Van Morrison - "Live on Air" CD Review (XXL Media)

While I've been able to identify the (with reasonably certainty) the dates and location all of the previous "Live on Air" releases that I've reviewed, Van Morrison's Live on Air release had me stumped until I realized it was a compilation. The disc's set list makes this disc look like it is from Van's 1973 show at the Rainbow Theater with the Caledonia Soul Orchestra. While there are a number of tracks from that show included on this disc, a few tracks are sourced from different live shows that span Van's career.

Like most Live on Air releases, the disc was recorded "track at once" (gaps between the tracks) which makes it sound like a live greatest hits compilation rather than a 'concert recording'. Here is how the track list breaks down:

1 - "Warm Love" from Musikladden, Bremen, West Germany July 10, 1974


2- "Take Your Hands Out of My Pocket" - from Rainbow Theatre, London 1973


3 - "Here Comes the Night" (this is really "Here Comes the Knight") - ??, Video is below


4- "I Just Want to Make Love to You" - from Rainbow Theatre, London 1973


5 - "Brown Eyed Girl" - from Austin City Limits, November 18, 2006


6 - "Moonshine Whiskey" - from Rainbow Theatre, London 1973


7 - "Moondance" - from Rainbow Theatre, London 1973


8 - "Help Me" - from Rainbow Theatre, London 1973


9 - "Domino" - from Rainbow Theatre, London 1973


10 - "Caravan" - from Rainbow Theatre, London 1973


11 - "Cyprus Avenue" - from Ireland 1979


12 - "Wild Night" - from Pacific High Studios 1971


Links:
Van Morrison

Lou Reed - "Live Performances 1972 & 1974" DVD Review (XXL Media)

I was excited by this release as Lou Reed – Live Performances 1972 & 1974 is the first live recording from Lou’s Sally Can’t Dance tour to be commercially released. The first video segment shows Lou and his band recorded live at the Paris Olympia on 5/25/74. This segment, which was originally broadcast on French TV, captures the first six songs of Lou’s thirteen song set. The second segment contains four tracks that were recorded in Brussels in May 1974 and the final track is from Lou’s reunion with John Cale and Nico at Le Bataclan in 1972.

On Lou’s 1974 tour, the songs have been given a radical reworking to take on an urban, funky vibe. Most of the songs are longer than their respective studio versions which give the band room to jam and highlight prominent bass and keyboard. While Lou has always been the leader of the band, he had now moved to be the focal point as well. Lou is a peroxide blonde, dressed all in black, with large “Marty Rev” style sunglasses – he has completely handed off guitar playing off to Danny Weis and makes some pretty ‘interesting’ pre-disco dance moves while not singing. Lou mostly seems lost in his own world in front of the mic but does tell the crowd “Hey! Shut Up!” as the band is starting into “Ride Sally Ride”. This DVD is a great bridge between Lou’s experimental solo work and the polish of his later work as Lou was a veteran performer by the time of his next concert video – A Night with Lou Reed, which captures Lou live at the Bottom Line in 1983.

Track List - Paris 1974
- Intro/Sweet Jane
- I'm Waiting for the Man
- Lady Day
- Vicious
- Sally Can't Dance
- Ride Sally Ride



Track List - Brussels 1974
- Rock 'n Roll
- Heroin
- Walk on the Wild Side
- Goodnight Ladies



Reed/Cale - "Heroin", Le Bataclan, Paris '72 (Uploader disabled embedding)

There is some variation in quality between the three segments on the disc. The Paris footage is the best quality footage – it is filmed in color and is clear throughout. The source footage has deteriorated so this isn’t nowhere near comparable to “MTV style” live footage but it is very watchable (B/+) and the sound is solid. The Brussels footage is of noticeable lesser quality – while this segment was filmed in color, wide angles along with a good bit of generational loss make the video portion muddy. There are also some source video glitches in this segment. The redeeming factor is that audio is comparable to the Paris segment. The Le Bataclan footage was filmed in B&W and this footage is pretty good – the camera starts behind Reed and Cale but ends up with some nice close-ups of both men.

Links:
Lou Reed

Lou Reed - "Walk on the Wild Side" CD Review (XXL Media)

Lou Reed’s Walk on the Wild Side CD (XXL Media) is a re-release of Lou’s live-in-the-studio performance from Ultrasonic Studios which was recorded on Dec. 26, 1972 in Hempstead, NY. At the time this show was recorded, Lou’s second solo disc, Transformer, had come out the month prior and the songs on this ten track disc are predominately drawn from Transformer and the Velvet Underground’s back catalogue (Lou amusingly refers to one of the Velvet’s tracks as a ‘blast from the past’).



