ELUSIVE, ILLUSION FADES & OPENED PARADISE LIVEAthens, Club Underworld Saturday 04 / 11 / 06by Panayiotis Papandreopoulos
Although that Gothic Rockers "Elusive" have released only 2 studio albums, they are not infamous in Greece, since this is the second time they play here. The first time was at the Elfentanz Festival of 2004; however this time they were the headliners.
The concert took place in the tiny "Underworld Club" and begun at about 8:30 with the Greeks "Opened Paradise". As most of the attendees, I had never seen them play live. Their songs sounded as a concrete classical Gothic Rock style of the 80ties, mainly influenced by "Fields of the Nephilim". They played very vivid and dynamically and the reactions of the band members and the audience were like those in a typical Heavy Metal concert. Their show lasted only 30 minutes and they left positive impressions.
Next band the veterans of the Greek Gothic Rock scene "The Illusion Fades", who were formed in 1990 and have released 5 albums so far. They begun powerfully with "Full Of Fire" and continued with "Your Love Has Faded". Next song the inspired long lasting "Eyes Of Sorrow". The singer, George Dedes, announced they would play the hit "Valentine", which was a small surprise because they hadn’t played it for ages. When it had been released it caused such a buzz that it had been being played by the local Rock FM radio station for a long. The audience seemed to enjoy a lot the show and George invited on stage the youngest attendee in the Club, Alexander, a 10-year old boy. It followed the successful cover of the Cult’s "Rain" and two more songs: "Dead White Snow" and "Light My Fire". In general I.F. played very well and joyful, but their show lasted only 35-40 minutes. A small anticipation was rising during the necessary arrangements and shortly after "Elusive" appeared on stage. The audience started to yell when the two guitarists Kristian and Tommy appeared on stage playing the first notes of "Ride", but the cheers escalated when the singer Jan rushed to the microphone. They began with a set of 4 songs from the latest release: "Ride", "She Is A River", "Fading Rose", "The Great Silence". Especially during "Fading Rose" Jan penetrated through our ears by singing loud and proud: "but I can not seeeeee!". This was enhanced by a small problem with the sound but soon enough it was fixed. We really enjoyed this set but the next one that followed based on the first album literally launched us to the sky by listening to the Gothic Rock dynamites: "Last Night", "Tomorrow Gone" and the more relaxing "Asylum". It followed the amazing songs "You" (I think the live version was a bit chopped) and "Shadowdance". The audience was already in high spirit when the Club vibrated by the fast rhythms of "Coming Home". The performance of the love song "Susanna", one of the best Gothic Rock hymns that have ever been written, let us speechless. Jan announced that the time they had available had expired and the show was over, but shortly enough under the strong audience appeals they returned and played the "Morendoes" years song "In Her Garden". It sounded a bit mysterious and emitted something of the mid-80ties "Sisters" flavour. I didn’t like it in the beginning but as it went on, it got improved and the main theme turned to be nice and catchy. And speaking about nice beat the exciting "Gemini" followed. The set ended with the "The Circle Never Ends" in an absolute panic atmosphere.
They returned for an encore and played the Depeche Mode cover "I Feel You" but somewhere in the middle Jan interrupted the song and played the famous Billy Idol success so well that even the bottles of "Rebel Yell" at the bar shook in the rhythms of the song. Elusive show lasted at about 80 minutes and the setlist included the best choice of their two releases (luckily they didn’t play the last songs from the "Great Silence"). Jan made fan with the audience and smoked so many cigarettes throughout the songs that one would wonder how this didn’t affect his performance and the quality of his voice, which was - despite that - amazing. The guitars of Kristian and Tommy (the latter played with his cowboy hat always turned down) kept the audience in a constant alert. Despite the fact they had prerecorded drums and bass, their live performance was absolutely exciting. One of the best and passionate Gothic Rock Lives I have ever seen. The audience of the approximately 500 people that congested in the small Club that night could consider themselves as lucky. It might have not been a quantitative, but definitely a qualitative (for the Gothic Rock standards) crowd. I hope to see Elusive live many more times, to keep on the same way in the future and to have the opportunity to play in front of bigger audiences because they deserve it 100%. Elusive Setlist
Links of interest:The Illusion Fades Opened Paradise Club Underworld
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