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Somebody Loves You Yellow Cab Jane Doe Libertine I Don’t Mind At All Drive Where Is My Soul Sacrifice Are You Happy Now? Minutes Slipping Past Don’t Hold Me Back Before She Was Gone The One Sure Thing Fairest Lord Jesus
Click here for some great photos of this gig by Jennifer Salyer.
Review by SueW:
Unfortunately this was another gig which was very badly attended. It must be so frustrating for Kasim as he's playing his best music ever and yet these gigs are being so badly promoted that people just don't know about them. I doubt that more than 20 people paid to get in (a few came along later for a meal). This is his 4th gig of the tour and there hasn't been a single piece of publicity for his first 4 gigs offline other than listings in a few newspapers which the venues submit. I know he doesn’t have a new CD to promote so in that respect it's harder to get interviews but he's playing in the summer when there are less club gigs and with the publicity generated by the recent New Cars Tour and the forthcoming Meat Loaf album, it is not that difficult to get him interviews.
As we'd got stuck in traffic we didn't arrive until just after 8.00pm and the opening act was just finishing so Kasim came on stage about 20 or 30 minutes late (thank goodness!). I don't know exactly how long he played for but it was about an hour and 20 minutes. The set list was similar to his other gig but he did include one of his new songs and a special tribute song at the end, plus a Utopia song was back in the set list. It also seemed that Dennis sung more background vocals tonight too.
People who bought advance tickets for this gig were offered free tickets for tomorrow's airing of Meat Loaf and The Melbourne Orchestra DVD here so during the interval they showed the performance of Paradise By The Dashboard Light from it so when Kasim came on stage he immediately asked what happened to the Meat Loaf show! He also told us that he had some throat lozenges in his mouth so he had to wait for them to melt before he could start singing! As often happens when there aren't many people at one of his gigs, rather than doing slick prepared speeches, he'll chat more to the audience especially at a show like tonight when he knew most of the audience. Tonight he was asking people about contact lenses and whether it was best to get 30 day or daily ones as well as discussing the weather!
 Kasim's first song (as on all this tour so far) was Nik Kershaw's Somebody Loves You. I know I've said this before but it does suit his voice SO well! I've also noticed that this is the song that I'm always singing to myself when I leave one of his gigs! They next went straight into Yellow Cab - this is the song which I think emphasises Dennis' voice the best (and he really has a lovely voice). I just can't imagine Kasim singing this song totally solo now. Jane Doe was next with a nice ending by Doug Kennedy. Kasim then chatted for a while (which was really amusing) before he said that he was going to play a song by Utopia. Someone reminded him that it was 30 years ago this year since he joined the band so he joked that he must have only been 7 then and that he was only 9 when Bat Out Of Hell was recorded! They then played Libertine and Doug played some amazing guitar in that!
 Next Kasim explained why he was including Bourgeois Tagge’s I Don’t Mind At All on this tour (he said that it touched a "special chord" in him) before singing Drive by The New Cars – when he mentioned the band they received a round of applause so he asked who had seen any of the concerts. I’ve often wondered if a musician really remembers one concert from another on a tour but Kasim remembered the rain at the Jones Beach concert okay. Where Is My Soul was next with Kasim and Dennis taking it in turns to say lots of the "Where is my soul"s' in the middle. Between most of the songs up until this part of the set, they had had to restring their guitars (not so much Doug but more Kasim and Dennis) so Kasim turned to Dennis and asked him why his guitar kept going out of tune (he said they were going sharp the whole time and that he was having to really pound the strings). Dennis explained that it was due to the air conditioning in the venue (it was getting a bit nippy in there by that point) and was to do with the strings contracting in the cold so Doug just told him "don’t go there" just as we were about to get the science lesson! Thankfully soon after that the venue turned the air conditioning off and it warmed up slightly. This was the Quid Pro Quo part of the gig as next they played Sacrifice. Once again, with the two acoustic guitars and Doug on lead, they played it very true to the album version. Although I miss that muted strings part, it’s really effective with Doug’s playing in the middle. This song received a massive round of applause afterwards! Kasim then said that they were going to play a new song and that we were the first people to hear it! He said that he had already recorded it although it wasn’t mixed. Later he said that the song was written by the two guys who wrote Yellow Cab. It was a really upbeat song called Are You Happy Now with a very catchy chorus. If Yellow Cab, Minutes Slipping Past and Are You Happy Now are all going to be on Kasim's next album then it sounds as though it will even surpass Quid Pro Quo!
 Kasim then sang his other new song Minutes Slipping Past which he described as depressing but I think it’s more of a reflective song than anything. Following that they played Don’t Hold Me Back (Kasim’s signature tune almost!). DHMB and Minutes were written by Kasim the best part of 30 years apart and that really emphasises the maturity now in his song-writing. When Kasim first walked on stage and mentioned his throat lozenges I was concerned that he was having voice problems but he sang DHMB note perfect and that’s always the song where, on the rare occasions that he’s had voice trouble, it shows the most but it certainly didn’t tonight. The only problem Kasim did have was that nobody had bothered to ensure that he had a bottle of water on stage! He had to cadge some off one of the audience before the venue bought him some out! As I said earlier, this was the Quid Pro Quo part of the set so next we had Before She Was Gone. They then switched guitars and played my favourite The One Sure Thing! If anyone hasn’t heard the live version of that song then it’s worth the price of admission alone and definitely worth bringing the extra guitars just to play it! Doug and Dennis then left the stage and Kasim gave a very moving speech about his childhood friend John who had had a stroke this past week and wasn’t expected to make it. He dedicated his final song Fairest Lord Jesus to him. He was visibly moved during the song (I think most of the audience were too) but gave a totally professional performance of it before he left the stage to loads of applause from everyone, including some people who had only come in to have a meal!
 I really can’t stress how great these gigs are, especially with the 3 musicians and the great rapport they have on stage, although it worries me that with these small audiences I don’t see how they can be financially viable and I dread the idea of Kasim having to stop playing solo gigs due to there being no publicity. And next weekend we have two consecutive gigs….brilliant!!
Comments posted on various mailing lists and messageboards:
"I had a great time. This was my first time seeing Kasim with Dennis. WOW the three guitars and Dennis singing the background vocals was awesome. Doug Kennedy was brilliant as always."
"I'm a little sad for Kasim, the turnout was POOR. He knew everyone by name , and introduced us to each other."
"It's really fun, Kasim is so talented and needs our support."
Pre-show page on KasimInfo.com:
 Many thanks to Laura England for the scan of the set list. All Rights Reserved |