ProgDay 2016 |
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Nogbad_The_Bad
Forum & Site Admin Group RIO/Avant/Zeuhl & Eclectic Team Joined: March 16 2007 Location: Boston Status: Offline Points: 20882 |
Topic: ProgDay 2016 Posted: September 05 2016 at 19:34 |
Very enjoyable with friends, good weather, a few lite ales and some excellent music. The weather was remarkably cooperative, if I can order a hurricane to blow through and clear the air and drop the temperatures next year that would be great. It was great to see so many friends again had lots of time for chats. Of the bands
Luz De Riada - A- - really liked their sound Ramses is really excellent on sax & EWI which he used to replicate guitar and tambla. Luis is a great addition to the band, his bass had great tone & sounded real fat. Great start to the festival, bought the new album. Jonathon Scales Fourchestra - C - not really my kind of thing, I'm not a fan of noodly fusion where the soloing every track overtakes the music, also steel drum, while a very interesting lead instrument, gets grating & a bit boring after a while. A lot a people seemed to love them so it's probably just my personal taste. Eye - B+ - 60's hard rock psyche with references to Purple, Uriah Heep, Sabbath, Hawkwind, Neu, keyboardist was outstanding and the highlight of the band, great fun & very entertaining Deus Ex Machina - A+ - wonderful stuff from one of the big draws of the festival, Alberto has lost none of the power and fire in his vocals and the band played really well, rapt attention for full set and they were hugely entertaining In The Presence Of Wolves - B - Hard Rock/Prog Metal for a Sunday morning to clear the cobwebs, vocals not really the highlight but lots of energy and fun, a 'see live' rather than 'buy' band for me. Ad Astra - D - instrumental symph with lots of classic sounds from the 70's/80's on the keyboards and lots of cliques but very little memorable, didn't really do anything for me, again seemed popular with others. Discipline - A+ - Very strong performance, loved the guitarists playing and Matthew was in top form, not many other bands are close to Discipline for dark angst ridden symph, I was too tired last time I saw them this was a much better experience for me Bent Knee - A++ - I love this band, took the soundman one track to get the level on Courtney's vocal right, not sure he was ready for her power, but this is one of the strongest performances I've seen from them & I've seen them 6 or 7 times, the new material sounded great, had me grooving away to all the stuff off the last two albums. They are such a well balanced band with the violin coming more to the fore than I've heard before. The interplay between guitar, bass & drums is fantastic with lots of fun going on between them. Loved this set. Many thanks to all the organizers for putting on a great festival and making the tough but right decision to stay in the field. |
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Ian
Host of the Post-Avant Jazzcore Happy Hour on Progrock.com https://podcasts.progrock.com/post-avant-jazzcore-happy-hour/ |
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micky
Special Collaborator Honorary Collaborator Joined: October 02 2005 Location: . Status: Offline Points: 46833 |
Posted: September 06 2016 at 06:00 |
yeah... as I just PM'd Terri.. who couldn't make it The weather was just perfect... no rain.. no heat.. just lots of blue sky, beer, friends, and ohh...music. A perfect weekend.
As far as the bands. I'll do my tradtional off the cuff unsensored detailed review in a few days.. but here is my report card version of the lineup. Jonathon Scales Fourchestra - A+ Deus Ex Machina - A Luz De Riada - A- Eye - B+ In The Presence Of Wolves - B+ Discipline - C Bent Knee - C- Ad Astra - D - |
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The Pedro and Micky Experience - When one no longer requires psychotropics to trip
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micky
Special Collaborator Honorary Collaborator Joined: October 02 2005 Location: . Status: Offline Points: 46833 |
Posted: September 06 2016 at 08:01 |
why wait a few days... that is what Raff needs to create the perfect insightful meaningful review. She is the brains of the two of us..I am the soul of the two of us. Thus my off the cuff reviews to her more thoughtful.
