The Australian Pink Floyd Show
KOCE/Channel 50
9:30 tonight
For shits and giggles, we were originally going to highlight this just so we could insert a snarky line about watching a Pink Floyd cover band on a PBS cover station. But that would be cruel now that a judge has ruled Orange County's only public-broadcasting outlet must put itself back up for sale, creating the very real possibility that it could wind up in the hands of a religious-broadcasting giant. Not that there's anything wrong with that; it may actually be an improvement over the crapola KOCE foists on us daily. But kicking KOCE when it's down (again), is like kicking Gray Davis now as opposed to pre-Arnie, when it was oh so much more fun. The more overriding reason we eschewed (with our mouth full!) the snarky line about watching a Pink Floyd cover band on a PBS cover station is that it may have offended the band. The Australian Pink Floyd Show (which those in the know call TAPFS, which is also how Antonio Banderas pronounces “taps”) is actually regarded as one of the better blatant rip-off experiences. Formed in 1988, when Floyd still roamed the Earth, TAPFS has recreated David Gilmour's guitar set-up, including the rare box used to make whale sounds; apparently, there are only four in the world, and Gilmour owns the other three. TAPFS played at Gilmour's 50th birthday party, and Gilmour has reportedly turned up at their shows on his own. They've also played at the Royal Albert Hall with Roger Waters in attendance and toured the world. So, as far as Pink Floyd cover bands goes, these guys are the real unreal deal—and probably worth seeing them perform Dark Side of the Moon—even on Orange County's fake and possibly doomed PBS station.
OC Weekly Editor-in-Chief Matt Coker has been engaging, enraging and entertaining readers of newspapers, magazines and websites for decades. He spent the first 13 years of his career in journalism at daily newspapers before “graduating” to OC Weekly in 1995 as the alternative newsweekly’s first calendar editor.