The ROSfest Early Report

[Firth]

I didn't see the first band, but Caravan and the after party band, Shadow Merchant kicked ass. I was ignorant of Caravan, but now realize how big of a gap I have. At first I thought they were sort of a Montt Python spoof of prog rock But by the time I heard In the Land of Grey and Pink, I was totally sold. Shadow Merchant did blend of prog covers and original music, and the sound system was awesome, great mix. SM pulled off those covers incredibly:d

[Shadow]

but now realize how big of a gap I have

That's what this type of music will do to you.

[zombywoof]

At first I thought they were sort of a Montt Python spoof of prog rock

No, that's Jethro Tull's "Thick as a Brick". :-)

[Firth]

No, that's Jethro Tull's "Thick as a Brick". :-)

Touché, probably as admitted by Ian

[Jon]

Can hardly believe how amazing Beardfish were.

[markwoll]

So my take on Saturday
A pretty brilliant day:
Elephants of Scotland provided opening toons. They seemed like they were into it. It was enjoyable for me. A bit rough around the edges in the vocal department at the beginning. I would characterize their material (after hearing only this one live performance ) as a clever mixture of prog cliche's.

Thank You Scientist was relentless high energy. I like this band. Saw them before at Progday and have their music in rotation.
They had some sound issues ( violin and guitar really low in the mix to my ears ) in the first couple of minutes of the first song.
They got that worked out. Loved the encore or I am the walrus.
The video of the Fantastic Planet was at times both fascinating and distracting.

Sound of Contact first I have heard the band other than some youtube snippets.
Good performance, radio friendly sounding songs. I was pleased to find that they were better than I expected.
Good energy, a bit too ballad-ey for my long term listening taste.

Beardfish , another first listen. Wow! Lots of range here. Lots of prog. I am going to be including them in rotation Real Soon Now.
They would not be a proper Swedish Prog band without at least one epic, lets just say the whole performance was epic.

just my $.02
Can't wait for tomorrow, more undiscovered territory.

[philsunset]

Can hardly believe how amazing Beardfish were.

+1. I thought Thank You Scientist were amazing too.

[Digital_Man]

Unfortunately I had to miss RF this year but I'll keep an eye out for the reviews(I'm sure Yanks will do one if he went).

[Camelogue]

Attended day 1 and 2.

/subjective rankings
Beardfish
Caravan
Sound of Contact
Clydsydria
Thank you Scientist
Elephants of Scotland
stayed for the complete performance of every band so none were off putting.

See ya in 2015 the gods willing/

[luvyesmusic]

It was another great event with some fantastic bands and a huge dose of fun and friends. What are you waiting for? Start planning for ROSfest 2015. I am.

[DGuitarist]

It was another great event with some fantastic bands and a huge dose of fun and friends. What are you waiting for? Start planning for ROSfest 2015. I am.

And I even got to play for some of youse! Someone shook my hand after the Firth Of Fifth solo during the late-night jam - so I guess I done good.

[beano]

Just got back to NY today..So glad I went, had a great time..Reached out and said hello to the Progeezer!! Came late Sat so missed the 1st band, here were my favs in order to keep this short..so I can go to BED!!

Beardfish
Sound Of Contact
Red sand
Fright Pig
Thank You Scientist
Subsignal & Collage Tied.. ( Possibly very exhausted by their sets ??? )

Overall, Great people, Great theater, Great sound, Great lighting, Great $ 4.00 beers( what other music/sports/etc venue can you get a DogFish Head or a Troeggs for this price??!!), Good to Great weather, Good eats, Decent well priced hotels, Great parking, Great town, AWESOME MUSIC FESTIVAL!!..Hope to be there next year!!

[beano]

+ 1 !!!

Can hardly believe how amazing Beardfish were.

[Proghound]

my rosfest review-

Caravan- nostalgic and loved their older stuff, which was more upbeat. Lots of song oriented soft prog.

Thank you Scientist- highlight of the weekend, excellent. very talented, young band.

SOC- Third time I've seen them as I saw them on CTTE twice. Same exact set, but not the best I have seen them. Simon was struggling with his voice. 1st and last song of the album/ show were the best as they are primarily instrumental. Too much like a pop Phil Collins solo album in the middle. 2 young girls started dancing in the front row in the middle of the set, so you get the picture. Not horrible, and he has some good musicians with him.

