Since the Dutch band ENorm started to play the music of their former band Marathon they gained a lot of success. This resulted in hiring venue Cultuurpodium Boerderij at Zoetermeer to perform a special live show dedicated to both Marathon's music and their musical heroes. Bands like Saga, Rush, Marillion, The Alan Parsons Project and Genesis inspired them to form their own progressive rock band. Also a new ENorm album was presented during this concert. As a warm up for this special event they invited Silhouette, another Dutch band that presented a new album as well.

Silhouette

The musicians of Silhouette got 45 minutes to bring out their new album Across The Rubicon (see review) in the open. Way too short to play the entire album and therefore they had chosen to perform a selection. However, they started the concert with

Jos Uffing

Far Away, an older piece from their second album Moods (2009). During Don't Stop This Movie two guests joined the band. On flute MaryO, who also plays the same flute part on the

Brian de Graeve

album, and on electric guitar Bart Laan, the sixteen-year old son of keyboardist Erik Laan. This time the latter only used one single keyboard, but that didn't prevent him from being the most dominant musician during this performance. His superb playing has always been the driving force during a Silhouette gig. However, this time I noticed that the other musicians came closer to his level.

As the show continued I realized that for the first time I saw a complete band perform in a rather professional way. I didn't expect this at all after seeing them perform three rather disappointing live shows. Therefore the musicians deserve a big compliment for delivering strong albums as well as playing them professionally on stage. I guess that a lot of practicing and some help of experienced musicians finally achieved the desired results! The use of a cutting edge mixing desk was another reason why this time everything felt in place. Unfortunately the audience didn't ask them to perform an encore. So they couldn't play When Snow's Falling Down. This means that I couldn't find out whether the children choir was present to join during the last part of this fabulous song, just as on the album. But anyway, even without this piece of music the musicians may look back at a well-performed concert.

ENorm's Marathon Revival

A lot of hard work was done before this special live show could take place, but both the band and the audience saw that everything went perfectly during this event. The venue was rather crowded because both fans from the old Marathon days and today's ENorm fan base had showed up. They gave

Erik and Ronald ten Bos

the musicians a warm welcome on entering the stage. In between the songs they cheered a lot and interacted with lead singer Eric ten Bos. Once again he turned out to be a perfect host, just like in the old Marathon days, giving some inside information about the performed songs. Sometimes he did that with a smile on his face, at other times very seriously when it was needed. As a true stand-up comedian he entertained the audience asking them whether they needed a break during this long set to get a drink, to go to the toilet or to smoke a cigarette. However, the audience reacted that a pause wasn't needed. They accepted this musical indulgence and took the difficult circumstances for granted. I guess it isn't that difficult if you can enjoy strong covers from the above-mentioned bands.

All songs were performed in the best possible way. However, during the two Saga-tunes Humble Stance and On The Loose the synthesizer solos by Martin Platenkamp got unfortunately lost in the overall band sound. This way those songs got lesser impact. The three Rush tunes, however, La Villa Strangiato,

Martin Platenkamp

Tom Sawyer and The Spirit Of Radio left a lot of people speechless. The audience also appreciated Easter (Marillion). Singer Erik ten Bos was dumbfounded when the audience took over the vocal parts of Lavender, another Marillion cover. They sang the intro rather well before Erik took over his vocal duties. Fortunately the band didn't forget that many people attended this concert for the old Marathon stuff. They could enjoy quite a number of songs from their two studio albums The First Run (1994) and Norm (1996) like Patters Of The Landscape, Ozone Layer, I'll Be There, Medicine Man, Casanovas and the final encore Beyond The Veil.

Beyond The Veil contained again some special effects. All band members sprayed water on the people in the audience out of their mouth. Other special effects during this wonderful concert were the many pictures and films projected behind the musicians. This was for instance done during the new songs from Finding My Way, the third and latest album by ENorm. This way the people got a better understanding concerning the lyrics. Not all songs were prog related like the many performed ENorm songs and their strong rendition of the U2 hit single With Or Without You. After the nice acoustic track Answers Erik ten Bos told the audience that buying a U2-album was simply not done when they were young! However, when they got older they discovered how well-written these U2-songs actually were. It showed that good songs don't need long guitar and keyboard solos or difficult time signatures to be enjoyable. Still it felt good to hear those progressive rock elements throughout the set. That made it for many people, including myself, a satisfying concert evening. Hopefully ENorm will continue with these concerts, playing the music of Marathon and their heroes! It certainly made a lot of prog heads happy as I noticed despite the fact that the concert lasted for three long hours!

Henri Strik (edited by Peter Willemsen)