Reviews

Listening to the recent re-release of Get Yer Ya-Yas Out was a reminder of how few new live albums are ‘officially’ released these days. Last year we had releases from Van Morrison (Astral Weeks Live At The Hollywood Bowl), Leonard Cohen (Live In London), Eric Clapton & Steve Winwood (Live From Madison Square Garden) Jack Bruce & Robin Trower (Seven Moons Live).

All contemporary recordings, much of them comprising old songs.  (Of course, there was even the Gary Louris/Mark Olson album Live At Eddie’s Attic – but that was more of a promo to sell at gigs).

Like the excellent Ya-Yas box, most of the other live material released was from the vaults. Neil Young almost pounded us into submission with a deluge of archival footage. Cohen also had his 1970 Isle Of Wight recording released to coincide with a DVD and there was an acclaimed Nirvana performance from the Reading Festival. Locally, Stephen Cummings released a Byron Bluesfest recording (Live At Red Devil Park 2002) and re-releases from Mondo Rock (Primal Park) and McKenzie Theory (Out Of The Blue) consisted mainly of live material.

These days, there doesn’t seem to be quite the same impetus for the live album. After all, so much is freely available on YouTube that by the time a disc is released it is almost redundant. Someone told me that I could find most of last year’s Springsteen Giants Stadium concerts already online in their entirety – for free.

Some artists, like Louris & Olson, produce live albums as a marketing tool, to sell as they tour without having to share profits with a record label. Over the past few years in Austin I have been to see Bob Schneider at Threadgills and been able to purchase a double disc recording of the show within 15 minutes of its conclusion. In both cases the discs act as nice souvenirs. 

Increasingly, there is the tendency to produce a DVD of a show and then add an audio recording as an extra-tempter. Eventually, one suspects that the live album will be a thing of the past as we turn to Blu-Ray or whatever else comes along.

In the meantime, there is Glitter & Doom - the best of all live album releases last year and one which can stand alongside other memorable live recordings. The 2008 concerts from which the album is taken marked Waits’ first major US and European tour for some years – a fact that demanded some commemoration. (It was certainly our loss that he did not make it out here. Bluesfest next year, anyone?).

Tickets to all of Waits’ shows were at a premium – a tribute to an artist who has walked the periphery of the music industry, rarely skirting the mainstream, and has always challenged his audience.

There must have been a time when Waits was tempted to continue the same shtick that we heard on  Nighthawks – that of the eccentric and amusing Bohemian balladeer. His marriage and subsequent collaboration with Kathleen Brennan seemed to jolt him from that course.

In the past 30 years (has it really been that long since Heart Attack & Vine?) Waits has charted his own path, never pandering to audience or critics. Along the way, he has made music that increasingly seems to come from some other planet that only Waits and his family inhabit.

Tom Waits never offers his listeners the easy path. Sometimes – as in 2006’s Orphans, Brawlers & Bawlers -  you have to really put some work into the listening process. Occasionally, as on Real Gone and Mule Variations, the gems are almost immediately blinding. Every so often the music can be daunting and impenetrable and, sometimes, you wonder if he is pulling our collective leg. But more than most, Waits – like Dylan - continually rewards his audience.

This is the third official live album from Waits and, like its predecessors, is completely distinctive. One thing that will hardly surprise, therefore, is that Glitter & Doom is not a collection of ‘hits.’ In fact, there is not one song that has even the remotest tinge of commercial success – apart from ‘Trampled Rose’ - but you think that others such as ‘Fannin Stret,’ ‘Falling Down,’  and ‘Make It Rain’ should have been hits for someone!

It is hardly recycling old material as so many others do. Although the songs do go back to 1985 the list favours the past decade or so. While there are some links to Waits’ previous work – the power of  1988’s Big Time and the hip dialogue of the 1975 classic Nighthawks At The Diner – this is Waits in his current persona. That rasping voice – like Captain Beefheart imitating Bob Dylan – is one of the most distinctive in modern music as it saws through the songs (and almost always in tune!).

Taken from ten shows in the US, UK and continental Europe, the band features two of Waits’ sons – Casey and Sullivan – along with Patrick Warren (keyboards), bassist Seth Ford-Young and multi-instrumentalists Vincent Henry and Omar Torez. You might wonder how Waits could possibly bring to life some of his complex compositions until you hear this awesome ensemble.

The penultimate track, ‘Story,’ introduces the melancholic ‘Lucky Day’ and previews the second disc in the set, Tom Tales – 36 minutes of patter that ranges from the hilarious to the bizarre.

Maybe we don’t have live albums of the impact of Ya-Yas, Humble Pie’s Rockin’ The Fillmore, Van’s It’s Too Late To Stop Now , The Who’s Live At Leeds or even The Allmans’ Live At Fillmore East but I reckon that when people start talking about the great live album of 2009 it will be Glitter & Doom.