by Jon Bauer
The drummer from the original line-up of supergroup Pink Floyd has put together an amazing group of talented musicians to create an experience like no other. They are calling their tour “Saucerful Of Secrets” in honor of the early Floyd album of a similar name. They perform early Pink Floyd songs from the middle 60s and early 70s – the psychedelic ones – the ones before Dark Side Of the Moon and Wish You Were Here and The Wall. Songs that original creator Syd Barrett created and ones that never saw the light of day in regular performances – even by any of the current Pink Floyd tribute groups around the world – as Nick pointed out.
The band consists of Nick (of course) on drums, Gary Kemp and Lee Harris on guitars, Dom Beken on keys, and Guy Pratt on the bass. One poignant moment came when Guy Pratt talked about the recent collaboration that Nick, David Gilmour, himself, and Nitin Sawhney reunited to record the bands’ first new material in 28 years in the form of a protest song against the Ukraine war. Guy also joked that this would be the ONLY politics mentioned during the show, and that the audience would NOT need to go to the bar. A tongue in cheek jab at Roger Waters’ recent show where he told the crowd that if they didn’t like his politics, that they could head to a bar instead of staying at the show.
Instead of all of the grand theatrics that Roger recently brought to his recent stadium show here at The Chase Center on September 23rd, this is a stripped down, analog embracing, monster-hit ignoring, psychedelic super-show. As the band said during the show – San Francisco and London are the two best cities for psychedelic rock, and they made sure the adoring crowd understood just how excited they were to perform on the stage that also hosted San Francisco based classic bands like Jefferson Airplane.
The visuals for the show were also performed “in the old way” and are done live. The old school method for creating the psychedelic visual accompaniment for the show are featured in this YouTube video.
The show was broken into two halves, with a 20 minute intermission in between. Sprinkled throughout the show were anecdotes about the Pink Floyd heyday including several jabs at their former leader Roger Waters. Nick Mason lamented that he never was able to pilot the ubiquitous gong and that on his tour, he will take that control back.
Here’s the setlist from the night:
First Half:
One Of These Days
Arnold Layne
Fearless
Obscured By Clouds
When You’re In
Candy and A Currant Bun
Vegetable Man
If
Atom Heart Mother
If (Reprise)
Remember A Day
Set the Controls For the Heart Of the Sun
Second Half:
Astronomy Domine
The Nile Song
Burning Bridges
Childhood’s End
Lucifer Sam
Echoes
Encores:
See Emily Play
A Saucerful Of Secrets
Bike
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