Crimson on the water
An excellent show. I had been told the venue was not all that wonderful beforehand, but I enjoyed the setting very much, along the river with downtown Cleveland as a backdrop.
I was only there for the awesome light show, of course. Well... seriously, while I thought maybe a little color and varied setting would have been nice, I truly appreciate the simplicity of not having a visual stimuli bombardment as so many people feel they have to deliver these days.
I must add a slight critical note, which might put me in a small minority. The overall level was too loud. It does seem to be an overall generally accepted practice for live performance sound reinforcement today to pretty much hammer people with as much level as they can take. King Crimson is certainly music that requires some power and size, but in my opinion, the simple fact is that I think if the overall level had been brought down somewhere around 6 to 8 dB, maybe even a little more, it would have been just about right; still plenty big and powerful, and not grating. As it was, in all but the relatively quite parts, the levels made everything mush together in sheer aural overload. On that note, another item, not at all unique these days, is the silly practice of feeling a need to have everything below around 100 Hz or so just massive. I'm still bewildered about how, when, and why, exactly, it became general FOH mixing practice to make the kick drum the most important element, in any live music. I don't get it. It's just silly, and really wears after not long.
That said, a wonderful show. Absolute musical excellence.