Entertainment For Lively Minds
Hello Cleveland!
Idly flicking through the latest edition of "Rolling Stone" today (yes, yes, I know, but it was a one dollar subscription through Amazon, don't judge me), I noticed that Rush have just released a live album of their Time Machine tour. By my count, this means they have now released NINE live albums, to whit:
All The World's A Stage
Exit Stage Left
A Show Of Hands
Different Stages (Triple CD!)
Rush In Rio (another triple)
R30
Grace Under Pressure Tour
Snakes And Arrows Live
Time Machine 2011
With a tally of 18 studio albums (not counting the Feedback EP), this represents a ratio of one live release for every 2 studio releases.
Is there another band with such a high Live-To-Studio release ratio?
(I would like to point out that I love The Rush, in case anyone wonders, and personally speaking there is no such thing as too many versions of Tom Sawyer or Closer To The Heart)
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Well idnoring the Pixies \ P Jam OS
of releasing entire tours as that's not quite the same - well the Stones have a had a few
Live Licks
Get Yer Ya Yas Out
Flashpoint
Love You Live
Still Life
Stripped
Shine a Light
No Security
Rock N Roll Circus
Got Live If You want It
and now the live Cd with the Texas 1978 DVD and Brussels Affair 1973
Are there any more?
The Fall
almost a ratio of 1:1
30 Live albums, 29 Studio Albums.
This is partly due to a complex web of licensing deals which resulted in a torrent of semi-official CD releases particularly during the 90s and 00s.
Wire,
16 Live albums (albeit several which are download only 'official bootlegs)
12 Studio albums.
Correction
they've just released a new one, so that's 17 live albums by Wire.
Damn-uh!
of course, the Fall.
I've got Totales Turn and the Last Night at Hammersmith (for sentimental reasons) any other good uns in the pile?
I've only heard a fraction of them
but for I think The Fall In a Hole is well worth having, 1983 vintage Fall on tour in Aus/NZ..two drummers and the definitive line up of Marc Riley, The Hanleys and Craig Scanlon. Stunning stuff.
..but get the Sanctuary 2CD re-issue as the previous CD versions were mastered from scratched vinyl complete with skips!
Fall-ah
A part of America Therein, 1981 is my favourite Fall album. Hex Induction Hour era, and you can get a CD that also includes the Slates EP.
"From the riot torn streets of Manchester, England..."
Frank Zappa
Out of 88 albums listed on the FZ website, 32 of them are live, or contain some live material. Many of them are also double or triple CD sets.
However, that figure doen't include the official (but now deleted) Beat the Boots box sets which between them contain around 15 live albums.
http://www.zappa.com/fz/discography/
Strewth
What a lazy arse FZ was. Why can't these musicians actually work for aliving. Only 103 albums? He should have been in a real band, like the Stone Roses.
Ver Floyd (Gilmour incarnation)
Two (count 'em!) studio albums, and yet you have Delicate Sound Of Thunder and Pulse, plus Is There Anybody Out There emerged from the vaults as well.
As a solo artist Gilmour followed On An Island with Live In Gdansk, keeping up his strike rate there too.
Grateful Dead...
There's hundreds of 'em.
16 studio albums (depending on how you count 'em)
In excess of 150 live albums - and, since appointing a new archivist/librarian (David Lemieux) there's a new series of Dave's Picks live albums starting next month.
Mind you, many of the live albums are multi-disc sets - the recent Complete Europe '72 box contained 70 CDs. According to my iTunes, there are almost 600 individual official live CDs so far.
Leonard Cohen
11 studio albums and 6 live albums, so pretty much the same ratio as Rush.
(Live Songs, Cohen Live, Field Commander Cohen, Live In London, Live At The Isle Of Wight, Songs From The Road.)
Stiff Little Fingers
9 Studio Albums
11 Live Albums
(Note: 3 of these Live Albums are from the same show (Aberdeen 1979) but count as separate releases)
A ratio of 1:1.2225
Aztecs!
Aussie rock legends Billy Thorpe & The Aztecs released 5 LPs during their brief lifetime (1970-74) comprising:
The Hoax Is Over [live in a studio]
Aztecs Live! [er, live]
Live At Sunbury (2LP and, yes, live)
More Arse Than Class (studio)
Steaming At The Opera House (2LP, and yes, live at Sydney Opera House)
Aside from recent expanded reissues on CD, a couple of years ago a posthumous 'new' album was released - Long Live Rock'n'Roll - and, guess what, it was live.
So even if we count The Hoax Is Over as a studio LP, that's a 2:1 ratio for live albums.
Here's two filmed tracks from the Melbourne Town Hall concert that made up their first live album. Apparently the first track, 'Somebody Left Me Crying' was literally made up on the spot - either way it's an incredible vocal performance:
Blimey
On the basis of that clip I've just gone and bought Live at Sunbury. Thank you.
Good choice James!
... It's probably their strongest album. They cut a load of studio singles but never quite nailed a great studio album (More Arse Than Class had great production but patchy material). Ironically, the closest the Aztecs got to a great studio Lp was a duo Lp by Billy & Warren, the keyboard player, with some other guys on bass & drums, released c.1973...
If you like the Sunbury reissue CD (and its a lovely package), look out for the Sunbury 72 festival film on DVD (comes with a slew of extra Aztec clips including the whole of the Melbourne 72 concert film)...
Rush - Hello Cleveland! (again)...
...by coincidence I noticed last night on amazon (UK) that a Rush CD called 'ABC 1974' is available - being a radio show from Cleveland that year. No one seems sure if its a bone fide 'official' release or not. But it's another Rush live album...
I'll concede
the sheer weight of Zappa/Grateful Dead releases, but most of those are archival. I guess I'm talking about those albums which have been released during a band's active lifespan.
Blue Öyster Cult
Have a 6:12 ratio as well.
One studio album was a compilation done the way that the songs are played live. If that makes any sense. So I've not counted that in either camp.