so off we go! We left early on Friday as we normally do. As much to try to beat the I-95 traffic as much to arrive for our usual lunch with our dear friend Michael Inman (who after a year absence was coming!). In past years we would zoom down there... 3 and a half hours... 4 if I couldn't browbeat Raff into forgoing bathroom stops . Well it wasn't to happen this year. Some a****le decided his car looked better in a tree rather than on the highway so we got stopped on I-95 for 45 minutes south of Fredricksburg while they opened the highway back up. Then we hit another accident between Richmond and Petersburg. Then we hit two construction zones on I-85 inside North Carolina. So after 5 hours we arrived. All eyes and ears were on the weather with that hurricane moving into the Carolinas. Part of the strong appeal of Progday versus the other major prog festivals is its outdoor setting. We haven't been to one yet that has been moved indoor and though we would surely still have a good time, it wouldn't have been the same. The forecast did have it moving far enough east to not interfere with Saturday's shows but it wasn't until late on Friday we got word that it didn't turn more north and thus the outdoor shows would go as planned. So to celebrate I went on a search and destroy mission to Total Wine and blew like 75 dollars on the pick of the best 4 packs of lethal American Craft brews, mixed with a nice selection of English stouts for my weekend. As everyone rolled into the hotel we got our normal group together and headed off to our favorite Tex-Mex place for dinner. After dinner it was back to the hotel where we overran the lobby and turned it into teh Progday bar and longue (and smoking room ). I was proud of myself this year. After falling off the wagon (20 years) last year I retained enough willpower to refuse to partake in smoking a J when offered. Yeah I felt lame but it is too much of a risk for me with my job. So after a good night socializing, catching up with everyone and drinking like fish it was off to bed to prepare for the first day of Progday! |
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The Pedro and Micky Experience - When one no longer requires psychotropics to trip
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micky
Special Collaborator Honorary Collaborator Joined: October 02 2005 Location: . Status: Offline Points: 46833 |
Posted: September 06 2016 at 08:42 |
so we awoke Saturday to a picture PERFECT morning. As forecast the rain from the hurricane had moved east out of the Chapel Hill area around 4am. We all gathered again the lobby to enjoy the usual hotel breakfast faire and some of the weakest coffee known to man and got psyched up for the days bands.
Of the 4 bands due to play of the day.. I had heard nothing of 3 of them and only a smidgen of the 4th. The perfect Progday experience.. for me Progday musically is all about discovering bands I didn't know. When bands are announced I sure don't check them out prior to going. I want to hear them for the first time on stage. So after a couple of hours hanging out at the hotel we all packed up and headed off to beautiful Storybrook Farm. It is a bit of a drive from the hotel to the site. About 20 minutes. A very pretty drive actually once you hit the backroad to it. As usual I trumpeted our arrival with Willie Nelson blaring. Once there I decided to actually have some breakfast and opened my first beer of the day. It is a vacation damnit! We arrived, as many do, about an hour before the first band kicked off. So we checked out the vendors, attempted to fly kites , and did more socializing. Soon the first band was ready to go... I was really curious about the first band, Luz De Riada, for a couple of different reasons. Number one was it had that dude from Cabrazes di Cero and .. some band from last year whose name escapes me (remember this is the uncenosred off the cuff review haha). I loved both band and figured I'd love this one. The other reason was the bassist, Luis Nasser, whom I had heard SO MUCH of. All of it possitive. Reinforced by meeting him Friday night. I wanted to see if the musical side of him was impressive as it was said to have been. The intellectual side sure as hell was. Well I love the band. Enough to snag their album and one we missed from ... that band from last year hey Raff.. help me out... Pascal Goodman