Beardfish- was very good, as this was my third time seeing them, probably not my favorite. Still very original but I thought the singer wasn't at his very best. Still enjoyed them very much.

Couldnt make Sunday- overall I thought the lineup was a bit weak this year, but thank you scientist were worth the admission. IMO

[Firth]

Just got back to NY today..So glad I went, had a great time..Reached out and said hello to the Progeezer!! Came late Sat so missed the 1st band, here were my favs in order to keep this short..so I can go to BED!!

Beardfish
Sound Of Contact
Red sand
Fright Pig
Thank You Scientist
Subsignal & Collage Tied.. ( Possibly very exhausted by their sets ??? )

Overall, Great people, Great theater, Great sound, Great lighting, Great $ 4.00 beers( what other music/sports/etc venue can you get a DogFish Head or a Troeggs for this price??!!), Good to Great weather, Good eats, Decent well priced hotels, Great parking, Great town, AWESOME MUSIC FESTIVAL!!..Hope to be there next year!!

Collage was the big surprise for me. Within the Neo category they are perhaps the best IMO. The other big names in Neo seem to be all about the vocals, leaving the instruments on the weak side compared to 70s prog. But these guys went to the limit. The drummer was top knotch on the different time signatures. The vocalist hands down beats the competition. The guitar player was more exciting than many prog guitarists with Big names.

[SteveSly]

Amazing festival once again. Although I liked some bands better than others, they were all good. George and his organization / crew shoud be proud. I will try to write a more comprehensive review tomorrow.

[AstroProg]

My 3 favorites in order were:

Caravan - I heard these guys were good, but wow!
Collage (a close second) - great mix, great guitars, and the best vocals of the weekend
Elephants of Scotland - I really like the lyrics and vocals from this band. Best of the newbies for me.

My least favorites were Beardfish and Thank You Scientists. The bands sounded good, but just did not suit my musical taste. Too much endless tickling of the ivories from Beardfish, and Thank You Scientists Would Have to lose the trumpet to make them palatable to me.

The other bands put on good shows, but I thought the sound quality was not the best. Clepsydra and Sound of Contact were good examples. Bass and/or bass drum mixed way too high drowning out the rest of the band. Clepsydra's vocalist also let out some ear splitting wails that had me pushing my earplugs in farther than I thought possible.

My biggest disappointments were Subsignal and Fright Pig. Subsignal has a lot of talent (including some killer harmony vocals), but between the endless attempts at getting the audience to clap and sing along, I completely lost interest (maybe I was just tired and cranky by then). I came to see the bands play, not to participate in a who can clap the longest contest. For Fright Pig, I loved hearing their CD played live, but could have done without the "is Deep Purple close enough to prog" segment of the show. Even Transatlantic wasn't beneath throwing in a Genesis cover on their first tour.

Overall this was a good year for RosFest, but certainly not close to the best. The variety was good, there was a ton of great guitar and vocals, but improvements in the mix would have made this a much better weekend.

[SteveSly]

Overall this was a good year for RosFest, but certainly not close to the best. The variety was good, there was a ton of great guitar and vocals, but improvements in the mix would have made this a much better weekend.

Interesting perspective. I actually thought the sound was the best of the 3 years I have attended. In fact for the most part I thought the sound was great all weekend. Maybe it depends on where one was sitting? I was towards the back 3rd of the venue only a few rows in front of the soundboard, so maybe that made a difference, but for me the sound was a big improvement over last year.

[zombywoof]

It seems that the two bands I wanted to see (Beardfish and TYS) were the highlights with most others too. Nice!

[Yanks2014]

OK, my quick take (full review coming Tuesday) - so happy I was healthy enough to go this time.

Awesome festival, despite me not thinking this would be a strong lineup.

Caravan - not a fan, but somehow I digged their set.
Beardfish - Unreal, these guys are so great live!
Collage - what a surprise, they really brought their "A" game.

Thank You Scientist - they just killed, 2nd time seeing them and I'm a huge fan now.

Knew nothing of Elephants of Scotland, came away a fan. Same with Subsignal.

Clepsydra and Red Sand. - Nope, didn't like either at all.

