This is a hard album for me to review. By the time it arrived in the mail, I had heard 9 of these 11 tracks live on multiple occasions. Because everything sounds better live (especially with Akron/Family), I was inevitably a bit disappointed. Making matters worse, I received the album on MP3 several weeks before the CD arrived in the mail. Since listening to the CD, I have found myself enjoying the album a lot more than I did at first. Further proof that MP3s do not sound as good as CDs. I just wish more people felt this way.
But even with CD quality (which I contend is as good as vinyl) sound, I find myself feeling disappointed and frustrated with this album. There are just too many songs that do not live up to their live versions. One, MBF, should not have even been recorded in the studio. This track is not as much as a song as it is Akron/Family playing as loud as they can. Seth wails away on his guitar and Miles screams. Live, it works. On the album, it's just kind of irritating and doesn't fit with the rest of the material which is mostly wonderfully melodic.
Penultimate track, Sun Will Shine also does not live up to its live version. The song only has one lyric "The Sun will shine and I won't hide" that gets repeated several times. Live, Miles only sings it a few times before Seth's guitar blasts it off into the most wonderful places eventually leading the audience into some beautiful but loud white noise. On the album however, the line gets repeated almost to the point of being obnoxious. And while the same guitar melody is played, it does not flow naturally into the white noise that concludes the song. The only song that is an improvement over its live version is Last Year, simply because the band doesn't insist that everyone sing along for 10 goddamn minutes.
But after listening to the album several times and getting further away from the live show, those two songs are really my only complaints. Sure, Akron/Family sound better and more adventurous live, but that doesn't make the album any less inspired. Their albums hold up better than those of their predecessor's The Grateful Dead. In fact, opener Everyone is Guilty might actually benefit from the studio treatment. The song has actually had a long road to travel before becoming an actual song. The first couple of times I saw it, it was just an instrumental (or nearly instrumental) jam that didn't seem to go anywhere. Now, the song is a tight and constantly shifting powerful rock song driven by a wonderful groove. The first time I listened to it, I found the constant tempo and melody changes jarring. But after repeated listens, I find myself craving it.
The band's other two rockers are also broken into movements. Gravelly Mountains of the Moon sounds like it's a pleasant acoustic singalong until around three minutes in when the electric guitars and horns kick in, giving the album an extra kick that it was needing around the halfway mark. My only complaint with the song is the "Put me in, let me run with the ball. Ha!" coda that concludes the song. Studio restraint does not manage to dampen my irritation with it. They Will Appear" is almost more successful, but the rock part of the song just feels to short. I once thought that it could eventually become their closer and replace Ed is a Portal (which has actually been replaced by Everyone is Guilty/Sun Will Shine/Last Year), but they haven't figured out how to make this one take off. It's a wondeful song, but not much of a jam.
And then there are the album's numerous smaller pleasures. The mostly acoustic The Alps and their Orange Evergreen, Set 'Em Free and Many Ghosts (the last two have not appeared live at any show in NYC) are both simpler wonderful songs that show what a great songwriter Seth is growing into. Dana's one contribution Creatures may not be the major work that Lake Song was, but it definitely makes the album more interesting.
Ultimately, I like this album. What had me disappointed is not what's on it, but what's not. Akron/Family have worked hard to cement their reputation as one of the most formidable live bands around today. And they have yet to release an official live album (they sell a live disc on their site and at shows, and included a DVD with Love is Simple), and I have seen several major set changes that have yet to be documented publicly in a live format. For their third album, The Allman Brothers decided to do a live album. The Grateful Dead did it on their 4th, and the MC5 made their first album live. So why the hell hasn't Akron/Family released a live album after five studio albums? I make this complaint about tons of bands, but this is by far the most egregious failure of a band to release a record showing them at their best.
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