Trio.. thanks! so I really enjoyed them. So after their set it was back to mass consumption and more socialization. And shopping. I even made a odd purchase for me. One of our friends Lee Barrentine and his darling wife Dana started selling craft jewellry last year. Raff bought a piece last year and was looking forward to seeing what they brought this year. So I headed over and saw a piece that I really loved so I bought it and proudly wore it that weekend. It looked really good on me I thought and I am not a jewellry person.. at least when I am not in drag that is. So next up came the band I had thought, considering what I knew of them, I might enjoy the most. Jonathon Scales Fourchestra. Well needless to say.. I did and I loved it. I love the atypical 'lead' instrument of steel drums and found my riveted to the stage area during the entire performance enjoying the interplay between Scales and the bassist and drummer. Both of whom were fabulous in their own right, as soloists yes, but in laying down some killer grooves. I have come to realize that what really drives my interests in prog/progressive rock these days is hearing something different and this one fit it to a T. I wasn't sure how well this would translate from the stage to disk but decided to take a chance, as well as supporting the band of course, and bought up all they had to sell. (by the way.. the albums are actually better..) after a bit of a break for more beer.. and chased with an attempt to put some vendor food in my system.. along with more socializing, including an interesting talk with Jose and Adele about the upcoming Romantic Warriors films. Krautrock then RPI, it was back to the music. Next up was Eye. Again a band I knew zippo about, other than it sounded cool and something I'd likely love. Reinforced by that one newbie we had join here than listed them as one of his favorites. Well that band was a BLAST.... welcome back to 1968 was a common refrain from friends as we watched them. No modern keys... but a true Hammond B-3 up there being rocked as hard as Lord or Emerson could have rocked it. And by a woman to boot Really cool heavy prog.. not particallry progressive in a Jonathan Scale way of course but damnit... it is a live festival.. and an outdoor one. This band smoked... completely loved them. again... a break in bands for more socializing and mass consumption. By this time Raff is probably wondering how I do it. Practice baby... so last for the day came the headliners. Deus Ex Machina. A lovely group of guys Raff and I spent a lot of time with the night before. However I really didn't know them well. I invested heavily, in time and money, exploring the classic 70's Italian scene but never really got too deep into the modern stuff. So I was really looking forward to them. And great they were. SO much so that their music, along with 10 hours of mass consumption had Micky dancing and losing all of his .. rather significant .. self conscious/esteem issues and I was dancing and losing myself in the music. Fabulous show and Alberto's pipes were incredible. You really can see the comparisons with Stratos. So after a wonderful day of music we all headed back to the hotel and met up again for a group outting for dinner. This time to a Korean/Japanese place sort of out of the way that was nearly empty for us. We enjoyed a wonderful meal and a few glasses of plum wine (UMM UMMM) and finally headed back to the hotel to crash to try to get some sleep for Sunday's shows! |
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The Pedro and Micky Experience - When one no longer requires psychotropics to trip
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micky
Special Collaborator Honorary Collaborator Joined: October 02 2005 Location: . Status: Offline Points: 46833 |
Posted: September 06 2016 at 09:24 |
we awoke Sunday to another picture perfect day... perhaps the best weather weekend of all the times I have gone. Met again for talk and weak coffee (next year I do think the Starbucks across the street will be seeing me). To my horror I saw I only had 4 beers left in my cooler. I did some mental calculations and in horror realized just how much I had drunk the day before I decided I'd go a bit easier on the stuff today. So I decided to limit myself to those and not make another Total Wine run (not that I could have.. thanks to N.C blue laws haha).