This disc is an important addition to Lou Reed’s catalog as his performance and the sound of his backing band, The Tots, sound like a logic extension of the Velvet Underground’s Loaded. In addition to the accessibility and spontaneous urgency of the performance, Lou seems (surprisingly) cheerful and upbeat, both of which stand in sharp contrast to some of his later live discs, specifically the heavy metal bombast of Rock & Roll Animal, which was recorded a year later, or Reed’s venom spitting performance on 1978’s Live: Take No Prisoners. Lou re-interprets most of the Velvet Underground tracks – playing a languid “I’m Waiting for My Man” and he adds back the verse that was dropped from the Velvet’s version of “Sweet Jane” during Loaded’s final mixing – and he gives a “punch” to the Transformer songs that David Bowie wasn’t able to capture in the studio. Lastly, this is the only legit live recording of “Walk It Talk It” and “I’m so Free” and the early version of “Berlin” (from Reed’s self-titled debut) only appeared elsewhere on the now hard-to-find live disc Le Bataclan ‘72.

For completists, there is one minor downside…this disc is missing two tracks that were part of the original radio broadcast. The first track is a brief interview that took place midway through the set where the interviewer asks Lou where Doug Yule is. The second missing track is “Rock n’ Roll”, which Reed closed the set with.

Links:
Lou Reed

Yes - "Live On Air" CD Review (XXL Media)

Yes - Live on Air documents the band on the last stop of the 90125 tour and this show was recorded at Estadio C. A. Velez Sarsfield in Buenos Aires, Argentina on February 1, 1985.

Ignore all the track lists for this disc that are posted on the internet as they list the complete set list for the 2+ hour show and this disc runs exactly 60 minutes. Sadly, even the track list on the package is wrong. Here is what is on this disc:

- "Leave It" (4:18)
- "Hold On" (6:27)
- "Changes / And You and I" (13:26)
- "Soon" (3:43)
- "Owner of a Lonely Heart" (4:57)
- "It Can Happen" (6:58)
- "City of Love" (9:34)
- "Starship Trooper" (6:19)
- "Gimme Some Lovin'" (3:54)

This show was pro-shot and was likely broadcast on TV as a Spanish-speaking announcers cuts in briefly between "Changes" and "And You and I". There are also a couple tracks from this show posted to YouTube.





While I think this is a disc that Yes fans are going to want to hunt down, I want to mention two 'issues' with the disc that may scare off hardcore audiophiles. The first is that the disc was recorded track-at-once so there are gaps between the songs. The second is that there is some slight "noise" in the recording that brings the overall sound down to a "VG+" as opposed to being a crystalline soundboard recording.

Regardless of these minor flaws, this disc captures an energized Yes and does a great job of documenting the 90125 tour. (Note: I always considered 9012Live: The Solos a complete throw-away so there is really no comparison between the two discs).

Links:
Yes

Neil Young - "Live on Air / The Lost Tapes Vol. 2" CD Review (XXL Media)

This second volume of Live on Air / The Lost Tapes captures an electric performance by Neil Young and Crazy Horse at Rock in Rio III. The show took place on January 20, 2001 and was simulcast in digital stereo so the sound on this disc is near perfect.

This 65 minute / six track disc captures the second half of Neil's 11 song performance and, as this was Neil's first performance in Brazil, the crowd responds enthusiastically as Neil plays extended versions of some of his better known songs. Below is the track list for the CD along with some videos from the show. One of the highlights of the disc is the false ending on "Like A Hurricane" and the feedback drenched, broken guitar string, bloody wrist jam that Neil goes into during the last few minutes of the song.

Live on Air / The Lost Tapes Vol. 2 Track List
- "Cortez the Killer" (12:23)
- "Like A Hurricane" (14:43)
- "Rockin' In The Free World" (9:58)
- "Powderfinger" (7:20)
- "Down By The River" (12:29)
- "Welfare Mothers" (8:14)





This is a solid release with my only complaint being that this disc, like all of the Live on Air discs I've heard thus far, was recorded track-at-once. This isn't a big deal though as a spare 5 minutes and a wave editor will quickly solve this problem. All that is really needed is for the first half of this show to come out on Vol. 3.

Links:
Neil Young