THE BEAU BRUMMELS: LIVE! (1974; 2000)
1) Nine Pound Hammer; 2) You
Tell Me Why; 3) Turn Around / Singing Cowboy; 4) Gate Of Hearts; 5) Lonely
People; 6) Music Speaks Louder; 7) Lisa; 8) Tennessee Walker; 9) Don't Talk To
Strangers; 10) Laugh, Laugh; 11) Lonesome Town; 12) Free; 13) Man And Woman
Kind; 14) Restless Soul; 15) Her Dream Alley; 16) City Girl; 17) Paper Plane;
18) Just A Little; 19) Love Can Fall.
For a band as «historically insignificant» as
the Beau Brummels, they do seem to have a rather disproportionate amount of
archival releases honoring their legacy — including a monumental 3-CD
collection of demos, outtakes and rarities (San Fran Sessions) that is not easily available, and, anyway, the
perspective of sitting through 60 samples of «second-rate» material by one of
America's classic «second-rate» band may not look all that appealing even to an
obsessive completist: a gross excess
of the allocated quota if there ever was one.
In its place, it is more useful and pleasant to
mention this, much shorter, archival
release of a live show that the reunited Brummels played in February '74 in
some little-known pub near Sacramento. For some reason, the show happened to
be professionally recorded — with no less than excellent sound quality — only
to surface officially twenty-five years later, licensed by the small Dig Music
label based in Sacramento.
There are two reasons to be happy about it.
First, this is the only Beau Brummels live album in existence, and what is a
rock band without a live album, even a bad one? Second, the time of the show
caught the Brummels in a highly creative mode — Ron Elliott was writing like
crazy for the 1975 reunion album, and most of that writing went through a live
testing period; 13 out of 19 songs are newly-penned, and, what is most
interesting, only three of them actually ended up on The Beau Brummels, so there is a swarm of previously unavailable
material here, and not in «raw demo» form, either: these are fully fleshed out
compositions that the reformed band was not afraid to offer for their limited,
but rowdy audience.
As a live unit, the reformed Brummels sounded
predictably professional and predictably not all that exciting compared to the
studio recordings. The vocal harmonies are not too good, particularly when it
comes to stretching out on the high notes — the "babe, babe, babe"
chorus on ʽDon't Talk To Strangersʼ goes painfully on the ears, and Sal's
«macho bleating» (I'm all out of words, goddammit) on ʽMan And Woman Kindʼ is
another seriously stressful moment. But in general, when they are not trying
too hard, the outcome matches the quality of the original recordings just fine
— ʽNine Pound Hammerʼ and ʽTurn Aroundʼ are the major highlights, and the
melancholic harmonica of ʽLaugh, Laughʼ has not lost a drop of the original
melancholia.
But generally, the album is really worth it for
several of the new songs that did not make it onto the 1975 record (they might,
perhaps, have made it onto subsequent recordings, had the reformed band
persevered for a couple extra seasons). ʽMusic Speaks Louderʼ is a lively,
friendly pub romp very much in the spirit of the Lovin' Spoonful, and it's
funny how its wah-wah-driven guitar parts unexpectedly contrast with the
overall soft folksy melody. Bassist Declan Mulligan's ʽLisaʼ is a moderately
heavy rocker with idiot lyrics, but a nice muscular drive that would be so
sorely lacking on The Beau Brummels.
So is Elliott's ʽRestless Soulʼ; and ʽFreeʼ is one of the band's prettiest
anthemic ballads (although, once again, it loses momentum whenever Valentino
starts stretching out — alas, Frank Sinatra this guy is not).
Overall, it is very good that the show does not
go too heavy on the «classics» and leaves such a huge space for new material,
even if this prevents it from becoming a well-rounded, conclusive «live
retrospective». Altogether, there is more energy, passion, and interest here
than the band demonstrated in the studio — maybe because by the time they did
get around to the studio, disillusionment had already started seeping in. As
it is, Beau Brummels Live! may not
deserve its exclamation point, but it may at least be a better example of the reformed
band at its brief inspirational peak, so one more final thumbs up is not out of the
question.
Check "Beau Brummels Live!" (MP3) on Amazon
If the listener can refrain from expecting 1964-65 this can be a quite enjoyable album. The sound quality is very good as are the performances. I find little fault with the vocal harmonies and Sal sounds great as he usually did then. They weren't the same band as before and what's what's wrong with that. For the devoted fan,it's quite a treat.
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