Well the Sunday Church of Prog was .. as it almost always was... a great choice. For those of us slightly in a daze and not completely woken up the first band In the Presence of Wolves would wake up anyone. Bunch of young kids playing high energy high octane sh*t. Some where put off by the vocals but to my mind that sort of goes hand in hand with bands like that. They are not a prog band, and probably was the first prog show they played, may ever play. They were kids and likely do a roaring trade playing to kiddies who dig that stuff. I really enjoyed it for what it was. I don't think I would have found any albums interesting.. but in a live setting they were quite good. During the break I had a lot of fun tossing a frisbee around with a bunch of little tykes. That is another thing I love about Progday. The families that come down. Progday is many things.. but a sausage fest it is not. Lots of children, lots of women. During one of the breaks in bands they got all the 'prog women' together for a photo session and there were quite a few. I did have to laugh a few times to see.. for perhaps the first time.. a line to the women's rest room. That NEVER happens at prog shows damnit. Next up was Ad Astra from New York. Whatever energy I gained from the kids in Wolves rapidly dissipated during this performance and I broke out my book and enjoyed them for good background reading music. Good musicians. Not much interesting to my ears musically. They could have used a vocalist IMO. Well that Sanderson dude is a hell of writer so I continued to read as the last of my unknown bands had played. The last two up were the two bands I knew of the whole weekend. Discipline and Bent Knee. Both I like, Discipline more so but neither were bands I was gaga about. Discplines set was pretty good, I especially was pleased to hear finally (after seeing them recently multiple times and not hearing it) the Rogue. It was well done and that guitarist my dear wife has the hots for really did a great job with Jon Preston Bouda's parts. The rest of the show... ehhh.. had heard it before and thought something was off in the sound. They sounded better in other shows we had seen of them. Thus the C grade. Not helped by the debut of a new song that really did nothing for me. Last up was Bent Knee. The present darling of the progressive scene. We saw them a couple of months ago at the Orion and while the show was good. Raff enjoyed it far more than I did, I didn't see the buzz. The singer was top notch but while the lyrics are supposedly a strong suit, lyrics mean nothing to me. I listen to the music, not lyrics, and musically they left me ...wanting. Perhaps I was a victim of the 'hype' or better yet.. the love of those who I respect... I just did not see what they did. Musically... I saw nothing special about them. So with that in mind I was curious if seeing them at Progday might change that. Take a group I found good. .and raise them to the level that many whose opinions I respect have of them. Well it didn't. Like more than a few I talked to.. I don't think the soundman really did get Courtney's voice figured out and her voice was far too overwhelming and at time to the point of irritation and pain to the ears hahaha. I really didn't get anything out of their performance I'm sorry to say. Still unconverted and still pretty firm on my notion that musically... they are good.. but not interesting which is what floats my boat. So with that musical part of Progday ended and it was back to the hotel. Raff and I did our usual Sunday night dinner with H.T. (joined this year by his wonderfully precosious gem of 13 year old son Thomas ) at our Indian Restaurant. We were pretty wiped out and skipped the pool party this year (we missed you Paul) which was probably wise as it was said to have gone on till past 3 in the morning hahha. Monday morning was full of lots of sad farewells for another as I have to come to see, as many do, that Progday is much more than a music festival.. but almost like some sort of family reunion. We had a nice drive back Monday to end it. Thus ended another Progday weekend.. if you haven't gone to Progday but have considered? Do it... once you go.. you'll always come back. It is sort of special. |
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The Pedro and Micky Experience - When one no longer requires psychotropics to trip
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Nogbad_The_Bad
Forum & Site Admin Group RIO/Avant/Zeuhl & Eclectic Team Joined: March 16 2007 Location: Boston Status: Offline Points: 20882 |
Posted: September 06 2016 at 09:34 |
Sorry Micky, but if you find the fusion noodly solo-ing of steel drums, bass & drums more musically interesting than the thoroughly composed avant wonky pop with turn on a dime changes of direction of BK then we are seriously coming at this from radically different directions.
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Ian
Host of the Post-Avant Jazzcore Happy Hour on Progrock.com https://podcasts.progrock.com/post-avant-jazzcore-happy-hour/ |
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micky
Special Collaborator Honorary Collaborator Joined: October 02 2005 Location: . Status: Offline Points: 46833 |
Posted: September 06 2016 at 09:45 |
I did I heard something with them I had not heard before, and done by A+ musicians and as Raff will tell you, and I've made quite clear here. I DETEST noddley fusion. It was interesting, and different much in the same way I took to Alec K. Redfearn and the Eyesores. I wasn't the only one to see that.. I had a few comments about the shirt.. and Scales. That something unique and different that some of us look for in our music.
