Tag Archives: Best live albums

30 Best live albums countdown: 28 – One for the road by The Kinks

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One for the road 1

A double album from a criminally underrated period in The Kinks’ carreer is number 28, One for the Road.

The Kinks‘ U.S. career never flourished like that of their British Invasion peers, but that’s another and very interesting story. The Kinks is the quintessentially British band – especially in the nostalgic bittersweet songs of vocalist/rhythm guitarist Ray Davies.

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The Kinks enjoyed arise in popularity in the U.S. in the late ’70s and early ’80s. The gold-selling 1980 double-live album One for the Road is a fascinating document of english gentlemen who paved the way for heavy metal and punk, but always made great pop songs.
This album is my choice for the 28 place on my countdown of the 30 best live albums.

It may be considered an odd choice. partly because many felt that Kinks was over the top at the time and also because they was seen as strangely unmodern, especially in Europe. But that dosn’t matter, I discovered Kinks at this time (two years later actually), we were fed great concerts from Germany’s Rockpalast TV-show and The Kinks was one of the bands that came through our TV sets. I was mainly into punk and new wave but two bands felt very right, even if they were very old (in our eyes at the time), namely The Who and The Kinks. They were just as New Wave as anything we heard at the time. My love for both those bands is an everlasting one, and I have dug into their past eagerly.

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One for the road also proves that Dave Davies is an extremely underrated lead guitarist. The guitar sound is very “punk like”. I belive Sex Pistols learnt a great deal from Kinks, both the guitar style (listen to Where have all the good times gone and Pressure) and the way Ray Davies delivered his lyrics. Brothers Dave Davis and Ray Davies, bass guitarist Jim Rodford, drummer Mick Avory, and guest keyboardists Ian Gibbons and Nick Newell recorded One for the Road at several concerts in 1979 and 1980.

One for the road 3 - lola (live)

Lola is the best-known track from this album, and this live performance was a minor hit single; Ray Davies’ teasing intro shows his playful side. Listen to the Spotify album at the bottom of the post and you will know what I’m talking about.

Lola:

The Hard Way, Low Budget, a raw, stripped-down Superman, Celluloid Heroes, and You Really Got Me are the other fantastic songs on this album. They may be faster or slower or very different, but they are just as good as their studio album counter parts. I also love the riff on Catch me now I’m Falling, where did they get that one? He, he.

Superman:

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30 Best live albums countdown: 29 – Waiting for Columbus by Little Feat

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Little-Feat-Waiting-For-Columbus

At number 29 in my countdown of the 30 best live albums in history, I have chosen Waiting for Columbus by Little Feat.

Many considered Little Feat to be over their golden age by 1977, but I think this live album shows them wrong. This is a band at its peak!

Willin’ 1977, Rockpalast:

Waiting for Columbus is the first live album by the “swamp rock” band, Little Feat. The album was recorded during seven performances in 1977. The first four shows were held at the Rainbow Theatre in London on August 1–4, 1977. The last three shows were recorded in George Washington University’s Lisner Auditorium on August 8–10 that same summer in Washington, D.C.

Little Feat Waiting 2

The band was backed by the Tower of Power horn section with whom they had recorded in previous studio sessions. And they really fill out the sound!

Dixie Chicken (w/Emmylou Harris, Bonnie Raitt and Jesse Winchester):

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The 30 Best Live Albums according to Hallgeir

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Live albums, a lot of people doesn’t like them, I love’em! I am not very concerned with sound quality. What I mean is that I like good sound on the recordings, but a lot of factors that are more important; the “feel”, the energy, the collection of songs and the general performance. It is nice to have good quality, but sometimes the energy of a show comes through even on bad recorded concerts.

When I decided to make this list I also made the decision not to do a “critics” list, my list should be made of my “love of the album”, not it’s place in history. It has to be a list of albums that I enjoy listening to, records that excite me, that has good versions of familiar songs and fantastic versions of songs that maybe isn’t that good on the studio albums.

Some of the albums will have long posts other will have shorter descriptions and more videos, all depending on my mood.

Should I include bootlegs?
At first I meant to do that, but I will do another list with my favourite unofficial live albums and outtakes. This list consists of legal, officially released live material.

Some of the records where bootlegs at some point, but have been released officially at a later stage. I have chosen to not limit my choice to one album per artist. If an artist have more than one live album that should be considered, well I have considered all of them and included them if I think they belong on the list.

When we did our lists of albums by favourite artists to include on our About us page, we decided not to include live albums. But we did, I included one and Egil included two! I included At Folsom Prison by Johnny Cash. Now, you would think that this meant that it has to be my favourite live album. That is not the case. That list was limited to just one album per artist, and therefore gives a wrong impression. It is not a list of favourite albums. If it where I believe Egil would have three or four more Dylan albums on his list, I would also have included more than one album by some artists.

What I’m trying to explain is that there are artists on that list that have better live albums than At Folsom Prison (not many, but they do exist…).

My list has Spotify links if the albums are on Spotify, and I have included YouTube videos from the concerts recorded when I have found them.

The first entry will be posted later today…

 

– Hallgeir

Posts in this series:
Introduction
27. On Stage by Elvis Presley
28. One for the road by The Kinks
29. Waiting for Columbus by Little Feat
30. Wings over America by Wings