Customer Reviews

Caught Live + 5

5 star:		(17)
4 star:		(12)
3 star:		(5)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(3)

 

 

In 1977, as the Moody Blues were coming to the end of their six-year sabbatical from recording, they released "Caught Live + 5," a double-album that featured three sides of a live concert recorded at the Royal Albert Hall on December 12, 1969, and one side of 5 rare studio tracks. Very similar in format to the 1982 double-album by Genesis, "Three Sides Live," but "Caught Live + 5" proves that the Moody Blues got to this concept first. The live concert recording---the only live Moodies release featuring original keyboardist Mike Pinder---is excellent, with the Moodies giving some of the tunes a refreshing, rough-and-tough live treatment, especially "Gypsy," "Peak Hour," and "Ride My See-Saw." The live portion of the album shows what a tight band the Moodies are, as they also give tremendous performances of other favorites like "Dr. Livingston I Presume," "Tuesday Afternoon," "Nights In White Satin," "Legend Of A Mind," and the progressive-rock suite of "Have You Heard" & "The Voyage." For those of us who never got to see the classic Moodies line-up live, the "Caught Live" portion of the album is definitely the next best thing. As for the five studio songs, they're all quite good. John Lodge's "Gimme A Little Somethin'" is a nice number, and Mike Pinder's "Please Think About It" is a fine, slow-but-steady piano shuffler. But it is Justin Hayward who shines the brightest with his trio of compositions. "Long Summer Days" is a marvelous light-hearted song, and "King And Queen" and "What Am I Doing Here?" are both wonderful, dramatic, haunting Moody Blues songs.With the long-awaited, brand-new Moody Blues studio album "Octave" still a year away, the Moodies sent their fans a very generous postcard with "Caught Live + 5," a most-appreciated combo platter of vintage live and studio material. For the diehard Moody Blues fan, this album is a must-have.

It's tragic that this is the extent of early Moodies live stuff that has been released. And they probably could have found a better show than this random, short 1969 set. But the fact that it's the only official early live stuff available is what makes it such a must for any Moodies collection.

The "+5", in case you don't know, is 5 songs from their classic period that for some reason or another didn't make it onto an album. They are all awesome; "King and Queen" and "What Am I Doing Here" are masterpieces.

As for the live stuff, it's awesome too. The highlight is a live rendition of the final third of "On the Threshold of a Dream," which consists of "Are You Sitting Comfortably," "The Dream" and the "Have You Heard" trilogy. It's wonderful to hear "Have You Heard" live, as it is such a masterpiece, and "Are You Sitting Comfortably" is mystical and achingly beautiful here... Ray's flute work is amazing! Far superior to the album cut! Other highlights include "Legend of a Mind," "Nights in White Satin" and "Peak Hour." There are a few weak performances, but even those are fascinating. The banter in between songs, with Mike Pinder doing most of the talking, is also awesome. I agree with an earlier reviewer that liked the raw sound of this album in contrast to the carefully orchestrated "Red Rocks" tracks. I have seen the Moodies perform with and without the orchestra, and I will always prefer them without, because their instruments are in the spotlight all the time.

It's a unique and very cool concept to get a live show and studio rarities on one cd. It's really a great deal!

I will admit that the sound quality isn't the best...but anybody who was around in 1969 can agree that most all live recordings from this era sound about the same.

If you're a long time Moodies fan and never got to see them live....and if you never grabbed the vinyl version when first released in 1977...this would be a bargain for you....and a nice addition to your collection.

The recordings acoustics are similar to that of an arena...I believe it was recorded at the Royal Albert Hall...as that is the building pictured on the case. I personally like the audience and background noises....it gives a bit of realism and an audience vantage point to the listener.

The 5 bonus tracks were also released on the PRELUDE cd..along with 6 other unreleased tracks from the early days. Something else that all true devoted Moodies fans should be without.

