10cc has always been respected for their musicianship and their melodic, at times complex, compositions. They share many characteristics with GENTLE GIANT and QUEEN--both contemporaries of the band.
What makes this album unusual and interesting is the retrospective nature of the set--founding members Eric Stewart and Graham Gouldman cover material from 10cc mach1(featuring Godley & Creme)and integrate fully with the latter day mach 2 releases(where the band functioned like Steely Dan with the founding members surrounding themselves with a shifting core of talented players).
It's surprising how well this mixed bag comes off. "I'm mandy fly me" and "Worst band in the world" fit pretty seamlessly with "The things we do for love" and "Dreadlock Holiday". The playing is spectacular and remains true(sometimes too true)to the original studio recordings.
It would have been interesting to hear the band play with the arrangements ! a bit more and to feature some of the Godley/Creme material as well(although this is fairly represented by the live King Biscuit Flower Hour concert from 1975).
Stewart's vocals are terrific. There are a few moments where one can tell he is stretching to reach a note just out of his grasp, but that's the fun of live recordings--one gets a terrific mixture of flaws and spontaneous changes from the original recordings. Although this isn't the best live album by 10cc(the honor falls to the King Biscuit recording), it, nevertheless, does a very good job of covering the music of their broad and inspired career.
This CD features a very tight performance by the band. The set, though short, is a fair representation of 10cc's history, and includes the BEST live recording of "I'm Not in Love" you'll find anywhere. Previous versions relied heavily on taped background tracks to replicate the song's studio production; whereas this version seems to be performed completely by live human beings. An interesting gem here is a cover of the Beatles' "Across the Universe," which starts out in a similar fashion to the original, but then takes off into a new arrangement. Very nice, although Stewart's voice may have been better suited to lead this track than Gouldman's. Very few complaints. There is no personnel listing anywhere in the liner notes, and the photos of the band aren't very much help in this matter. One can see Stewart, Gouldman, and later-day 10cc guitarist Rick Fenn, but I'd like to know who else is playing. I believe Godley and Creme perform on the medley that ends the CD, but it's unclear whether they appear as "guests" or otherwise. A few of the songs fade out at the end, which, in a live recording situation, makes me wonder what I am missing after the faders have gone down. Good stuff!
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