on the flip side.. I simply didn't hear anything that 'grabbed' me musically from Bent Knee. Personally I found MoeTar, a similarly leaning avant prog pop leaning band to be far more interesting musically and Moreas vocal style (and her obvious influences) to be much more to my tastes. Perhaps with teh next album they'll connect. It just hasn't done it yet. |
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The Pedro and Micky Experience - When one no longer requires psychotropics to trip
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Nogbad_The_Bad
Forum & Site Admin Group RIO/Avant/Zeuhl & Eclectic Team Joined: March 16 2007 Location: Boston Status: Offline Points: 20882 |
Posted: September 06 2016 at 11:20 |
I found their originality to be purely in the instrumentation, once you got past that it was fairly standard live jazz fusion with an excess of individual soloing, I didn't find it that interesting once I got past the steel drums. Alec Redfearn is different in a whole other way beyond the instrumentation, he's performing thoroughly composed folk based tunes with an avant twist and lost of psyche elements, wonderful stuff but apples and oranges to compare that originality to Scales.
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Ian
Host of the Post-Avant Jazzcore Happy Hour on Progrock.com https://podcasts.progrock.com/post-avant-jazzcore-happy-hour/ |
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micky
Special Collaborator Honorary Collaborator Joined: October 02 2005 Location: . Status: Offline Points: 46833 |
Posted: September 06 2016 at 11:32 |
apples and oranges compositionally.. no doubt. The point is... noddling or not... I found it interesting from a completely visceral point of view. Much as I did, and other do Alec Redfearn, we connected the dots between the two. If he had used a guitar instead of an accordian.. I likely wouldn't have cared what his influences were... it wouldn't have connected as hard as it did. If Scales had been up there jamming with a guitar.. I wouldn't have liked it half as much.
the reason I made the connection between the two Ian.. and others did in conjunction with him seeing me wearing his shirt yesterday was purely from a visceral level. This is music you know.. the reason why Raff and I are different in our tastes in spots and much more in how we see music.. even where we are so much alike otherwise. I don't attempt or care to analyze music... I just feel music. Scales hit me where it counts... as did Redfearn. That is where we might see this differently and why some like me make that connection between the two, and also distinquish what we heard Saturday from your basic dude with a guitar along with a bassist and drummer just jamming away. I have heard that a 1000 times.. and 999 times too many. What I heard Saturday I hadn't... and thankfully since these were top notch.. grade A+ musos...they connected with me and I loved it. Edited by micky - September 06 2016 at 11:34 |
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The Pedro and Micky Experience - When one no longer requires psychotropics to trip
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Nogbad_The_Bad
Forum & Site Admin Group RIO/Avant/Zeuhl & Eclectic Team Joined: March 16 2007 Location: Boston Status: Offline Points: 20882 |
Posted: September 06 2016 at 11:47 |
Cool, interesting perspective, and as I thought we are coming at this from very different viewpoints
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Ian
Host of the Post-Avant Jazzcore Happy Hour on Progrock.com https://podcasts.progrock.com/post-avant-jazzcore-happy-hour/ |
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micky
Special Collaborator Honorary Collaborator Joined: October 02 2005 Location: . Status: Offline Points: 46833 |
Posted: September 06 2016 at 11:53 |
and I did count you as those voices that I have respect for considering Bent-Knee. Perhaps as we talked about at breakfast.. this group just needs more time to click. Sometimes we need more time for stuff to connect. It isn't a question of quality with them and with me.. it is about feeling the music. I give a lot of people a lot of sh*t for some of their perferences but it always has been with a wick and a nod... I know as well as anyone that it is not a matter of quality that rules what we love in music.. it is all about how we connect and relate to what we are listening to. |
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The Pedro and Micky Experience - When one no longer requires psychotropics to trip
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micky
Special Collaborator Honorary Collaborator Joined: October 02 2005 Location: . Status: Offline Points: 46833 |
Posted: September 06 2016 at 12:04 |
and one last tidbit.. I gambled on his studio albums... and scored. Lew Fischer was the driving force behind getting them to Progday and told me I needed to hear the albums. Especially since I loved their live show.
