LIVE AND LET LIVE

When I follow a band's discography I use to also listen to "classic" live albums from a past era and the double LP "Live and let Live" by 10cc is one of them. It was released 1977, thirty-eight year ago and the name seams to relate to the Bond movie "Live and let Die"(Live and let live though is more pleasant to hear from). The highest proportion of song comes from the most recent(then) album "Deceptive Bends" but the line up is more similar with that from "Bloody Tourists". At this time 10cc consisted of Graham Gouldman, Eric Stewart, Paul Burgess, Rick Fenn, Stuart Tosh and Tony O'Malley. On the cover the band seams to come from a truch and Gouldman looks very tired on the picture.

Usually I am not a big fan of live recordings. The sound quality could seldom match that from a record and the music doesn't seem so tight either. I must also here say that the majority of the songs are better on the studio albums than here. There are exceptions though. Some songs that I didn't like very much before became better live. The live feeling has a bit more energy and it is vital in some way. I also believe this 10cc sound is a bit harder than usual, a little more piece of rock'n'roll. Better than on studio records was "Modern man blues" (8/10) and "Good morning Judge(7/10). The most exciting experence here was the live version of "Feel the benefit"(9/10) but there and many more fine songs here such as: The Second Sitting For the Last Supper, Wall Street Shuffle, I'm Mandy fly me and Waterfall(8/10). The absolute majority of the others were good(7/10).

What I lacked on this album what some of the odd arrangements that 10cc are famous for and of course I missed Lol Creme and Kevin Godley. The band did good without them but on "their" tracks, from older 10cc, they were very missed. The joyful performances on "Live and let live" do I take with me happily. My song to song rating ends at 3.63 which makes this a (rather weak but still) four star record.