Customer Reviews

Live (The Road Goes Ever On)

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My friends and I wore out the live "Dream Sequence" side of Mountain's "Flowers of Evil" album back in the early 70s, believing it was about the best live rock guitar ever captured on vinyl. Some 30 years later this completely non-descript "live" offering from Mountain shows up in the bins, looking like just another budget compilation. Instead, it is a full Mountain concert recorded on New Years Eve 1971, at the height of their popularity.

Mountain was an incredible live band, and Leslie West a true guitar hero. This concert includes a Dream Sequence that threatens to displace the Flowers of Evil version for sheer intensity and guitar licks, but I still prefer the slightly more focused FOE version. Still, this newly released concert is 2 full CDs of their best material, containing the only live verions (that I'm aware of) of some tracks. West's playing on "Travelling in the Dark" is both fiery and beautiful... he had an uncanny ability to deliver lightening fast, blistering blues riffs with great emotion and power.

The sound quality certainly isn't up to today's audiophile standards, but it's not bad at all for a 34 year old live recording.

Like many of the great rock bands from that era, Mountain attempted to stay alive, going through personnel changes, reforming several times, in fact they are still touring in some form or other today. But there was a short period long ago when they were truly magical, and this concert captures that magic.

This album, which probably is identical to "Millenium Collection" is totally LIVE. The technical quality of most tracks is good and the musical performance is outstanding. It makes me very happy to hear "new" versions of old favourites like "Nantucket Sleighride", "Long Red" and a 23 minutes long version of "Dreams Of Milk And Honey":-), tracks that are almost totally worn out on my old vinyls "Flowers Of Evil" and "The Road Goes On Forever". This 2CD is a MUST for all Mountain-fans.

I, too, just happened to find this a few years ago at some on-line service, and decided to take a chance. Without a doubt, this is one of the best live concerts I have ever heard from that era. I have played this for friends over the years, and their jaws drop in awe! I can't believe Mountain are releasing a whole series of bootlegs that most reviews say are of questionable, if not horrible, sound quality, when this thing is floating around out there. In fact, I can't believe it was never released as an official album, because it is that good. The recording and the performance of Mountain on this New Years Eve show is just incredible. I may not have heard some of these other "official bootleg series" albums, but I don't think any of them could be better than this! (Hey, Leslie and Corky, I'll sell ya back a copy. Then you could do your fans a REAL favor, and release your best live recording!)

This, to me, is simply the best Mountain live album ever. The only thing that bothers me is the lack of information (line-up, venue, recording date, etc..), but the performance is absolutely fantastic.