If you listen to most "live" recordings since the seventies, you will notice that the audience applause is edited to allow for more music. Any ramblings of the group is also edited except for the most important announcements. That does not happen here. The listener hears Ray Thomas banter on as if he forgot what song was next and the clapping between songs is real - that is, far too long for a recording. To make it worse, this concert was recorded in 1968 (this album was releasd in 1977) when live recordings were very difficult. The sound quality is simply poor and sadly, no one went back to redigitize this. It is a shame, as the Moody Blues perform fantastic concerts wherever they go.

The 5 great things about this album are the five studio songs at the end. They are classic late sixties Moodies songs and make up for the live recording. This was a clever move on the marketers part, who were given less than enough material for four sides of the original double album (yes, this is a single CD). They added these last five songs to further the purchase appeal. It worked.

The "Red Rocks" concert is far superior. Buy this for the five songs and "Red Rocks" for the live quality.

I agree with what the previous reviewers have said: John's falsettos almost hurt your ears; the sound is more "raw" than what we've heard since they returned to full-time touring in '92.

But you know what? That's what makes Caught Live so interesting and so much fun. It is EXACTLY where the Moody Blues were in 1969...experimenting with their sound and letting the audience in on the experiment.

Some observations of my own: Mike Pinder was very much the heart of this incarnation of the band. You can hear the beauty of the strings in his Mellotron, and his sound is so recognizable and more lush when compared to anything Patrick Moraz and Paul Bliss have done in his wake. It also appears, as I listen to this for the first time on CD, that he was the live leader of the band. I'm pretty sure that's Mike introducing all the songs and speaking on behalf of the band. And I really think that his harmony is missed on the band's later work.

As for the songs...I've wanted the current band to do "Peak Hour" for a long time. The live version on Caught Live only reinforces that feeling. Obviously they can't do "Have You Heard," since it's Mike's song, but I agree with the earlier reviewer that it is absolutely splendid. "Gypsy" definitely sounds like an alternate take, but I love the fact that it's not an exact reproduction of the album version. I'd love for the band to resurrect this one in concert. "Never Comes The Day" is an under-rated classic and sounds great here.

This album is definitely worth having, if only to compare the differences between the Moody Blues of 1969, 1992 and 1999.

To start off, what a topnotch remastering job on this splendid release! :)

I was so glad when "Caught Live + 5" was finally released on CD, back in 1996! When I had a copy of the album on cassette, and compared it to the vinyl release, I was shocked at how much material was edited out of the cassette version ... I guess it was a matter of fitting the entire album onto the cassette, but thank goodness the CD featured the unedited full versions of the live songs, as heard on the vinyl release. I was also impressed that all of the material between the two original records fit on a single CD!

For the live portion of the album, "Gypsy" was a great way to open up the act, and it really rocked ... Both the mellotron and lead guitar really grab the listener's attention, here!

"The Sunset" sounded awesome on this release, and since the mellotron was really powerful, on this occasion, I call this the "To Our Children's Children's Children" rendition of the song! :) Notice that, on this track (and also on "The Dream"), Mike Pinder's voice is more audible on the left stereo channel, within the stereo field ... This reminded me of the stereo trick used on the earlier recordings of The Beatles (Ex: "Day Tripper"/"We Can Work It Out"), where the voices were offset to one of the stereo channels!

On "Dr. Livingstone, I Presume," you can hear some amusing screams, here and there, probably by John Lodge!

Both "Never Comes The Day" and "The Voyage" feature magnificent mellotron solos from Mike, near the end of each track. On the latter composition, the mellotron replaced the pianos from the original version, but the piece was played just as well, here!

The harmonies of John Lodge and Ray Thomas are great, as they sing the bridge to "Peak Hour" twice. Mike's mellotron solo is outstanding, once again.

The Moodies really rock well on both the bridge and ending of "Tuesday Afternoon!"

"Are You Sitting Comfortably?" features some well-done flute and mellotron solos.

Mike delivers Graeme Edge's poem, "The Dream," in an enthusiastic way, and I love the way he recreates the wailing sounds of the mellotron for the backdrop, sounding much like the original version!

On both parts of "Have You Heard," I liked the "gust of air" effects in-between the individual lines in the song, as well as the group effort of each of The Moodies chanting in their own way, in unison, near the end of Part Two.

