Tuesday, 27 October 2015

Blondie - In The Flesh


Rating: 5/5

Review:
A fine concert



This is a very good recording of a fine radio concert from 1977.

Blondie were still a slightly raw, slightly punk-ish band at this time, and their performance is true to form: driving, slightly angry and very, very good.  Debbie Harry is in fine voice and Clem Burke's drumming is especially brilliant, I think.  It has the slight warts-and-all feel of a live show with Harry not quite hitting some of her notes in the middle – especially some of the less emphatic, transitional notes, which aren't great in places – but that's what I like about a live recording: it's real, without studio tricks and you get a real sense of the musicians themselves.  The sound quality is pretty good, thank heavens, and it's a fine set list.  Debbie Harry chats a little between songs but not much and the sense of New Wave urgency comes over well. 

I was nervous trying this, because there have been some disgracefully poor-quality releases of archive recordings of bands recently (Canned Heat at Carnegie hall is a particularly terrible example) but this is very good.  If you like Blondie, or just music of this period, don't hesitate – you'll really like this.

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