Across a Wire-Live in New York

by

Counting Crows

Edit

Adam Duritz and the rest of the CC's are simply amazing as live performers. If you have not seen or heard them live, I highly recommend doing so, as it will make the rest of their recordings come alive. The Crows are able to produce an entirely new sound for each of their songs so that, while they are still playing the same old songs, they almost sound "new." If you like the passion with which Adam sings on their regular CD's, you'll LOVE him live. He causes the listener to vicariously experience the music, so that they walk away with a completely new interpretation for every verse, chorus, and overall song (perhaps maybe only an appreciation for their music, that formerly could not be established by listening only to their records). Personally, I was sort of so-so about the Crows before I saw or heard them live. When I went to their concert they instantly became my favorite band; every song became more real to me, and I can now better interpret the rest of their music. I highly recommend this live CD because it makes the rest of their music SO much better.

What you get here is two cds from completely different takes on the Counting Crows music. Both recorded during the tour for the bands second album "Recovering the Satellites"

Disc 1 is from their VH1 StoryTellers performance, it's an excellent CD, with great acoustic versions of the some of the Counting Crows best songs. Only problem is they edited out all the stories (big mistake!)

Disc 2 - This is most of the concert Counting Crows plays on MTV Live at the 10 Spot, completely unlike the other CD, this CD contains all "electric" music, and is ment to portray the Counting Crows ability to play heavy, only problem is the recording quality isn't so great, they purposely didn't mix it to give it that "bootleg" feel, but in truth it needs something. Some of the songs come out good, "Angels of the Silences" for example sounds great when performed with this level of distortion and energy, but a lot of the songs are missing the empty space emotional element that makes them great.

The concept here was to show the diversity of the counting Crows style, unfortunately this is more of marketing ploy than anything else. Since this albums release Adam Druitz has said he wasn't very happy with this album and has since released two limited edition live CDs on the bands web site:

"By The Time We Got to WoodStock" "Face the Promised Land"

If you can find either of these you'll be in for a real treat, and you'll hear just how good this band is live.