Best of the Day: The Australian Pink Floyd Show – August 13, 2015

Welcome to Best of the Day, our daily recommendation for what to check out around town. If you do one thing in Boston today, consider this.

Australian Pink Floyd photo by Bradford Timeline on Flickr

Since we’re in a Throwback Thursday mood, we’ll go out on a limb and say that few things rival the weird rush of nostalgia (vicarious or otherwise) that comes from one of our favorite guilty pleasures: Laser Floyd. And if you haven’t been to a laser light show at the Museum of Science Planetarium since high school—well, pretty much nothing’s changed about the experience: You walk through a sleepy after-hours Museum of Science to sit in the dark with a handful of goofball stoner teenagers and have your eyeballs bathed in the laser equivalent of a 90-minute After Dark screensaver. It is transcendently cheesy.

But for diehard fans, it may not be the best way to scratch that Floyd itch.

That, however, can be a pretty tall order. Although former Floyd member Roger Waters popped up at the Newport Folk Festival last month, it’s been decades since Floyd’s last appearance in Boston—too bad, considering that the bootleg for 1977’s In the Flesh tour stop at Boston Garden is a particularly sought-after recording.

Fact is, without a time machine, you’re never going to have an authentic Floyd experience. But the next best thing is on its way: Tonight, The Australian Pink Floyd Show hits the Blue Hills Bank Pavilion.

Not convinced? You’re not alone. “The early years for the band were hard,” TAPFS bassist/vocalist Colin Wilson has said about their efforts to convince fans that a Floyd tribute show isn’t heresy. “People didn’t want to believe that anybody else could ever get close to sounding like them.” But these Aussies have been at it since 1988, and in that time they’ve sold over four million tickets to concerts spanning 35 countries. Their act is so uncanny, in fact, Floyd guitarist David Gilmour hired them to perform at his 50th birthday celebration.

Tonight, they bring their lasers and inflatables—past shows have featured not just the giant pig, but also a stage-dwarfing kangaroo called Skippy—to the Seaport.

And don’t miss openers Led Zeppelin 2, whose classic-rock simulacra have wowed the likes of the New Yorker, the Portland Mercury, and Metallica’s Kirk Hammett (quote: “These guys sound fucking exactly like Led Zeppelin!”).
August 13, 8 p.m., Blue Hills Bank Pavilion, 290 Northern Ave., Boston, 617-728-1600, livenation.com.