The closing sequence of the live set was nice, featuring "Nights In White Satin" (More great harmonies from John and Ray on the "Oh, how I love you," parts), "Legend of a Mind" (An amusing mellotron track during the "Along the coast..." part of the song), and "Ride My See-Saw" (Featuring powerful drums from Graeme in the intro, as well as an amusing count-in, sounding more like "Fee... Fo... Fee... Fee," rather than "One... Two... Three... Four!").

To me, the "+5" tracks are just as enjoyable as any of the material from the "Classic 7" albums. :)

"Gimmie a Little Somethin'" sounds like it was recorded during the same recording sessions as "Dr. Livingstone, I Presume" or "House of Four Doors." There are some nice flute tracks in-between the verses, and I like the ascending notes on the piano and mellotron during the chorus ... Great stereo mix with excellent separation of the different instruments and vocals, too (Best experienced through headphones)!

Both "Please Think About It" and "Long Summer Days" feature wonderful harmonies and piano tracks.

"King and Queen" has a similar rhythm track to "Legend of a Mind," once the chorus kicks in. I enjoy this Justin Hayward track as much as "Voices In The Sky" and "The Actor" ... The acoustic guitars and mellotrons really stand out on this track, as well as Graeme's drumming on the chorus and during the fadeout!

"What Am I Doing Here?" features a lot of layered soaring mellotron tracks, making it sound like a selection from "Children's Children!" I like the piano and additional mellotron pieces during the fadeout, plus Graeme's thunderous drumming, especially near the end of the track, is outstanding!

To finish up, I enjoyed "Caught Live + 5" just as much as the "Classic 7" albums ... That's why I gave it the nickname "Classic 8" in my review title! The album was like an addition to the other amazing albums from the same time period. :) Thanks for reading! God Bless... :)

I find it a little hard to understand the negative reviews for this CD. The "classic" line up of Moody Blues is intact here: Hayward, Lodge, Pinder, Thomas, Edge. That's the line up that produced those great first seven albums. Hear those, and you'll realize that the band (and producer) could create terrific studio albums. But if you want more from that line up, you'll have to go for this disc, because Mike Pinder left the band between the seventh and eighth albums, and hasn't returned [author's edit - actually Mike Pinder IS on the 8th album, Octave, but didn't join the live tour for it and thereby was out of the band from that point].

Here the band plays a live set at the Royal Albert Hall on December 12 1969, and also gives you 5 studio tracks that were recorded during the creation of those first seven albums (but not included on those albums). One amazing thing here is that the 5 studio tracks are good, really good. They are finished songs, nothing wrong with them at all, other than they either didn't fit the theme of whatever studio album they happened to be doing, or there just wasn't enough space on a vinyl LP of about 45 minutes maximum length.

The other amazing thing is that the Moodies perform very well at their live show, and the recorded sound quality is quite impressive for the time. So why are my comments at odds with the comments of several others here? Probably because I didn't expect the raw live performance to sound like a polished studio album, and I didn't expect the sound quality of a 1969 live recording to be spectacular by modern standards. If you do have those expectations, sure you may be disappointed. But this is real music folks, performed live, no overdubs, one "take" only. The pace is a little fast on some of the songs, I'll agree with that. You get used to it though. Now how does this compare to the other live Moody CDs? The recorded sound quality on those other live CDs is better than here, and the performance on the other live CDs is more like what you hear on the studio recordings. But which of the official live recordings has the "best" performance?

Personally, I like this one the best. Because it's got Mike Pinder playing the keys/mellotron, just Mike - not a replacement keyboardist, or two keyboardists at once, no matter how good those multi-keyboardists might be. This performance just has just Graeme Edge playing the drums, not Graeme plus a second drummer - even as great the second drummer that they've had in recent years truly has been. This one has Ray Thomas on flute, the original, even as good (and attractive) as the woman who has recently played flute for the Moodies has been. You see, for me this is the best live Moodies CD because this is just "the five" that made it all happen, back at the time when it was happening. No string orchestra, as nice as that might sound. No back up singer/dancers. No second drummer, no extra keyboards, no additional musicians of any type - this is not a "Las Vegas Revue" type of performance. It's just the original five, live and raw, doing the best they can. When you hear this without the expectation of a flawless, crystalline, note for note, tempo for tempo reproduction of the studio albums, I think you'll greatly enjoy this. If not, well then you can always listen to those studio albums all over again. But give this a chance. At the price, for both the live concert and the five extra studio songs, this is a very good buy. Give it a little something, please think about it, this may provide you with some great listening for those long summer days (and winter ones too).

