Customer Reviews

Live In L.A.

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

When Trevor Rabin releases music, you can bet it's going to be great! This live CD not only sounds awsome, but it has an excellent song set list from his solo "Can't Look Away" 1989 tour show in LA. Intersting how parts of "Lift Me Up" from Yes' "Union" album are introduced for the first time on the intro to "Cover Up", well before the song was actually released...cool! The band sounds tight! Trevor's tour band gels extremely well in re-creating Trevor's music including, his musical masterpieces with Yes. Trevor's "Owner of a Lonely Heart" from Yes' 90125, is enhanced with Trevor's clever audince participation that smoothens out "Jon's" absence...Changes is one of the best live recordings to date! Thumbs up to Jim Simmons for his bass work covering Squire's Yes bits. Lou Molin adds power to the music with his DRUM work and Mark Mancina's keyboard playing is right on!
This CD is a must for Trevor Rabin fans and musical enthusiasts who live and die for that colorful progressive, cutting edge rock sound that Rabin creates so well!
...brings back memories of his show at the "TLA" in Philly. Looking forward to seeing Trevor live once again!

This CD brought back great memories, as I had been to 2 of the shows on this 1989 solo tour. Good sound, I don't know how much "touching up" may have been done in the production. Wonderful guitar work, as one would expect from Trevor Rabin. If you are a Rabin fan or a YES fan, you should add this title and also the subsequent 90124 to your collection. My only regret is that there was never any video released from this tour.

While some previous reviews took issue with the sound quality of this CD, I prefer to view this release in the context of 'live rock and roll.' Personally I have no complaints about the sound quality, this is rock and roll, not Mozart so crank it up and let 'er rip! Now, down to brass tacks.

The setlist features tracks from Trevor's outstanding 1989 solo release 'Can't Look Away' as well as a few Yes songs and an older track from 'Wolf'. The songs are performed with a great deal of energy and the musicianship is A+. What really impressed me was the quality of the vocals. 'Can't Look Away' had some really rich harmonies and I was delighted to see that the vocals on 'Live in LA' were of such a high caliber.

I, like zillions of other rock fans, was introduced to this amazingly talented musician via '90125' and as a fellow geetar picker, I was knocked out by his melodic chops. This guy can play. I purchased 'Can't Look Away' upon release in 1989 after hearing Trevor plugging the album on 'Rockline' and after listening to the awesome live renditions on 'Live in LA', I went and dug out 'Can't Look Away' and was even more impressed by the vocals and the live release.

If you are a fan of Yes, or AOR in general, then I heartily recommend this CD.

Trevor Rabin is a musical genius. Nobody doubts that. The songs are intricate yet, somehow manage to sound radio friendly. This "live" record is definitely worth getting but, it's worth mentioning that it's not 100% LIVE. There are overdubs and punch-in's everywhere...as well as backing tracks and doubling (and every vocal effect imaginable) used on the vocals. You can actually HEAR an edit when the lead vocal comes in at the beginning of "Changes".
Having said that...this record is sonically superb. It really does capture that majestic Rabin sound. Now if we could just get him to record some more Pop/Rock and do another tour!

Superlatives don't do this recording justice. Masterful and brilliant to name a few. Trev revs up, with guns a blazin'. If you've read this far, go the rest of the way and purchase this. "Cover up" is worth the price alone. His soundtrack to "American outlaws" is phenomenal also. Mark Mancina plays keyboards, Lou Molina on percussion. And Jim Simmons on bass. These musicians did their homework. No stoner garage band here. Many live recordings sound empty. Not this one. I'm perplexed as to how four guys could make themselves sound like an orchestra. Now if we could just rope him into touring again, the world would be a better place.

Who is this guy to release a live cut of his '89 performances 14 years later? The man's the king of South Africa with Rabbit, charms Chris Squire into joining up which eventually leads to the most widely popular version of Yes. Knocks out a very underrated "Can't look away" studio album and then leaves Yes for very impressive Soundtrack career. His next move will be big you can count on it and this is a sampler.

About this cut: "Owner" sucks, the "Lift me up" intro is a gas, and the rest of the disk will never get nearly the acclaim it deserves. If it weren't a CD I would have worn it out.

Ttrevor Rabin brought great music and energy to YES, but his solo work Cant Look Away also ranks up with the best of post 1980 YES. This could have been a 5 star CD, but is lowered to 4 because of the following:

First, this isnt a very good version of Owner of a Lonely Heart. Love Will Find Away is played better (no audience sing along), but I wish he could have put the far better Shoot High, Aim Low on instead of those two selections.

Sludge sounds more like sludge on this version . It sounds better in the studio as it precedes....

I Miss You Now.... what a great song! ...that should also have been played live and put on this CD. Im happy with this CD, but if you like Rabinesque YES, make sure you pick up the studio versions of many of these songs found on Can't Look Away - one of the best solo Cds of the past 15 years.

Maybe I got a special "sludge sound" version of this CD, but as a sound engineer of way too many years I want to warn other discerning listeners that this Cd sounds like a very loud band playing in a small, crowded room and being recorded on 1989 analogue equipment. The kind of clarity and crispness you expect these days just isn't there at all... and don't get me wrong- I'm not surprised. It was 1989 after all. But I AM surprised that Rabin let a recording of this poor quality out into the public domain when his solo work and years with Yes were highlighted by such high production values. Often, his guitar is buried under woofey bass and open drum mikes, or mixed so well back you wonder if it's him playing. I suspect the original recordings, while not exactly a "desk tape", may not have ever been destined for release as an album. And there's only so much you can do to fix these things.
Song choice is good and there are moments of great musicianship, until you get to "Owner". The audience sing-along is absolute crap and disappointing, trashing a much-anticipated number, but fair enough- it was written for Jon Anderson's unique vocal range and I think the sing-along disguises that Rabin struggles to sing it well himself. Don't blame him for that.
Listen carefully to any demo's you can for this album. The muddy sound isn't too much MP3 compression to let it stream... the sound quality is not good at all. Mind you, I just bought the first two Queen albums and they suffer the same thing. We're spoiled for sonic quality these days and 20 or 30 years ago WAS exactly that. If you expect crystal top end and precise mixing, just like on Rabin's studio albums, this Live Cd will irritate you.

I love this cd.
This is Trevor is his true form.
He is such a talented artist, this cd is proof
that he can do it all!
This live cd is fantastic!

Well I am buying these the Live CD and 90124. Mr Rabin please do some more albums, PLEASE. Hey after you listen to the album please come on over to www.yesfans.com and tell us about it.