Hey, Community gang, Iām working up a new Community-driven playlist for next month with a companion blog. Iām always so impressed with your passionate music posts, and I thought itād be fun to share your thoughts on some of the prominent artists and selections Iāll feature. So thenā¦drumroll
All submissions are welcomed: subjective soliloquies, impassioned impressions, obsessive odes, feverish free-form fusillades, scintillating scholarly shoutouts, academic asides, expert essays, first experiences from your personal music journeys ā itās your thing, do whatcha wanna do. Iāll run them; there are no wrong answers.
Post here in the thread, or feel free to message me at @jamie. Please note that sharing means youāre okay with us publishing your wonderful music comments on our blog, etc.
Must count as one of the demo tracks of my library. Especially the percussion bits at the start. many YEARS ago I hear it when I was buying speakers , the Hi Fi shop had just found it and it was on DVD, I was shopping for 5.1 so I finished up with 2 x Quad 21 and 2 x Quad 11 and a Sunbird (?) sub sadly all long gone
In term of musical quality it is spoilt by audience interactions , I am not a great lover of live albums. if I want Hotel California I go to the studio album
The good bit was after re-listening the track it sparked an afternoon of Joe Walsh listening from before the Eagles, James Gang and Barnstorm (AHHH Roon)
The other great percussion demo is Wrapped Around Your Finger from Policeās Certifiable
I heard this particular recording for the first time a few years ago on a Roon Radio session, and soon afterwards, it was added to my library.
Hotel California is a classic track, immediately recognizable by everyone, so hearing this version with its acoustic guitar intro, felt like a reimagining and fresh take of the iconic song. Thatās something I expect from live performances. And, unlike @Mike_O_Neill, I like to hear the audience in live recordings (Joan Armatradingās Live at Asylum Chapel edits out the audience and is worse for this.)
Indeed, I remember seeing Michael Jackson (Bad tour) in the 1980s, and was very disappointed. His performance and presentation was perfect ā a facsimile of the studio recordings. Whatās the point of that?
For me, Hell Freezes Over ticks most of the boxes for a live album, and is definitely worth listening to from your favourite chair at the end of the day.
I will admit, I have no love for the Eagles, and in descending order my preferred members were Felder, Frey, Walsh, Henley, Schmidt.
That said, I have always felt like Hell Freezes Over was a blatant 90ās money grab entered into by men who didnāt even like each other in an attempt to cash in on the middle age of boomers with expendable income. They marketed and merchandised it ad nauseum and I didnāt feel that the live recording quality matched the obvious high production value of the video. I own plenty of live takes that arenāt overshadowed by the audience, but this album has excessive extraneous noise.
Henleyās constant acoustic guitar body drumming throughout the album is also distracting and not sonically pleasant to me, and his insufferable ego just pours through, especially on Hotel California. This would have been a tune better done acoustically with Linda Ronstadt, who showcases more talent singing about the Plow King than Henley does most of his solo career.
When viewed against a masterpiece of both live audio and video recording in Oingo Boingoās Farewell in ā95, Hell Freezes Over looks and feels even more like musical exploitation for money than an attempt at a world-class live performance for their fans.
It might have been cool to be there in person (minus the industry changing ticket price rape), but listening to the recording just reminds me that nostalgia+high prices= high perceived value despite being less well recorded than several of my Slayer bootlegs.
