Search - Caravan :: Show of Our Lives

Beware

08/29/2002

(2 out of 5 stars)

"The sound quality on this is terrible; apparently this was taped off the radio or with poor recording equipment at some gigs (no information is given). You're much better off with some of the other live releases such as Oblivion Fishermen, which has most of the same songs. I don't know where the "official" reviewer of this got the idea that Robert Wyatt and Kevin Ayers were members of this group. I gave this two stars rather than one because, after all, they're great Caravan songs."

BBC Radio Sessions, Great Performances, Poor Fidelity.

r-devic-saint | Pittsburgh, PA | 04/25/2006

(4 out of 5 stars)

"The criticism of this disc is most often that the fidelity is not of high quality, and that it is poorly annotated with no information about the dates and personnel of the recording. To solve the later issue. Here's the basic info:

(1-4) BBC Alan Black Show March 11,1971 (6-9) BBC Radio 1 In Concert October 1970 Pye Hastings (g,vo), Richard Sinclair (b,vo), David Sinclair (key), Richard Coughlan (dm)(5) BBC John Peel Show February 7, 1974 Pye Hastings (g,vo), David Sinclair (key), John G. Perry (b), Richard Coughlan (ds), Geoffrey Richardson (vln)Reading Festival August 24, 1975 Pye Hastings (vo,g), Geoffrey Richardson (vla), Jan Schelhaas (key), Mike Wedgwood (b), Richard Coughlan (ds,perc)

As for the fidelity, the radio recordings are much better than the 3 songs from the Reading Festival. If you are an audiophile you will be frustrated by the quality. If you are familiar with the quality of bootleg recordings you will find these cuts very listenable. Most importantly these are wonderful, very spirited performances, many quite different (in instrumentation and solos) than their counterparts on the bands classic albums. Some of the songs here are in my opinion better than those on those on the albums.

So make an informed decision, this is a great historical document of the band in it's prime with less than studio quality fidelity. It is generally inexpensive, available, and the recordings included are quite rare. In my opinion the pros far outweigh the cons on this release."