very obvious this time was how much Moo Bass’ playing dominates the sound. From the machine-gun riff of the title track of “Wintercoast” onwards, his bass both drives the rhythm and acts as a principal lead instrument, leaving Rob Cottingham’s keys and Adam Hodgson’s lead guitar to add colour to fill in the sound. Like Panic Room the weekend before, with performances like this they seem destined for far bigger things.
While I’d hardly say the O2, with it’s overpriced beer and often indifferent sound and atmosphere is a favourite venue of mine, this was certainly the best gig at this venue I’ve seen to date. With the tour promoted by Classic Rock Presents Prog, attendance was very good indeed, with over 250 through the doors. And nice to see Porcupine Tree’s Steve Wilson in the crowd.
I think I'm going to have to find the Brit channel on iTunes – I've never heard of any of these people!