Click here for some great photos of this gig by Jennifer Salyer.

Review by SueW:
About halfway through Kasim’s set I thought to myself how brilliant and interesting it was but unfortunately I thought he petered out a bit by the end of his set. I really felt sorry for Kasim as he had a lot of distractions on stage and if the second part of his set was as good as his first then it would have been a brilliant first gig of his tour. But at least he has a good basis to build on for the rest of the concerts.

The Bitter End is not an ideal venue for an acoustic set in the middle of a Saturday night show. Previously Kasim has played his set here at the beginning of the evening and although playing later meant that more people attended (as in New York some people will go out for an evening of music later regardless of who is playing) when he’s between two louder artists this means that people who weren’t there specifically to see Kasim could talk through his set. Also, due to the nature of this venue, during his set the next band were coming into the venue which was disruptive too.

As often happens here their schedule was running late so when we got there at 9.15pm (Kasim was due on stage at 9.30pm) the act before him were only just starting. They were three blonde girls (called Bombshell or something). One of them had a good voice but they seemed to be trying to outdo each other in their singing rather than singing together, plus their microphones were turned up very loud and their voices were ear-shatteringly shrill. Apparently they’ve won some contests (presumably for shrill female singers!!).

Once they’d finished playing lots of people left so that freed up a few seats but unfortunately we weren’t fast enough so we ended up initially sitting behind the piano and couldn’t see a thing! Thankfully Gary “Goat” Goveia was there and had a couple of spare seats at his front table so we sat right at the edge of the stage!

When Kasim first walked on stage he handed his glasses to a young girl (Katie) sitting at the front of the stage and said that she was a very important part of the show as he needed her to hold his glasses in case he had to read his crib sheets!

Kasim’s set started at about 10.10pm and lasted for just under an hour. He started with Nik Kershaw’s Somebody Loves Me which is always a great song for him to open with as it suits his voice so well – Kasim has a great knack of covering songs which suit his style so well. Next he sang Yellow Cab which I must admit that I didn’t recognise as it sounded far more sophisticated than the version he recorded which used to be on KasimSulton.com!

Next came an amazing arrangement of Where Is My Soul! Kasim's played it once or twice at his other solo gigs but always on a piano (like on Quid Pro Quo) but this time it was on the two guitars and it sounded really good. I haven't heard the Finn Brothers version of the song so I don't know if that's guitar or piano based but I prefer this version.

One of the things which struck me at this gig was that Kasim talked far less than he has at previous solo gigs. That may be because of the time restraint or all the distractions but I thought it was a shame as he can be really funny on stage.

He did however start telling us that he was playing without a pickup in his acoustic guitar (he had two microphones at guitar height) but then he really shouted at the bar area as they were talking louder and louder! It was obviously very distracting for Kasim - it was for us too! Kasim said that he knew they were there to see the next band (a metal band) but asked them to keep quiet for another 40 minutes or so and then he made a joke of it that he couldn't get his emotion out in the songs if they kept talking. It did keep them quiet for a while but not for long enough.

After Before She Was Gone Kasim then explained how much he likes Nik Kershaw's music so he sang his second song from him, Jane Doe (for the first time on stage). Before Kasim started this song he handed the words to Katie and asked her to follow along in case he got stuck! During the song, as he was singing I saw a big smile come across Kasim's face and then he said that he knew that he'd sang some of the wrong words but that none of us would have noticed! Poor Katie must have wondered which parts he was singing as he was doing that! In fact if he hadn't said anything then we wouldn't have noticed as he covered it fine!

Kasim next explained how he'd been touring as part of The New Cars and gave a faultless performance of Drive before singing his own upbeat song Sacrifice. They played that great muted guitar string part again at the end which is SO effective!

The other main distraction that Kasim had at this gig was with the sound that he was getting from the monitors wasn't very good (the monitors are suspended from the ceiling and are quite high in front of the stage). The sound that we heard in the audience was reasonable for The Bitter End but to Kasim it obviously didn't sound good enough. In fact it was so bad that at one point Kasim stopped during The One Sure Thing to ask Alex (his brother who was doing the sound) to fix it. After a while he started again but then he couldn't remember how the second verse of the song started so he asked the audience if we could remember! Unfortunately nobody did or (as in my case!) they weren't brave enough to call it out so he played the end of the chorus again and picked the song up perfectly.

Kasim next sang Libertine before he said that he was going to try something and played (for the first time on stage) I Don't Mind At All. It wasn't a song that I recognised so I hoped that it was a brand new Kasim song but later I did a search on the lyrics and discovered that it was recorded by Bourgeois Tagg. However it did match Kasim's voice perfectly again.