Frightpig - Missed half the set, but they were fun, and the Serbian guitarist was a MONSTER!

SOC - Lukewarm to them, but the long epic was impressive. Simon looks and even sounds like his dad.

Awesome sound and lights, Rosfest outdid themselves this time.

I'm beat, need to sleep then I'll post a thorough review.

[Mike Potter]

Another very fine RoSFest! Thanks a million George, Krista, Carl (monitor sound guy), Bobby Mac, all the Majestic Crew, so many others! Anyway, my surprise band was Fright Pig. Man did they lay down the gauntlet! Woke my tired ass up after having only an hour or so of sleep on Saturday night/morning! As expected, Beardfish were superb and I'd vote them my favorite. Loved the newer heavier stuff from "The Void". Thank You Scientist were great as well. In fact all the bands were great - just have a few that I liked better than others. Slept 18 hours last night/today. About to log another 8 hours or so!

[battema]

Yeah...George and company did a fantastic job this year. The sound and lighting and organization of everything was simply stellar. Really impressed. Simply can't emphasize this enough.

(one minor aside: 'sup Nancy!)

As for the bands:

Caravan, Beardfish and Thank You Scientist were my hands-down favorites. While I knew Caravan and TYS would be on this shortlist, Beardfish actually really surprised me with their strength. Terrific performance and charisma.

Collage, Clepsydra, and Subsignal were musically not quite my thing but nonetheless, they all gave really strong & impressive performances. After the somewhat "meh" performance that Satellite gave a few years back, I was especially impressed with how strongly Collage came across. Well done, gents.

Fright Pig had a terrific first gig. Keyboardists need to learn to stay in front of keyboards when backing tracks playing though...kinda breaks the fourth wall to have a big keyboard line going and both cats are over chatting with the sound guy.

Elephants & Red Sand...again, not my thing musically but I can definitely appreciate why others enjoyed them. Guitarist sounds like he literally stole Hackett's rig...which again, is probably exactly perfect for what these dudes were doing. And hey: always great to see an exotic band singing in their native country's language

That leaves Sound of Contact. For those that enjoyed their set, I'm happy for you, sincerely. For me, they were the low point of the weekend. The only set where I can honestly say I walked out disappointed. And yes, I have the album and yes, I like it.

More than the bands though...it was the atmosphere that made the weekend so fantastic. Many great conversations with both old and new friends, and Gettysburg was perfect for walking around between sets. Never knew what a 'Scottish Egg' was before Saturday and now I'm not sure how I lived without them

I will happily attend ROSfest '15 if I can.

[Sean]

Sounds like they didn't "contact"....your heart. :P

[battema]

Hey, one dud out of 10 bands is a pretty damned good ratio for any fest! And let's be honest: I disliked them but plenty of other folks enjoyed it.

[gryphs also]

I'm beginning to think I'm getting picky in my older age, or just that I'm holding on to my work negativity when I'm not at work.

Missed Clepsydra

Caravan: Not a great fan of their work but was extremely satisfied with their performance. Each song sounded like one big entity as opposed to a group of musicians playing together. Great start to the festival

Elephants of Scotland: Had some very good sonic and rhythmic elements, but for me they didn't translate into "songs".

Thank You Scientists: I thought the mix was not great, but a lot of energy and significantly different to impress.

Sound of Contact: Put me in the "meh" category. Collins' vocals were very pitchy. Just OK.

Beardfish: Talk about a rollercoster of emotions. I expected greatness and I got it.

Fright Pig: Loved this band. Just wish they had a full set of original material. A great way to force yourself to wake up after a few after-hours brews.

Red Sand: They were good, not great. The singer was overly dramatic but I prefer that to the rock-star poser or the forcing people to clap leaders.

Subsignal: The harmony vocals were to far back in the mix for me which took away from the songs. As to the singer, see the above comment.

Collage: As my friend Bob said, "If you saw Believe last year, you've seen Collage this year." Stayed for half the set and left. What the did was good but I just wasn't in the mood at that time of the festival. Also, the singer would leave the stage often when not part of the song, but at other times he moved around as if he wanted to be the focal point. I found him annoying.

Anyway, thank you to everyone who helped put this wonderful festival on. Great to catch up with friends I've known for a while (I didn't want to say "old"), meet some new people, and escape from the world for a few days.