That was just the official ones: There used to be a major trade in bootleg live recordings too. Most bands didn't appreciate the inferior quality of the bootlegs that surfaced on the market - not surprisingly when you consider many such recordings were literally made by an audience member standing in the crowd with a cassette recorder, albeit some better recordings did emerge from sound desks. (The Grateful Dead however were unusual in being the one band that positively encouraged recordings of their shows and many high quality semi official releases exist).
The unofficial recordings nevertheless served a useful purpose for the fans. Bootlegs would present full concerts from one venue on one night, with all the songs in the intended order, and all the warts, fluffs, inter song banter, and audience coughs present. To relay the experience of actually being there these usually surpassed official releases.
Official live albums were usually variously enhanced with edits and overdubs, which meant the tracks were sonically better but this did defeat the object somewhat - one didn't really want to hear a live album where the songs were identical to the studio recordings.
For me the most interesting live albums were from artists that would perform significant reinterpretations of their studio recordings. An electric track would be played acoustically on stage, or a short track would be extended for instance. Bob Dylan and Neil Young were the obvious masters at reinventing their material. Sometimes an artist would present a live recording of entirely new songs.
While the 70s was probably the heyday of the live album many artists have recently begun to release multiple recordings of live concerts from their vaults. Young for example is releasing a series of live concert recordings, many (mostly inferior versions) of which had appeared as unofficial bootlegs previously.
Not all 70s rock artists released live albums. There are some surprising omissions, whether by contractual restriction or other reason. Some artists have recorded albums live of course, but in the studio without an audience. And not all live albums work, whether by poor design or recording, or the music simply not being reproducible or suited to live performance - some of the more complicated prog rock music for instance doesn't always seem to translate so well live.
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| Great cover, dated film, disappointing recording |
Sometimes bands would make a hash of the multi venue edits or the crowd noise - rendering the live album devoid of atmosphere or continuity. The live offerings from some very revered live bands disappoint (evidence from youtube footage would suggest that classic rock bands like Led Zeppelin or Black Sabbath were exciting particularly in their early days, but even the most loyal fan would be hard pushed to argue The Song Remains The Same, or Live Evil, are good albums - perhaps their live albums just caught them on off days (or off tours), or simply past their peaks). Drugs certainly played a part with some bands who couldn't get it together live (although I always think not as much as you would have expected - if the lifestyles of these bands were as incessantly "rock n roll" as reported the bands would rarely have been able to turn up let alone play anything).
This week Eddy revisits 6 classic live albums from the era - there were of course 100s to choose from and the subject, like the Roger Dean covers log, probably deserves a series in future, but for now he has steered clear of some of the more obvious albums (like Live in Leeds and the aforementioned The Song Remains The Same) to present a Frampton Comes Alive Free Zone below):
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| Why is this album so famous? Right place right time? I honestly don't know (having never heard it). |
Van Morrison / Too Late To Stop Now
Wishbone Ash / Live Dates
UFO / Strangers In The Night
Rory Gallagher / Irish Tour '74
Tom Waits / Nighthawks At The Diner
Scorpions / Live In Tokyo
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