Primus, Pordenone, March 23, 2012

The best definition of Primus? “Frank Zappa meets metal music”!

For non-Primus aficionados out there, that’s pretty well the closest way you can sum up the rather “particular” music performed by this American trio from California. The band dates back to the mid-1980s and had, back then, to their name three albums: “Frizzle Fry”, “Sailing The Seas Of Cheese” and “Pork Soda”.

A treat for Italian fans as the band includes one of the world’s foremost bass players, Les Claypool (he was joined on stage by drummer Jay Lane and guitarist Larry LaLonde). Claypool and Co. managed to play 19 songs in front of about 2,000 fans over a 2 ½ hour show and included hits such as “Hennepin”, Salmon”, “Moron” and “Tweek”.

The show came with two large inflatable astronauts as well as a 15-minute screening of old Popeye cartoons that were used as an interlude for the band. Definitely a FIRST for a rock concert with some fans actually jeering the band as they hadn’t really come to see Popeye, Bluto and Olive Oil (wonderful memories though for your correspondent who as a child would rush home from elementary school to catch Popeye on tv)!

Future dates for Primus also include two shows at London’s Royal Albert Hall. Indeed a must for Primus fans in England’s capital!

Roger Daltrey, Trieste March 18, 2012

Roger Daltrey, the former front-man of one of the all-time greatest rock bands in the world, The Who, still had it in him for a 2 hour+ show in Trieste, Italy. Old rockers never died, they just keep knocking the socks off of rock&roll aficionados out there! That was indeed the case for Roger Daltrey—at 68 years old and still in splendid shape—the former singer of one of the all-time great rock bands in the world, regular “Chernobyls” of rock music, The Who (memorable was how guitarist Pete Townshend would destroy on stage his guitars or how the late, great drummer Keith Moon would do the same with his drum kit, and the odd hotel rooms too)!

Indeed a treat for this correspondent as he saw The Who way back in 1977 in Canada and then again in an epic performance in 2007 in Verona’s Arena with Pete Townshend by Daltrey’s side and Zak Starkey on drums (n.b. Zak is Ringo Starr’s son. He once said that he never thought that his old man was a great drummer, but instead admired Keith Moon. And there he was that night sitting right in Moon’s place!).

Crisis, so what crisis? Tickets were a whopping 115.00 Euros, and yet die-hard Who fans were on hand to watch this great artist perform for more than 2 hours, dividing his great show into two parts: part one were songs dedicated to The Who’s epic “Tommy” rock opera while part two included some golden oldies from Daltrey’s old band (see below for set-list details).

No Moon, Townshend or Entwistle to back Roger this time, but a great five-piece band which also included on guitar a fellow by the name of Simon Townshend, yes indeed, Pete’s brother (same voice and almost same looks as brother Pete too). Another great treat for all those present at Trieste’s wonderful “Rossetti” Theater!

Not a quitter by any means (that evening in Verona a major thunderstorm hit the outdoor arena. The concert was suspended for 1 hour. In the meantime, Roger’s vocal chords gave up on him because of the cold and humidity. For the rest of the show he had basically lost his voice, but as Freddie (Mercury) once sang, “The show must go on”!, and Daltrey managed to sing, whatever he had left in his throat, right to the very end of the show with The Who’s greatest song, “Won’t Get Fooled Again”!), Daltrey, moved by the fans’ affection, left them with a small romantic song on, of all things, a small ukulele. Kind of funny as at one point he even forgot the words to the final song, but we forgave him as he was very, very "simpatico"!!!!!!

A very enjoyable two-hour show by Giorgia in front of 3,000 adoring fans

Giorgia Todrani, simply known to many fans as “Giorgia”, played for the very first time in Udine last night. The “Carnera” arena (for boxing aficionados out there, Primo Carnera, a mountain of a man and also a home-grown boy in the Friuli area of Italy, remains to this day Italy’s only heavyweight boxing champion. He won the title in 1933 and subsequently lost it to the devastating Max Baer) was sold-out with a crowd of 3,000 people made up of both young and old fans.

The 41 year-old singer, who originally hails from Rome (she started singing in clubs at 16 years of age), is perhaps one of the closest things that Italy’s has to an Afro-American version of the late, great Whitney Houston (just one of Giorgia’s idols) and to Italy’s “Grande Dame” of pop music, Mina.

In town to promote her latest album, Dietro Le Apparenze, Giorgia’s entrance on the stage was like an alien that had just come out of a space ship, all dressed up in suit made of small shimmering lights, unquestionably a first for many artists. She was backed-up by a funky seven-piece group, including two great vocalists.

Some of Giorgia’s own admirers have been the likes of Herbie Hancock, Sir Elton John (she’s been the only Italian singer who has sung together with Sir Elton during one of his Italian concerts. He said of her: “She’s got one of the nicest voices in the world”!) and Canada’s very own troubadour, Michael Buble’. Giorgia’s also sung together with another Italian great, Andrea Bocelli and managed to even captivate audiences many years ago during Big Luciano Pavarotti’s highly popular show, Pavarotti & Friends, when she sang Queen’s Who Wants To Live Forever. Her own personal success in Italy and also abroad (the Netherlands and Canada) has helped her sell so far 6 million records. But one of the highlights of her career was back in 1995 when in Rome’s St. Peter’s square she sang the Ave Maria in front of the old Polish pope, Wojtyla.

Giorgia’s fine mixture of pop-jazz-soul-blues-reggae-funky, together with a touch of rock music, has also been part of several Italian movie soundtracks. Many of these same movies have been highly successful at the box office, no doubt an attraction also for those fans in Udine who certainly went away with their money’s worth after a solid two-hour performance by this fine (and also rather beautiful) Italian singer!