I was sitting about 6 feet from Kasim and although I couldn't read his set list word for word I could see that he was following it song for song (as I could see how many words were in the titles of the songs) until after his next song Libertine when he played something different to what was on the list. By this time the noise in the bar was getting distractingly loud again so I don't know whether that really bothered him or what but the impression I got (and it's only my opinion) was that it was at this point that Kasim opted for his "safety zone" and played songs like Don't Hold Me Back and There Goes My Inspiration which he could churn out in his sleep. I could be totally wrong but that's why I felt that the set which started so brilliantly and novel but it deteriorated slightly towards the end. He still played the same number that were on his set list but just safer ones IMHO. Kasim still played the songs really well and put 100% into them but I thought he could have made some more inspired choices especially as he'd said at the beginning of his set that he'd be playing different songs to those he's played before.

When Kasim said that he was only going to play one more song, Doug started playing the intro into Across The Universe but Kasim stopped him and opted for One World (the safer option again). However it did go down a real treat with the crowd as there were loads of Utopia / Todd fans there again.

Kasim then thanked us all for attending and said that he had some CDs available to purchase for $10 (apparently it was Quid Pro Quo). He had to be reminded to thank Doug(!!) and Doug had almost left the stage by then anyway!

And then, all too soon it was all over!

A special mention must go to Doug Kennedy who gave an outstanding performance on the guitar throughout the whole set - his lead on Libertine was especially impressive. Plus I think a mention should be given to Kasim's brother Alex who worked hard on the sound despite not appearing to having the best facilities at the venue.

As I said before I thought the first half of the set was brilliant and I doubt that anyone was disappointed in his show generally. It was a shame that he didn't play the new Kasim music that we'd been promised but exactly the same happened on his Have Guitar Will Travel Tour in 2002 when he played his older music at the first gig and sang his new set at the second gig so I probably should have expected it.

Roll on the rest of the tour! And let's just hope that more than one gig a weekend are soon added so that fans can make travel plans because I know so many people are putting off booking tickets in case more gigs are booked in that area (myself included!).

Review by Grady Moates:
The act before Kasim was "Bombshell", three blonde singers with an acoustic guitar accompanist. They each had great voices, and the arrangements of their material were quite good, but some of the vocal work seemed a bit over-the-top, self-indulgent, the way a lot of the new pop music vocals are these days. Watch American Idol a few times and it's kinda like that. Bombshell ran a good 15 minutes over, so Kasim started quite late. This is the worst position on the bill, since you get squeezed between the opener and the last act.

The man got a good rapport with the audience right from the top, handing his glasses and some lyric sheets to a young woman in the front row, and asking her to keep them for him, in case he needed them later. About three songs in, when the chatter near the door got unbearably loud, he actually shouted at the chatterers, in a semi-good-natured way, to shut up 'cause, hey, I'm tryin' to perform over here. The attentive audience loved it, and it was effective for a couple of tunes.

Much of the Quid Pro Quo material was featured, including a killer performance of "Sacrifice". "Before She Was Gone", "The One Sure Thing", "Where Is My Soul", I don't remember all the of them, but it was a very strong set.

Surprises on the set list included "Drive" from his TNC tour days, and "Libertine" from Utopia's "Network" period. The aforementioned late start forced Kasim to cut the last three songs on the list, and he ended with the Utopia anthem "One World", saying as he started it, "I know I'm gonna mess this up." The entire room was singing along on that one.

The Bitter End is a _VERY_ small club, much wider than it is deep, which is always a nightmare for the sound guy. In addition, the monitor system for the artists is non-traditional, hanging from the ceiling, to reduce the size of the stage to a minimum. This requires a non-traditional microphone placement for minimum feedback, but the time to figure that out is not during the show, so it didn't get fixed and the sound for much of the performance was boomy and on the threshold of feedback. As luck would have it, the resonant tones were, in a couple of songs, a half-tone or so off-key, so bass notes were pulled off-pitch and the delicacy of some of the melodic structure in Kasim's tunes was masked. You could see the frustration in Kasim's face, and he even stopped a song once to say something like, 'You've gotta fix this. These people paid good money for this show, and this just doesn't sound right.'

After the show, Kasim graciously visited with all guests who wanted a moment of his time, posing for pictures and swapping stories for well over 30 minutes outside the venue on the sidewalk.

Kasim's solo shows are stronger now than the last time around. . . he's getting comfortable in his own skin, and it shows. Seven more confirmed dates are on the list, and I hear that a Boston date may be added soon, so make the effort to see a show if it comes with a few hours' drive.

Kasim Sulton:
Click here to read Kasim's opinion about this concert. He includes the comments "It was especially nice to see all those familiar faces who constantly come out to support me. There were some new ones too. That makes me glad that I chose to do these gigs. The Bitter End is always a crap shoot in terms of who's going on prior to me and, in the case of Saturday, after as well.
Because the show was put on with short notice, I didn't have the luxury of making sure the act following me wasn't a Metal Band! That won't happen again. One of the reasons I didn't perform any new material was time constraints. I only had 55 minutes. This isn't the case in the coming shows and I can guarantee you, next time I play there, I won't be subject to some Neanderthal yapping loud enough to break my concentration. I hated the fact that I even had to address it during my set but it was driving me NUTS".

Pre-show page on KasimInfo.com:
Click here

Many thanks to Gary "Goat" Goveia for the photo on this page - loads more will be added soon!

Kasim's 2006 Tour