WAY OF LIFE

• Giant Gentle Giant, 1970
• Wreck Acquiring The Taste, 1971
• Prologue Three Friends, 1972
• Knots Octopus, 1972
• Experience In A Glass House, 1973
• Playing The Game The Power And The Glory, 1974
• Free Hand Free Hand, 1975

This is a 2-CD compilation of live tracks (1973-1977) from the previous GlassHouse releases: "In A Palesport House", "Prologue" ,"Interview In Concert", and "The Missing Face". All these recordings are either soundboard (rather good sound quality) or cheap tape recording from the audience (collector item only!!!). Most of these boots had been made official,(like Zappa' s boot politics : better release them on your own, than somebody else does) but are un-edited. The first disk represents the period '73- '75,mainly from "Prologue" : tracks 2-4 the '74 Münster concert and tracks 5-8 the '75 White Plains concert. The sound quality of the first disk is bad, especialy if you are not used to boots.The second disk represents the period '76-'77 : tracks 1-5 the '76 Hempstead concert and tracks 6-12 the '77 Cleveland concert. The second disk has average to good sound quality, the best sound comes from the Cleveland tracks ("The missing face") which is IMHO the best GG boot. Now,a part from the sound quality this compilation gives nevertheless a good overview about GG as a live group. If you are not familiar with GG go for "Playing the fool", the official live recording. If you want to have an overview of the boots go for it (it is cheap) and decide than which "original" boot you want to have. Five stars for the music. From 1 - 4 stars for the sound.

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Posted Thursday, August 18, 2005 | Review this album | Report (Review #43286)

Albums like these should be avoided like the plague unless you're a fan of this band. This compilation of mid-70's Gentle Giant performances has a great tracklist, but often horrible sound quality which makes it worthless for new fans. It's a shame that the people responsible for this release didn't mix the track so they sounded good in the end or else this would be a great representation of Gentle Giant's live skills in their prime days. Unfortunately, they didn't and two CD's with bad to average sound quality is just irks me. Hardcore fans should get this one, newcomers should get "Playing The Fool" instead. 2 stars because of the music.

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Posted Thursday, November 17, 2005 | Review this album | Report (Review #56757)

This is a collection of poor to at best fair sound quality tracks from a number of live concert releases. I can't imagine that this could actually have been a legitimate release, but I did find this one (at an extremely low price, luckily) in a store that does not usually carry bootlegs.

For the price of the disk, you get some sound board mixes, mostly with drums and bass mixed way down, keyboards too loud, and awkward vocal mixes, some audience recorded tracks, with drop outs, tape warbles and all, and a few songs that sound like the band was in another room.

There is not much here that can't be found on other Gentle Giant releases, with better sound. Avoid this one, unless you must have everything from this band.

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Posted Thursday, December 31, 2009 | Review this album | Report (Review #258655)

Such a shame that the sound quality is so bad. GG seem to have a lot of this type of release out on various labels. It is advisable to look up any GG cd that is not part of their official studio release before buying as some of these CD's are truly horrible. However there are far more good liv ... (read more)

Report this review (#753451) | Posted by burgersoft777 | Tuesday, May 15, 2012 | Review Permanlink

I was fooled by Amazon/myself to buy this double CD due to the "excellent value" it offered. Hah !!! The sound quality is not worthy this band. It actually diminish the songs. The songs itself is OK, but nothing more. Their message is lost in the translation......ie the bad sound quality. T ... (read more)

Report this review (#247551) | Posted by toroddfuglesteg | Saturday, October 31, 2009 | Review Permanlink

What an insult to devotees of Gentle Giant - forking out good money for sound quality the producers should be ashamed of. The only decent track - soundwise is exerpts from Octopus. Gentle Giant and their fans deseve better than this! ... (read more)

Report this review (#163288) | Posted by DAVE M | Thursday, March 6, 2008 | Review Permanlink

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