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Sacrifice Yellow Cab Afraid Himself To Be I Just Wanna Touch You The Traveler Summer's Gone Are You Happy Now There Goes My Inspiration Libertine Cliche I Don't Mind At All The God Of Low Yesterday Sometimes Love Is A Dangerous Thing Before She Was Gone The One Sure Thing Watching The World Go By Don't Hold Me Back Set Me Free One World I thought New Hope in Pennsylvania was a really pretty little town! It seemed to mainly consist of one street which had a plethora of eating places and craft shops, as well as a place to go for piercings! The sign outside John and Peter’s had Kasim’s surname spelt as Sultan but when we went in there was a pub-type area that was warm and seemed inviting. Unfortunately the larger room where Kasim played was bitterly cold as I don’t think there was any heating on in there! On the plus side the stage area was a lot better lit than other places he plays which was great for photos. The other thing that struck me was that people were allowed to smoke in there. I can’t remember the last time I was in a room which allowed smoking and my clothes certainly smelt of it the next day. The gig was advertised to start at 9.30pm and everybody was there by that time but for some reason Kasim didn’t take the stage (or rather the floor area) until past 10pm. This was one of Kasim’s longer solo gigs as it lasted an hour and 43 minutes so for only $12 it was excellent value for money! It was also one of my favourite Kasim solo gigs in the past year or so. His voice sounded really strong, he seemed much more focussed than recent gigs and it was a brilliant audience. Even though the audience wasn’t as large as at some of his gigs, as soon as Kasim asked them to sing in Libertine, they also sang really loudly and, more surprisingly in tune! They also sung the descant part of Set Me Free totally unprompted by Kasim which was just amazing to hear! Apart from the cold, the only downer at this gig was a couple on the next table to us who talked loudly throughout Kasim’s gig. I really don’t understand why people pay to see a show and then talk though it! I gave them a filthy look a few times and the guy took the hint once or twice and told the girl to talk quietly but they both got louder the more they drank. To add insult to injury after the gig, the guy said to Kasim that he didn’t know that he had been in Utopia even though Kasim had sung their songs throughout the set! At the start, Kasim came out on stage and thanked us all for coming before singing Sacrifice. Right from the beginning his voice sounded very strong and warmed up. He then went almost straight into Yellow Cab followed by Jason Falkner’s beautiful Afraid Himself To Be. Kasim then spoke about the Utopia Reunion gigs that he had played the previous weekend and admitted jokingly that he was glad that some of the songs he didn’t have to learn as they were complicated! He also said that they had missed out lots of Utopia’s most popular songs which neatly led into I Just Wanna Touch You. Kasim next sang his beautiful newest song The Traveler (or The Traveller as we would call it!). He then spoke about collaborating with Phil Thornalley and sang Summer’s Gone. As there were several feet of snow outside, Kasim mentioned that Summer was definitely gone! Kasim then went straight into Are You Happy Now which was very popular with tonight’s audience. Kasim then noticed a lady sitting right in front of him who looked really bored. Her name was Melissa who thankfully was a good sport as Kasim spoke to her several times through his set. Utopia’s There Goes My Inspiration was next followed by the audience participation song – Libertine. As I wrote above this audience were great and didn’t need to practice the song at all. At the end Kasim got just the girls and then just the guys to sing. He then followed it by trying to get just Melissa to sing it! Despite Kasim’s persuasion and even him saying that the set wasn’t continuing until she had sung it, she refused (I don’t blame her!) but it was very funny. Kasim then spoke very fondly about Todd Rundgren and sang his lovely song Cliché. Kasim followed that by talking about the My Record Fantasy Camp which he had recently done and spoke about how much he enjoyed playing with Larry Tagg and Brett Bourgeoisie at a jam session on one of the evenings and sang their song I Don’t Mind At All which was brilliant to hear again. Unfortunately Kasim couldn’t remember quite all the words so there were a few ah ahs at one point! Next Kasim spoke about someone else before singing his wonderful song The God Of Low which I really like and is usually the one that’s going through my head the morning after one of Kasim’s gigs. Kasim then spoke about playing as part of the Classical Mystery Tour in 2010. At this point I wasn’t sure how he was going to be able to sing one of the songs as Kasim only had one guitar on stage but, after a cheesy joke that he used to have to do on stage with them, he sang Yesterday by The Beatles which was just brilliant to hear Kasim sing. That song received a massive round of applause. After Sometimes Love Is A Dangerous Thing, Kasim said that he had come to the serious part of the show as he sang Before She Was Gone. As he only had the one guitar he re-tuned it to play his beautiful The One Sure Thing. Unfortunately he didn’t quite tune it correctly at first so there was a slightly abortive start but when he sang the song, it was just beautiful. I’ll never understand why a song with such lovely words as that hasn’t become a massive hit, if not for Kasim, for someone else. Watching The Wold Go By was next before Kasim told us about his new album and how people can get their photos on the front cover. Some people then asked for a Utopia song (someone said that Mated was their wedding song which Kasim said he thought was sweet). However Kasim then sang Don’t Hold Me Back before singing Set Me Free which he said that he wasn’t planning on singing tonight. This was the song that the audience sang the descant part of without any prompting which I don’t think I’ve ever heard at a Kasim solo gig before! Kasim then went straight into One World with the great line “From New York to New Hope” and everybody joining in with the clapping at the end. And then, all too soon for me, it was the end of another brilliant Kasim Sulton solo gig! Roll on the next Kasim solo gig!
Videos:
MzBell121 has added some videos of Kasim Sulton's solo gig last night in New Hope, PA onto YouTube.com. The videos are:
The venue (taken from the KasimInfo.com Blog that day):
The gig is at John & Peter's and the address is 96 South Main Street, New Hope PA 18938.
Click here for full details but the gig starts at 9.30pm and tickets (from this link or on the door) are only $12.
Kasim is currently busy writing songs for his album so this may be the only chance to see one of his solo gigs for a few months.
Pre-show page on KasimInfo.com: All Rights Reserved |