Live at Red Rocks 8.15.95 Review
I don't think the DMB gets much better than what must have been an incredible late summer's night in the Colorado mountains in 1995. I had to smuggle these low-key tan-colored CD's from my friend's Case Logic one by one to listen to them, but the theft was worth it and I loved what I heard: like Crash, the sound is so instantly appealing, the definition of listenable, so sheeny and buoyant: listen to the little rubber ball-bounce quality of the guitar in the sneaking, teasing intro to Dancing Nancies, and Carter's falling stardust chimes mixing with the rocket ship vapor trail acoustic sound/"Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" melody of "Satellite." Dave, too, still has that helium-balloon weirdness in his voice, but it's starting to mellow and enrichen and even flatten dully: the first encore song "Typical Situation" is so lonely; you can almost feel the darkness and wind starting to become chill and the dew starting to collect on the grass, and gets up to real pathos in a remarkable final two minutes filled with howled random syllables and sentence fragments firming up with the ironic recovery "we'll keep the big door open, everyone'll come around--you'll see." Great artwork, too...the album booklet has old black and white Gold Rush-era photos from`the actual construction of Red Rocks, and besides standard shots of the band, one photo is just of someone's shoes, all on almost-cardstock paper. If only I wasn't eleven at the time.
Fave lyric: "Some people drink, some people don't, / Some people think-- some people won't / Some people do and some people don't / but it's ok, 'cause it's meant to be that way." (Intro to "Recently")'
Live at Red Rocks 8.15.95 Overview
Like a lot of his jam-band compatriots, Dave Matthews's personality can come off as muted in the studio, but really spreads out live--which makes this a must-have for fans who don't already have the bootleg, or nineteen more from the same period. But absent a hits sampler,
Live at Red Rocks could also be the best Matthews album for more tentative listeners. It draws heavily from the
Under the Table and Dreaming material, as well as from the then-upcoming
Crash. "All Along the Watchtower," previously only available on an indie EP, ends the set.
--Gavin McNett*** Product Information and Prices Stored: Apr 19, 2010 23:40:06
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