Colosseum – Live 05 (Ruf Records).
Colosseum has been going since 1968 (with a long hiatus between 1978 and 1994) in various incarnations and boasts some of the best musicians ever to have graced a stage in the UK. Vocalist Chris Farlowe, guitarist Clem Clempson, keyboards player Dave Greenslade, bassist Mark Clarke and drummer Jon Hiseman have been the mainstays and Hiseman’s wife, Barbara Thompson took over saxophone duties from founder member Dick Heckstall-Smith, who died in 2004. This 2 disc live album, recorded in Germany and Austria in 2005 covers a number of tracks from their 1971 Live album, which came out just before the original band broke up for the first time. The opener, Come Right Back is bluesy with big sounds from a tight band, as you would expect with their joint pedigrees. Theme For An Imaginary Western – this is my first real involvement with Colosseum but this prog rock with flecks of jazz is just what I expected, especially when it was written by Pete Brown and Jack Bruce. Good guitar from Clempson and a great rapport with the crowd. Rope Ladder To The Moon, another Brown/Bruce composition, is an English blues and this is more like it – over 8 minutes, an organ solo – true prog band form. The Valentyne Suite covers three tracks, January’s Search, which is an expansive instrumental covering jazz, prog rock & classical themes all backed with frenetic sax from Thompson and Farlowe, February’s Valentyne which also has sax to the fore and builds to the end and finally, The Grass Is Always Greener where Clempson’s guitar gets its chance in the slower passages.
The second disc opens with Those About To Die, a mix of rock (classic and prog) and jazz and is followed by the T-Bone Walker classic, Stormy Monday Blues. This has sharp guitar from Clempson who trades licks with Thompson on sax. The laconic drums of Hiseman and Clarke’s bass back things up very well with Chris Farlowe in his element with his vocal gymnastics. Dave Greenslade lifts the whole thing to a different level with his playing. No Pleasin’ is a straightforward rocker without too much interference and although there is no doubting the virtuosity of the musicians, it is Clempson’s guitar that shines through. This merges into Tomorrows Blues, a prog fest at over 11 minutes although not a blues as such. The penultimate track, Drum Into LA has a virtuoso performance from Hiseman on drums, although it is short for a drum solo at 2 minutes 56 seconds, before it leads into Lost Angeles, which at over16 minutes is a true prog/jazz epic. Greenslade is to the fore and Farlowe’s voice is still going strong although we could do without the scat.
This is a classic example of a Great British institution and as the sleeve notes say, “turn it down to deafening”.
http://www.rufrecords.de/
David Blue.
Colosseum has been going since 1968 (with a long hiatus between 1978 and 1994) in various incarnations and boasts some of the best musicians ever to have graced a stage in the UK. Vocalist Chris Farlowe, guitarist Clem Clempson, keyboards player Dave Greenslade, bassist Mark Clarke and drummer Jon Hiseman have been the mainstays and Hiseman’s wife, Barbara Thompson took over saxophone duties from founder member Dick Heckstall-Smith, who died in 2004. This 2 disc live album, recorded in Germany and Austria in 2005 covers a number of tracks from their 1971 Live album, which came out just before the original band broke up for the first time. The opener, Come Right Back is bluesy with big sounds from a tight band, as you would expect with their joint pedigrees. Theme For An Imaginary Western – this is my first real involvement with Colosseum but this prog rock with flecks of jazz is just what I expected, especially when it was written by Pete Brown and Jack Bruce. Good guitar from Clempson and a great rapport with the crowd. Rope Ladder To The Moon, another Brown/Bruce composition, is an English blues and this is more like it – over 8 minutes, an organ solo – true prog band form. The Valentyne Suite covers three tracks, January’s Search, which is an expansive instrumental covering jazz, prog rock & classical themes all backed with frenetic sax from Thompson and Farlowe, February’s Valentyne which also has sax to the fore and builds to the end and finally, The Grass Is Always Greener where Clempson’s guitar gets its chance in the slower passages.
The second disc opens with Those About To Die, a mix of rock (classic and prog) and jazz and is followed by the T-Bone Walker classic, Stormy Monday Blues. This has sharp guitar from Clempson who trades licks with Thompson on sax. The laconic drums of Hiseman and Clarke’s bass back things up very well with Chris Farlowe in his element with his vocal gymnastics. Dave Greenslade lifts the whole thing to a different level with his playing. No Pleasin’ is a straightforward rocker without too much interference and although there is no doubting the virtuosity of the musicians, it is Clempson’s guitar that shines through. This merges into Tomorrows Blues, a prog fest at over 11 minutes although not a blues as such. The penultimate track, Drum Into LA has a virtuoso performance from Hiseman on drums, although it is short for a drum solo at 2 minutes 56 seconds, before it leads into Lost Angeles, which at over16 minutes is a true prog/jazz epic. Greenslade is to the fore and Farlowe’s voice is still going strong although we could do without the scat.
This is a classic example of a Great British institution and as the sleeve notes say, “turn it down to deafening”.
http://www.rufrecords.de/
David Blue.
