Two bands, one idea. How'd it work?

I'm not a big fan of Phish, so it came a wonderful surprise when, via Metafilter, I was recently introduced to their tradition of covering, in its entirety and in order, an album they love (or were influenced by) on Halloween.

( Thoughts on live in-concert albums , both covers and by their original artists )

I really like the idea of "live in-concert albums" if for no other reason than to get less-played material its day. (Yes, it helps to choose your albums wisely. Of the eleven albums here, there is none that has more than one or two clunkers, and since so many of the albums are double albums, that's a low percentage indeed.) It'd be really good to see more musicians do these (Elvis Costello and Joe Jackson come to mind as excellent candidates, either to perform or to be covered).

Now to settle in with a couple of hours of these guys.

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Sometimes I don't remember what's on the shows I've downloaded until I transcode them. This morning, I was working through some Pete Seeger shows, and the uploaders had missed a bunch of song titles, so I was listening and checking the lyrics, when along comes The Mary Ellen Carter. That was a very pleasant surprise at 5:30 AM.

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More on my prior entry on live in-concert albums: I'd forgotten that Peter Gabriel's current tour is structured to where he's playing his current album (which is all cover songs) in the first set, and then his own material in the second. Haven't listened to the shows I have from the tour yet, so can't judge it on that basis, but I haven't been terribly impressed by the pieces I've heard from the album, on WFUV.

I thought I'd remembered a Styx show where they went through Paradise Theatre from start to end, but on further review, it's got the beginning and end of the album bookending other material. Dommage.

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Even more on live in-concert album play: Pink Floyd (and later, Roger Waters) is notorious for it. Not even counting The Wall, which is a concept album and coherent story, they consistently played through their current album on their tours up through The Wall.

I should note here that concept albums lend themselves to this treatment, and prog-rock is where you'll find many of them. Others that come to mind are Genesis' The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway (definitely played through), Yes' Tales From Topographic Oceans, Jeff Wayne's treatment of War of the Worlds, Rick Wakeman's Journey to the Center of the Earth, and the two rock operas by The Who (Tommy and Quadrophenia), of which the only one where I don't have a concert performing the album through is ...Topographic Oceans. I know I'm missing a bunch here (not as familiar with, say, Spock's Beard and Camel as I ought to be, but I know each of them also did this sort of album and performed it live).

The main point still stands, though. (Okay, The Main Point is no more. Picky, picky :-) Albums performed through, live and in concert, are generally, allowing for technical glitches, a pleasant improvement on their studio counterparts, because of the energy and interpretations that artists bring to their work live. (I've made that point before, but here it's even more so, I'm finding.)

Back to the music.