I love live recordings – at least, I should say that my favorite songs tend to have live versions and that I prefer those. Some live recordings aren’t great, of course, but some are perfect.
Anyway, here are three live songs that have the ability to move me more than modern transportation. If I can listen to one of these before I die (one and only one) I might kill myself trying to decide.
Pocahontas
Neil Young
Recorded at (Oh God I don’t know where!) as part of MTV Unplugged, the second take according to Wikipedia, in 1993.
Available on the Unplugged album.
Much more emotional, much slower and much better than the Rust Never Sleeps version, Young’s voice is more chilling when it’s allowed to echo like this. The harmonica adds, as always, a true tension and horror to the song, which has beautiful if depressing lyrics. I love Young, but not for Harvest and the like, nor for the later (rather odd) heavier rock…rather, I adore him for songs like Helpless (especially live), Thrasher, Pocahontas, Stringman and the like, where the raw emotion in his voice rips right through you and you find yourself cry-laughing in the fetal position.
They massacred the buffalo
Kitty corner from the bank
The taxis run across my feet
And my eyes have turned to blanks
In my little box
at the top of the stairs
With my Indian rug
and a pipe to share.
The River
Bruce Springsteen and the E-Street Band
Recorded at Madison Square Garden in June/July 2000
Available on the Live in New York City DVD and CD.
The River is a classic song, and needs very little elaboration about what makes it so good. I’d like to point out that this version is especially emotional and chilling, starting with the long and slow intro from Clarence, followed by the slow introduction of other elements. Of course, one’s heart just gets ripped out when Bruce gets on his harmonica at about 1:48. The soft and slow piano in the background with the sharp, tearing harmonica breaking through is unnervingly haunting. I love it. The song also has less of a Rock&Roll feel and more of a ‘eulogy for my best friend’ feel. The singing starts very hesitatingly, almost apologetic, as if it’s not the words that matter but the way they are presented. It picks up a bit at the first mention of the infamous river.
After a chilled session, he returns to the harmonica to haunt us again. The tone also changes quite a lot, becoming angry, when Bruce sings the following:
I got a job working construction for the Johnstown Company
But lately there ain’t been much work on account of the economy
and
Now those memories come back to haunt me
they haunt me like a curse
Before getting to the message (in my opinion)
Is a dream a lie if it don’t come true
Or is it something worse
that sends me down to the river
though I know the river is dry.
And then moving to the most emotional section, an almost crying-ly high vocal wailing at 8:10, which is enough to send shivers down my spine…just as it calms and comes to an end, the harmonica comes back for it’s third and final, and fatal, attack. Pure brilliance, it brings tears to my eyes every time.
Visions of Johanna
Bob Dylan
Recorded at the Free Trade Hall in Manchester in 1966 as part of his famous British Tour where he ‘went electric’ and changed music forever.
Available on The Bootleg Series Vol 4: The ‘Royal Albert Hall’ Concert
People far more competent and famous than me have covered this concert in as much detail as it deserves, and I won’t attempt to better there assessments. If you like Dylan, watch Scorsese’s film, watch Don’t Look Back, read Christopher Rick’s book, read the Rolling Stone articles and his Chronicles…I’m going to stop now, I think my point is made.
With the reslease of the ‘official’ bootleg, they decided to keep the erroneously attribution to the ‘Royal Albert Hall’. In a brilliant article on the importance of the show and the tour and the album, Seth Rogovoy writes:
…It is at once an historical document of unparalleled significance in rock and simply the greatest live rock ‘n’ roll album ever released. With clarity that defies the lapse of decades, it captures a moment when rock musicians and audiences alike were struggling over the role folk, rock and popular music would play in the greater culture. It also contains some of the most shocking, urgent, incendiary rock music ever made.
For over three decades, myths have swirled around this particular concert, in which a fan supposedly hurled the epithet “Judas!” at Dylan, presumably a reference to his so-called betrayal of folk music by plugging in and playing with The Hawks, a mostly Canadian rock ‘n’ roll outfit which was later to evolve into the great American folk-rock group The Band.
…
His vocal tone is at times downright beautiful, in his patented, unschooled, streetwise fashion, smooth and youthful, alternately deeply resonant and lightly playful and full of subtle wit, intelligence and with just a hint of a sneer. He caresses his syllables with a respect for diction he never showed before or afterwards — was it England that made him do it? There is a slight hint already of the smoother, country-like twang that he would affect later in the decade, or perhaps it was just there all the time and is simply more apparent given the hushed, naked quality of the production.
Instead of attempting to capture the atmosphere of this song, I’ll end with some lyrics and refer you on to listen to it yourself. I will, however, add that the song takes on a more and more emotional tone when listened to a second time in the context of the concert, as it is very much part of the calm before the storm and, in a sense, the last guiltless meal our ‘Judas’ can have or, is it perhaps, this very song that serves as the kiss?
Inside the museums, Infinity goes up on trial
Voices echo this is what salvation must be like after a while
But Mona Lisa musta had the highway blues
You can tell by the way she smiles
PS – notice how all the songs have harmonicas? Mmmm…The harmonicas play the skeleton keys and the rain