COOK [AKA: LIVE IN THE USA]

A great-but-not-perfect live album of a great band.

PREMIATA FORNERIA MARCONI is often mentioned as one of the best groups from the Italian prog movement. Their influences are clearly visible during their prime period. Some King Crimson-like songwriting, add some Yes virtuosity and some of Geneses' symphonic landscapes and you'll get PFM. Most of the vocals are in Italian, but some material was released in English too. On this live set PFM sings both English and Italian.

The sound of the recording is good enough for a '74 recording. All instruments are amplified nicely and the overall experience of the concert with it's enthusiastic crowd is good. The vocals aren't as good as on the album, but overall they sound alright.

The material presented is taken from the first four albums of PFM. The opener is an up-tempo sympho prog track (from The world became the world), the second track is a devoted ballad with some great melodic guitar solo section and the third track, They Just Look Away, is another balled with an impressive ending-section. On side two we have more jam parts and the great guitar and keysolo's are truly a good contribution of making this a worthwhile purchase. It's not just the album material.

Throughout the album I'm impressed by the high quality compositions being played very accurate. With a better recording this might have sounded even better.

Conclusion. If you're a fan of PFM there isn't a good excuse for not owning this live album. For people interested in high quality symphonic prog this also a good addition to their collections. I do recommend to listen to some of their studio albums first. Three and a halve stars.

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