I was at a concert of Todd Rundgren at the Paradiso in Amsterdam last night!
He played with the Metropole Orchestra , a dutch orchestra consisting of a full big band, a 25 piece string section, a woodwind section and two percossionists.
It was a wonderful concert, Toddās not only a phenomenal guitar player but also an incredible singer.
He has a great range for a 63 year old rocker and sings with lots of expression and emotion, and heās also very funny!
They played a selection of his hits, like āHello Itās Meā, āI Saw The Lightā and āCan We Still Be Friendsā and also some lesser known songs.
The arrangements were wonderful and made good use of the porential of the orchestra.
The highlight was a song with just strings and Toddās vocal, goose bumps all over!
[Edit:] For those of you who are interested, Iāve now got a recording of the show.
It was a high quality stream from the Radio 6 website that I recorded in 320 kbps mp3.
I will host it from my website for a short while. Send me a PM when interested and Iāll send you the link.
Hermit of Mink Hollow was my favorite record for a long time. Heās one of my all time faves. Iām really jealous (both for Amsterdam and Todd). I hope I can catch the radio show. Iāve seen him solo and with Utopia a number of times. The shows were anywhere from embarrassingly bad, to mind blowing good. Sounds like this was on the really good side.
I ādiscoveredā TR just a few years ago. Iāve always sort of known that there is a person with that name but, you know, you canāt listen to EVERYTHING, can you? The I fell over an interview with this Todd and he seemed to be a reasonable person. A few years went by and YouTube popped up ans showed me some moving pictures and ā¦ MUSIC! Great goggelimoggli! So maybe I should have a little collection of Todd Rundgren as well haha!
The odd thing about TR is that he was/is always at the cutting edge of technology and distribution. Because of that a lot of the video and web stuff seems primitive. But, he was actually making music videos before well MTV was even a station. He made a interactive music sharing/publishing/fan interaction application for mac, PC and Amiga about the time MSN was in beta (early 90s?). Heās also an accomplished producer as well, although almost without fail the bands that used him made their first polished album.
TR suggestions:
Hermit of Mink Hollow: amazing pop/rock/psychedelic/r&b and soul record.
A Wizard a True Star: Same as above, but a technological marvel for its time.
Todd: Weird songs that are very āToddā.
A capella: Listen and just be in awe for the amount of work and details went into it.
Utopia:
Utopia : one of the original psychedelic prog albums. Again, way ahead of its time.
Adventures in Utopia: Awesome pop rock, very unique even though it is pop rock
RA: Fun record, donāt take it too seriously ā¦ the opening song is kick ass
Just a few personal faves there. Almost everything has something worthwhile in it, although I havenāt cared for things after Nearly Human, which is a great album also.
I listened to Todd constantly throughout the 80ās and early 90ās. Heās been an influence on my music more than
any other artist I can thnk of.
Toddās been touring a lot lately, and doing something very smart IMO. Since heās got such a large back catalogue,
each tour he does is to support a particular album or two. This enables him to keep his fans coming back to see him again and again - because each time theyāll be seeing him perform one of his old classic albums in itās entirety. Just this past spring I saw him do the āHealing/Toddā tour, and it was outstanding! Heās 63, but he doesnāt look it. Heās all over the stage, energetic and giving the crowd his all - and Iāve never seen him in better voice, or better on guitar.
Recently his keyboard player from the first Utopia album, Moogy Klingman, was diagnosed with cancer, so they put that original lineup back together to do a benefit show in NY for Moogy. Apparently it went well, and theyāre now touring to support that album - plus some of his other tunes to round out the night. Iām going to see that show on Nov 18th in Peekskill.
Did you not like āSecond Windā, which came right after Nearly Human, and with the same band? That was a good one, but after that I, too, drifted away from Todd after he released a few disappointing experimental albums like No World Order, The Individualist, With A Twistā¦but then he redeemed himself in 2004 with āLiarsā, which is an outstanding album where he got back to songcraft again. Iād highly recommend Liars.
He also released his own tribute to the music of bluesman Robert Johnson and called it Todd Rundgrenās Johnson - and also an EP of these songs, called (what else) Todd Rundgrenās Short Johnson.
Yeah, Pretending To Care is a beautiful song. Itās from the A Capella
album and has no orchestra on that version. Todd does all that by
layering his voice with oohs and ahhhs.
Iām migrating to the more ācorrectā side of the brain and I have tons of work to do. Iāll get āHello, Itās Meā done before the yearās up. Hey Lenny, wassup!
Saw him in the 70s with Utopia. I was (and still am) a total synth geek, so seeing him with Larry Fast was ā¦ well ā¦ Heavenā¦
Then in 2001(?), I was hanging out at a little tiki lounge on the Esplanade at Burning Man and some guy is doing Bosa Nova verions of Rundgrenās pop songs to an old Roland beatbox. I recognize the music and (while laughing my ass off at the irony of hearing TR at Burning Man) say out to my friend (a Grammy winning percussionist) āhey, those are Todd Rundgren tunesā¦ā
To which he respondsā¦
āYup, thatās Todd Rundgren playing them, weāre having dinner with his camp tonight.ā
DOH!
Steak and Lobster dinner on the Playa that night with Todd and his whole camp. One of the nicest guys Iāve ever met. Talk about heavenā¦
For those of you who are interested, Iāve now got a recording of the show, Todd Rundgren & the Metropole Orchestra, Paradiso, Amsterdam, sep. 24th, 2011.
It was a high quality stream from the Radio 6 website that I recorded in 320 kbps mp3.
I will host it from my website for a short while. Send me a PM when interested and Iāll send you the link.
Got it, thanks a lot, great show. Listening to it now. Wondering if he did his own orchestrations; I think he knows how to do it. Utopia was my favorite one of hisā¦