Tag Archives: The Musical Box

The Musical Box, Gig Review (2018). Philharmonic Hall, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *

People quite often think of silence as being damning, of largely falling into the zone of negativity and condemning, the muzzled contempt biting at the tongue and willing to spread the seed of discontent and slander when your back is finally turned. Too often silence is greeted with the look of lack of enthusiasm, and yet silence for a short while is the epitome of awe, the reflected understanding of what can pass for sheer majesty, the shock of beauty, the reverence of joy, silence is esteem.

The Musical Box, Gig Review. Philharmonic Hall, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *

It is somehow easy to dismiss the creativity of people, the stroke of genius that inspires others, that captures the zeitgeist and in which something truly incredible can arise, a spectacle, theatre of the mind. It is easy to dismiss it because to some eyes it looks like fun, that the players are solely reaping the applause for having performed a song, written a poem, created a play in which political leaders quake.

The Musical Box, Gig Review. Symphony Hall, Birmingham.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *

Away from a night surrounded by folk musicians and the odd nervous poet in attendance, everybody from the high end diva tagged performer to the watcher in the wings wants nothing more than the spectacular on stage. The crowd may feel as they have got their money’s worth, the fawned over photograph a hit on social media, a certain kind of artist knowing that if the crowd goes wild then the sales of DVD and all its associated regalia projected to be sellers for the Christmas market; the bigger, the better, the brasher; to be talked about for weeks and have the lights be more vivid than a night in Blackpool.

Steve Hackett, Gig Review (October 2013). Philharmonic Hall, Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 91/2 /10

There are very few performers that will attempt to capture the magic, the very special experience of a gig twice in the same venue in the same year. Then again, it may have been thought impossible to recapture the very essence of a classic in the first place. However when the venue is the prestigious Philharmonic Hall and the artist is the phenomenal guitarist Steve Hackett, it really shouldn’t come as any surprise at all that the musician and his finely crafted band should once more come to Liverpool and give the legion of fans in the city yet another night to remember.

Steve Hackett, Liverpool Philharmonic Hall. Gig Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *

It is near on nigh impossible to recreate a classic. To recreate a masterpiece and make it epic takes musical genius and a talent that coupled with a deep burning desire to give some of the great tracks of Progressive Rock a re-imagination could only be found in the hands and minds of some of the very few that practice the art.

A Liverpool Sound And Vision Special: An Interview With Steve Hackett.

Steve Hackett is a musician who really needs no introduction. His music has stretched across five decades with his first band, the supergroup of Progressive kings Genesis and with his own soaring solo career which he kick started in 1975 with the critically acclaimed album Voyage of the Acolyte. In 2012 Steve released the album Genesis Revisited 2  in which songs from the years in which Steve was part of Genesis and some of his own songs were re-worked to an even higher standard than was possibly thought. Tracks such as Horizons, Supper’s Ready, Dancing With The Moonlit Knight, The Musical Box, Ripples and Please Don’t Touch were given a new lease of life and become a top 30 hit for the quiet man of Progressive Rock.