EMERSON LAKE & PALMER IN CONCERT

ELP used Montréal as a springboard for what was to be their last ambitious tour with a full orchestra and a convoy of eighteen wheelers. Not even halfway through this extravaganza they ran into finacial problems and had to ditch the orchestra. This album,which includes the orchestra, was released in 1979 possibly to recover some of the losses and basically highlights the show at the Ollympic Stadium in Montréal, Canada in the summer of 1978.

It contains mostly material from Works Vols. I &II as well as excerpts from Pictures at an Exhibition which, although sounding more polished with the orchestra, lacks the rawness and harder edged power of ELPs original 1971 take on Mussorgsky`s masterwork. The only really interesting thing here is the introductory synthed up version of Henry Mancini`s Peter Gunn television theme song which gives the illusion that we`re in for something really spectacular.

More or less the final nail in the coffin for ELP as far as we knew them during the glory years of the seventies. We can only thank God that no material from the catastrophic previous studio album Love Beach was presented here. As much as I like the band and their brief comeback in the 1990`s this album is roadkill going through it`s final coniptions. For die-hard ELP fans only.