BARCLAY JAMES HARVEST: GLASNOST (1988)
1) Nova Lepidoptera; 2) Hold
On; 3) African; 4) Love On The Line; 5) Alone In The Night; 6) On The Wings Of
Love; 7) Mockingbird; 8) Rock'n'Roll Lady; 9) He Said Love; 10) Turn The Key; 11)
Medicine Man; 12) Kiev; 13) Child Of The Universe; 14) Life Is For Living; 15)
Poor Man's Moody Blues; 16) Berlin; 17) Loving Is Easy; 18) Hymn.
If, having lived way past the Gorbachev era,
you happened to forget the exact meaning of the Russian word glasnost', or if, on the contrary, you
are too young to have lived through that era and are in need of a good
translation, look no further than the fourth live album by Barclay James
Harvest! Of course, they forgot to put it on the album cover, but I will gladly
fill it in for you: «Glasnost' is
when they finally let us sing our crappy songs in East Berlin as well!»
Recorded July 14, 1987 at the Treptower Park
(the actual date would rather suggest a different location, like the Place de
la Bastille, but the BJH codex of honor explicitly states that all memorable dates in BJH history must
take place on German soil, or else John Lees' right to a life-long supply of
free Sauerkraut will be forfeit), this is a full CD — these days, actually a
nearly full double CD, containing the
entire concert — of songs played live before an appreciative audience of East
Germans, about a year prior to the demolition of The Wall, but with change
already high in the air. The band was invited to play as part of a larger
celebration of Berlin's 750th anniversary, and the attendance was measured at
way over 100,000, particularly since many were able to get in for free. (In
retrospect, I wouldn't probably go to a BJH concert around 1987 if you paid me,
but those times were sure different).
However, even if there actually was a feeling of liberty and excitement
at the venue (and there obviously must have been), it is not well translated
onto the recording. Chief reason for this is that, even at that juncture,
Barclay James Harvest still refused to come to terms with themselves as an
oldies act, focusing chiefly on new material. Consequently, we get an eye-(and
ear-)popping set of six songs from Face To Face — songs that deserve to be
forgotten upon first listen, much less revived in a live environment — and, on
the whole, more than half of the set is culled exclusively from the
post-Woolly era. With minor exceptions, all of these loyally reproduce the
studio recordings, bringing the sonic wonders of such late-period masterpieces
as ʽHe Said Loveʼ, ʽAfricanʼ, and ʽOn The Wings Of Loveʼ back to your tired
ears just as you thought you would never have to encounter them again.
Real golden oldies, in addition to the
ever-present ʽMockingbirdʼ, are also represented by the welcome return of the
hard-rocking arrangement of ʽMedicine Manʼ, done in good style and with the
expected frantic solo by Lees. Mid-1970s oldies, though more abundant in scope,
are also totally predictable — ʽPoor Man's Moody Bluesʼ to drown the crowd in
third-rate sentimentalism, ʽBerlinʼ to justify the paying crowd's expenses, and
ʽHymnʼ to merge with the crowd in throbbing religious ecstasy at the end of the
show. Only the album opener ʽNova Lepidopteraʼ is a relative surprise. but,
again, the live version is almost completely identical with the studio album's.
(At least the new CD edition makes it into a slightly unexpected opening — the
original would open with ʽPoor Man's Moody Bluesʼ!).
Clearly, there are only two groups of people
who should care in the least about this album — (a) the really hardcore BJH fans, those who simply need to have an official live record from Germany recorded on
proper equipment (something that Berlin
did not really offer), and (b) East Germans, particularly those who were there
on that memorable day and, naturally, attach special nostalgic value to the
show; for them this event may have had a very special meaning — anything, after
all, that makes one's life happier and nobody else's life unhappier, should be
worth owning and cherishing. That said, I'm fairly sure that many other good
things — better things — than this
show could have taken place in Berlin on that day, so, for justice' sake, let
us not forget how almost utterly awful this particular setlist is, and settle
with a thumbs
down after all. One thing must be said for Lees, though — he learned
to speak a fairly good German in all those years that the funny old Krauts were
sponsoring his personal and artistic existence.
Check "Glasnost" (CD) on Amazon
With a title like "Glasnost" you'd expect the concert to have been in Moscow or Leningrad rather than in Erich Honecker's East Berlin.
ReplyDeleteYeah, this should be called "Wallbreaker", similar to AC/DC "Ballbreaker". ;-) But, unlike AC/DC, BJH don't have balls.
DeleteBesides, uncle Erich let them in to play, though he surely was informed by Stasi about the meaning of the "Martyrs" lyrics. So they don't play it here.
"all memorable dates in BJH history must take place on German soil, or else John Lees' right to a life-long supply of free Sauerkraut will be forfeit"
ReplyDeleteClassic!! As good as explanation as any.