Twenty Years Ago This Week, I Had 2nd Row Seats At the Best Concert I Ever Saw
I was six feet away from Peter Gabriel when he brought the Secret World tour to the Tacoma Dome. I’ve seen other shows, of course, but Secret World remains–and given how we treat musical memories from our 20s it’s likely to remain–my favorite concert of all time.
Here are some bits recovered from Youtube, for your Friday pleasure. The whole show’s up on Youtube somewhere, and of course it’s available on Blu-Ray and DVD. Enjoy your weekends, reading several.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JRLjpXLEp1A]
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k2FOPaZs_7o]
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4fCpVJGZjvQ]
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z-V7cXEddJs]
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wkXeUE5gvRs]
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kxCuWORzaBg]
One of the great things about the Secret World tour is that the set-up of the stage allowed a LOT of people to get what felt like front row seats. I was just a kid, but we were in front of the round stage – which was really sort of the front of the stage – just a few rows back.
It was fantastic, and I can still see his “Digging in the Dirt” and “San Jacinto” bits in my head without watching the concert film.
Fantastic – it was like seeing my subconscious ripped out of my head and placed on a stage.
I’m not sure whose idea it was to build a 3/4 thrust stage for the Secret World tour, but it was brilliant. The 3/4 stage strengthens the bond between audience and artist, mainly because it feels like the performance is happening in the audience’s space. That’s probably why my friend’s sister, who was seated halfway up the stands on stage left, still felt like she was close to the performance.
I wish more music venues were arranged that way. If they were, I’d like performers to take as much advantage of it as PG and company did. Their use of the whole stage was marvelous.