They are indeed fabulous. You perhaps might have found them much to your tastes than the stripped down live show we saw. There was a lot more going on musically on those albums. Which is what you hope for when stripped of the visceral side of seeing a band live. That is why I gambled on his studio albums and passed on others that were obviously purely 'live' bands. Edited by micky - September 06 2016 at 12:05 |
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The Pedro and Micky Experience - When one no longer requires psychotropics to trip
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Nogbad_The_Bad
Forum & Site Admin Group RIO/Avant/Zeuhl & Eclectic Team Joined: March 16 2007 Location: Boston Status: Offline Points: 20882 |
Posted: September 07 2016 at 20:02 |
Just listened to the most recent studio album and while it certainly is better than the live performance with less noodling and benefiting from the added instrumentation it's still not anything that excites me enough to want repeat listens.
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Ian
Host of the Post-Avant Jazzcore Happy Hour on Progrock.com https://podcasts.progrock.com/post-avant-jazzcore-happy-hour/ |
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Raff
Special Collaborator Honorary Collaborator Joined: July 29 2005 Location: None Status: Offline Points: 24429 |
Posted: September 08 2016 at 07:21 |
In case someone is interested, here's my review of the event: https://progmistress.com/2016/09/07/live-review-progday-2016-like-a-hurricane/
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Nogbad_The_Bad
Forum & Site Admin Group RIO/Avant/Zeuhl & Eclectic Team Joined: March 16 2007 Location: Boston Status: Offline Points: 20882 |
Posted: September 08 2016 at 11:50 |
Nice review.
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Ian
Host of the Post-Avant Jazzcore Happy Hour on Progrock.com https://podcasts.progrock.com/post-avant-jazzcore-happy-hour/ |
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Nogbad_The_Bad
Forum & Site Admin Group RIO/Avant/Zeuhl & Eclectic Team Joined: March 16 2007 Location: Boston Status: Offline Points: 20882 |
Posted: September 09 2016 at 09:35 |
Crowd shot from end of Bent Knee set, I'm in the Union Jack shirt on the right Edited by Nogbad_The_Bad - September 09 2016 at 09:38 |
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Ian
Host of the Post-Avant Jazzcore Happy Hour on Progrock.com https://podcasts.progrock.com/post-avant-jazzcore-happy-hour/ |
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micky
Special Collaborator Honorary Collaborator Joined: October 02 2005 Location: . Status: Offline Points: 46833 |
Posted: September 10 2016 at 05:56 |
That makes sense. I saw you as having good enough tastes as it was Ian... if you liked everything under the sun I'd have revise my opinion of you to freak status. If you had liked this I was going to start trying to turning you on to Willie Nelson after nearly 10 years.. I've nearly got Raff.. to the point she stands him. And I have caught her singing along and shaking her ass on occasion... |
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The Pedro and Micky Experience - When one no longer requires psychotropics to trip
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3RDegree
Forum Senior Member Joined: March 31 2007 Location: United States Status: Offline Points: 129 |
Posted: September 10 2016 at 22:34 |
Glad you all had a great time! We'd love to come back. :)
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www.3RDegreeONLINE.com www.facebook.com/3RDegree "Defiling Perfectly Good Songs With Prog Since 1990"
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micky
Special Collaborator Honorary Collaborator Joined: October 02 2005 Location: . Status: Offline Points: 46833 |
Posted: September 11 2016 at 09:46 |
We'd love to see you back Robert... be it on stage... or just with us in the audience. Been a good bit since we've got together.
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The Pedro and Micky Experience - When one no longer requires psychotropics to trip
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3RDegree
Forum Senior Member Joined: March 31 2007 Location: United States Status: Offline Points: 129 |
Posted: September 11 2016 at 22:16 |
Missed you and Raff this whole past album cycle. Hope to rectify that next time if we decide to play some shows.
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www.3RDegreeONLINE.com www.facebook.com/3RDegree "Defiling Perfectly Good Songs With Prog Since 1990"
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