[Edit: back when I wrote this review, this CD was the only official release of a Moody Blues concert with the "classic" 5-man line up. But in 2009 the "Isle of Wight" concert from 1970 was released as both an audio-only CD and a audio/video DVD, again with the "classic 5" line-up. The setlist from that concert is nearly identical to this one, with some differences. Die hard Moody Blues fans will want both concerts, but if I had to choose only one it would be the Isle of Wight one on DVD. Then again, this concert is worthy on it's own, and you also get the "plus 5" previously unreleased studio songs.]

This was originally released in 1977-much to the original bands displeasure rumor has it-probably to keep interest in the band as their solo years were wrapping up and a reunion was imminent. This captures the band in a December 1969 Albert Hall concert and accurately recaptures the sound of the band live in concert at that time period. Upon listening to this it was a deja vu experience- I saw the band in October 1970 at the Cincinnati Gardens- they played basically the same set list-except the 1970 concert had three Question of Balance track. I also recall a film crew was at the Gardens concert- excerpts of concert performance appeared at the end of the video- Legend of a Band-perhaps more footage from this time period will appear someday. Personally I wish the record company would have chosen a 1973 concert performance-the set list was much more challenging-but this is fine in its own right-with some cool live versions of "Gypsy" and the Threshold of a Dream suite. The mix is identical to the stage set up- Thomas and Pinder to the the left-Hayward and Lodge to the right. Note how Edge's drummming fills each song-much needed when these songs are performed out of the studio. Also included are 5 studio tracks-Two of the earlier ones. "Think About it" and "Long Summer Days" sound like an abandoned 45 attempt- the B and A side respectively. These were recorded prior to acquistion to the mellotron and sound similar to the "Fly Me High" period. The other three tracks sound like album tracks from the "Lost Chord" period that didn't make it on lp since they didn't exactly fit into a particular album concept. All are winners and "Gimme Little Something" would have made a nice summer of 1968 single. The track "What Am I doing here" is a great Moody Blues song-typifying all the aspects of the group that made them so unique. An interesting note- original posters advertising the Woodstock festival had the Moody Blues listed. Justin Hayward stated in an interview that a coin toss determined that the Moodies would play free concert in France instead on that date. Well if they would have played Woodstock and had appeared on the LP- this is what it would have sounded like.

This album is a de rigeur purchase for serious Moodies fans, especially if you have only had the chance to see them in concert lately. The tracks on these performances at the Royal Albert Hall compare nicely with the latest live album releases, especially Red Rocks. If you want to hear the Moodies in their prime, listen especially to track one, "Gypsy", which will take you straight back to 1969 and the band in their mellotron soaked heyday. It's also interesting to hear the stage patter - even though there is very little, but mostly because it is velvet voiced Mike Pinder doing the talking - it's great to hear his songs performed live, and to hear these classic tracks as they were heard so long ago. You will notice some flubs, and frankly, the band has only gotten better with age. This album catches them at their raw best.

Review # 32. I've been wanting this CD for ages. Recorded at the Royal Albert Hall on December 12, 1969. 'Caught Live + 5' just shows us how far ahead of their time the Moody Blues actually were. So many fantastic art rock, progressive (whatever you wish to call it) vintage tunes here - several I simply do not remember. It was great hearing the beautifully played "Dr. Livingston, I Presume", the catchy "Never Comes The Day", the inventive "Peak Hour", "Tuesday Afternoon", "Are You Sitting Comfortably?" {great flute playing}, "Nights In White Satin", the trippy "Legend Of A Mind" and "Ride My See Saw". Plus, the five extra studio cuts are nice as well - liked "Please Think About It" and the well played "Long Summer Days" the best. A must have.