“Journeys of the Eastern Minds” was a gig held at the Music Room on Friday, April 18th. The band lineup consisted of local bands EYE, with an acoustic premiere, and Jay Wud, in addition to the German band Two Wooden Stones.
The band performances started relatively late, as to what had been announced previously on the Facebook Event page, nevertheless the crowd enjoyed the gig. EYE was first to play, with an acoustic set for the first time. Unfortunately, there were technical problems and sound issues, but apart from that their performance was – as we know it by now – pretty awesome.
The set list included tracks from both albums, their self-titled first release, and Kallisti, their most recent release. The band opened with the track ‘Poet’, which is a great piece to begin with, but being acoustic, it was given another nuance. Among the songs played were, ‘Untitled’, ‘The Blue Eyes of a Dog’, and ‘God Has His Reasons’, the latter to be my personal favorite of the evening. Another nice twist was added by the drummer using the Middle Eastern traditional drum –also known as Dirbakkeh- every now and then. Not only did it sound good with the music, but it also linked back to the narrative nicely.
The second band on the bill was Two Wooden Stones, who had come in from Germany to play their set of Folk Rock. As this was the first time I was hearing this band, and not being an ardent listener of folk rock as a genre, I was overwhelmed to an extent by the performance. The 3 member band, had something of their own signature to song writing, which was pretty evident in the songs they performed that night.
The last band for the night was Jay Wud. Now the last time I had seen these guys play was at the Du Arena in Abu Dhabi opening for Guns N Roses. That being the first time I had witnessed these guys live, they had me waiting for a year to see them again, which was tonight. Jay Wud got the whole venue right up front of stage and moving. They definitely were the highlight of the night. Their set consisted primarily of originals. The one cover they did perform was from one of my all-time favorite bands, Check My Brain by Alice in Chains, and my word they nailed it. The backing vocals of Bojan complementing Jay throughout the set was a joy to hear.
The show ended with Jay Wud and the Two Wooden Stones coming together on stage for a jam for one final track. With that the night ended, and it indeed was a blissful night of Rock music.
