Artist: The Security Project
Album: Live 2
Label: Self Released
Release Date: 10/21/2016
Stage two of the Security Project is finished. Still on the job, celebrating the recorded works of Peter Gabriel, this assembly of progressive-rock luminaries apparently decided that just one concert album in 2016 wasn’t enough. Hence, the release of Live 2, which finds this amalgamation of King Crimson, Shriekback and Gabriel bandmembers tackling more obscure pieces in the enthralling and utterly compelling follow-up to the highly acclaimed Live 1.
Dipping their toes into Gabriel’s Genesis period, the quintet of touch guitar wizard Trey Gunn, keyboardist David Jameson, guitarist Michael Cozzi, lead singer Brian Cummings – a dead ringer for Gabriel, by the way, with his slightly weathered voice – and drummer Jerry Marotta lovingly resuscitate the glorious theatrics of “The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway.” And from the famed album of the same name comes that track’s conjoined twin “Fly on the Windshield,” expansive and stomping with winding lead guitar.
In their capable hands, “Family Snapshot” remains as affecting as ever, while the bizarre carnival that is “Moribund the Burgermeister” retains its surreal edge, chameleon-like character and full-on bombast – also found in the busy urgency and silvery splash of “White Shadow.” Spare, but lovely, the acoustic sketches of “Mercy Street” and “Father, Son” need no adornment, as this intriguing set list – defined by warm, clear sound – finds the Security Project reveling in the shape-shifting tricks and spells of Gabriel’s compositional magic, working off well-crafted arrangements. Live 2 is full of songs that seem like ageless art films, beautifully restored by the Security Project.
-Peter Lindblad
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