•
Rating: Many times their fame is overshadowed by the great "giants" of English rock of the period like Zeppelin, Purple, or Sabbath, but Ten Years After, led by the great and unfortunately recently deceased Alvin Lee, the "Fastest Guitar in Rock 'n Roll", are absolutely no less in terms of skill and spectacle, and this double album is the most sincere testament to that.
This live was recorded from the dates the four English musicians performed in February 1970 at the legendary Fillmore East in New York, a historical venue that in its short life hosted concerts of the greatest ever, from Hendrix to the Allman Brothers, from Joe Cocker's "Mad Dogs" to the greats of the West Coast like Janis Joplin. It wasn't the first time Lee and company played in this legendary place, the first time was in 1968, where they opened for the Staples Singers and Janis Joplin's Big Brother & The Holding Company during one of their first American tours, bringing their mix of rock blues, psychedelia, and boogie across the Atlantic and making themselves known to the American public.
On the evenings of February 26, 27, and 28 the band was the headliner, supported by John Hammond and Zephyr (where the very young Tommy Bolin played, future Deep Purple after Blackmore). Supported by the warmth of the fans, TYA put on some great concerts, with a setlist full of great songs from previous albums, improvisations, and some new tracks that would end up on the album "Cricklewood Green" released the same year. The concert opens with a great classic of the band, "Love Like a Man," which begins quietly with a bluesy riff and then bursts into a fast and spectacular solo by Lee himself, the true symbol of the group. The band moves confidently and tightly, Alvin thanks the enthusiastic crowd and launches into other powerful and decisive interpretations like "Good Morning Little Schoolgirl" stretched out of all proportion and the boogie-based "Working on the Road," with a very West Coast sound. In the subsequent "The Hobbit," it's the drummer Ric Lee (no relation to the frontman) who warms up his hands with an endless solo, letting the rest of the band take a break; a solo that leaves the audience breathless for a good dozen minutes.
In my opinion, the blues-psychedelic "50000 Miles Beneath my Brain" is excellent, another historic track featuring an endless solo by a peak-formed Alvin Lee, supported by a precise Leo Lyons on whom falls the hard task of keeping up with the leader's improvisations, a task undertaken in the best way and completed by the excellent hidden but effective work of the keyboardist Chick Churchill. The guitarist delivers fast guitar phrasings and also improvises on the riffs of two great classics of the period, "Sunshine of your Love" by Cream and "Purple Haze" by the Experience, proving to be on par with calibers like Clapton and Hendrix. After so much rock blues, the band swings to rock 'n roll classics, bringing electrifying covers of Chuck Berry, like "Sweet Little 16" and the very fast "Roll Over Beethoven" which are obviously met with great enthusiasm by the American audience. "I'm Going Home," a true flagship of the English band, is disarmingly fresh and also encompasses another great Berry classic, "Johnny B. Goode." After saying goodbye to the audience, they immediately return to the stage, concluding the show with "I Woke up this Morning," a hypnotic slow blues, and the historic "Spoonful" by their great idol Willy Dixon.
This album perhaps represents one of the highest points in the band's career. Lively, sparkling, and very precise in their performances, a great group that will leave us for a few more years some great songs and great albums, to then disappear until at least the late '80s. As drummer Ric Lee says in the cover notes, this is the highest point in the live reached by the band, listen to believe..
Tracklist
Loading comments slowly
