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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
34 of 37 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
As Good As Live Rock Gets,
By
This review is from: Live in Europe (Audio CD)
Back in the early '70's my friends and I used to refer to Rory Gallagher as the "King of the Cut-out Bin". A frist rate guitarist with a great feel for all kinds of blues, soulful singer, and charismatic performer (though without pretense), Gallagher was, for some reason, a non-seller. This album was the first Gallagher cut-out I bought and when the CD was released I didn't flinch at all at paying full price because this is some of the best live blues and rock on earth. After a perfunctory introduction and some enthusiastic applause from what sounds like a small audience, Gallagher rips into the first notes of his cover of Junior Wells' "Messin' With The Kid" and never lets up. His acoustic blues are just as impassioned as his electric rock; his performance of "Pistol Slapper Blues" is actually reminiscent of Blind Boy Fuller's, complete with fine Piedmont style fingerpicking and "Going To My Hometown" features mandolin and audience participation. Bassist Gerry McAvoy and drummer Wilgar Campbell fir perfectly with him. ther challenge and push him without getting in the way. Campbell's fills never intrude on the music, rather they help to fill the background and tend to keep the intensity up. Gallagher's own virtuosity never seems to exist for its own sake; his ego seems totally subsumed in the music. This is the mark of a true musician. The production is competent without being the least bit slick and there are just enough wrong notes to indicate a minimum of overdubbing. This is a great live rock album, doubtless one of the best, and an object lesson for many musicians with great chops and little maturity. Don't miss it.
19 of 20 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Proof positive of the incredible musical genius of Rory Gallagher,
By Robert Moore (Chicago, IL USA) - See all my reviews (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER) (VINE VOICE) (TOP 100 REVIEWER) (REAL NAME)
This review is from: Live in Europe (Audio CD)
Of the many inanities on the Rolling Stone list of the 100 greatest guitarists that came out with great fanfare a few years ago, the most absurd is this: Rory Gallagher did not make the list. One can argue about where various guitarists should have been placed, but around 65 of the guitarists on the list truly belonged there. But 90 or 95 of the ones on the list must cringe with embarrassment that they were ranked above Rory Gallagher. There is simply no way that one can listen at any length to Rory play one scintillating solo after another and place him outside the top ten guitarists in the history of rock. Yeah, he was never terribly popular and even now is not especially well known to the public at large, but the fact is that he had utter mastery over his primary instrument. And unlike most guitarists, Gallagher was a multi instrumentalist. It is widely reported that when Mick Taylor left the Rolling Stones, the first choice to replace him was Gallagher. It is easy to see why. He was even more of a blues purist than any of the remaining Stones, was a better slide player than Keith Richards, Brian Jones, or Mick Taylor, would have provided far better back up vocals than anyone ever has for the band, would have brought some of the same multi-instrumental mastery that Brian Jones contributed in the sixties, and just generally would have forced everyone else in the band to get better just to keep up.
A lot of guitarists fake it in the studio. They get the benefit of multiple takes, double tracking, and various sound effects. Live albums show what you can really do, and luckily we have two great live albums from Gallagher, this one and IRISH TOUR. I actually prefer this one, however, because most of the cuts here did not appear on other albums. For the most part, he sticks with reworkings of classic blues songs. Unlike many bands, his versions never, ever sound like parodies of the originals (for instance, Led Zeppelin on all their blues covers except the truly haunting "When the Levee Breaks"). This album illustrates something that I think shows just how special Gallagher was: how superbly he managed to play while singing. The overwhelming majority of guitarists shift to a sort of back up or rhythm mode when they are singing, moving away from a kind of counterpoint until the singing stops and they can shift to lead guitar mode. Even a guitar god like Richard Thompson does this (though his "back up" mode is far better than most). What is eerie about Gallagher is how is intermixes his singing with lead playing. He often is effectively soloing or playing counterpoint to his singing, as if he able to devote separate parts of his brain to singing and playing. The only other guitarist that I know who does this as well as Gallagher is Jimi Hendrix. Anyone wanting to see what I'm talking about should just listen to this album carefully, noticing not just how he shifts from singing to playing, but how he is playing WHILE he is singing. This also comes across with the way he can play a guitar solo while also playing the harmonica. Whatever else this proves, it demonstrates his almost freakish musical gifts. Every cut on the album is nothing short of amazing. Later in his career Gallagher would throttle back ever so slightly on his playing, adding more of a lyrical touch when he played. But here he is playing with almost reckless abandon, though never out of control. The only rock guitarist that I think was better on slide was Duane Allmann and on several cuts here Gallagher shines in his slide work. I utterly love, for instance, the way he shifts from regular playing to slide on "I Could Have Had Religion" while also moving from vocals to harmonica. And while he is equally as impressive on cuts like "Messin' with the Kid" and Laundromat" and "Bullfrog Blues," the icing on the cake is what he does with acoustic guitar on "Pistol Slapper Blues" and mandolin on "Going to My Home Town." The most astonishing thing about the number he performs on mandolin is how incredibly exciting it is. One wouldn't normally imagine this to be the case, but the proof is in the listening. This is without question one of the great live albums ever released and vivid proof of how great Gallagher was. It also stands a rebuke to whatever morons were in charge of that silly Rolling Stone list.
12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
One of the finest live albums I've ever heard,
By Virgil "Virgil" (Chapel Hill, NC) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Live in Europe (Audio CD)
Rory Gallagher's "Live in Europe" ranks up there with the greatest live albums in rock music. It's certainly in the same league as The Allman Brothers "Live at the Fillmore", Frampton Comes Alive and The Who "Live at Leeds".
From the first song 'Messin' with the Kid' Rory's guitar comes out swinging. Backed by excellent bass and drums, this power trio delivers rock-n-blues at its best. Another fine highlight is Blind Boy Fuller's 'Pistol Slapper Blues' a Rory Gallagher favorite. Perhaps no song among in this fine collection shows just at what a high level of playing this trio was capable of than 'Bullfrog Blues'. If you've never heard Rory Gallagher before prepare to be pleasantly surprised. One warning, other Rory Gallagher albums-studio and live- are, in my humble opinion, of equally high quality. You'll want them all. Highly recommended!
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