LIVE

Schulze's live albums just don't do it for me. Why? He's had some great live tracks ("But Beautiful"), but most of the tracks on this (and on the only other live album I have of his, Dziekuje Poland) don't benefit from the combination of live playing and sequencers. Or maybe it's me.

Released in 1980 as a double album, ...Live... was comprised of four songs, one per LP side, recorded in 1976 and 1979. This should be good news, as he was at the height of his powers right around then. The 51-minute "Sense" (the vinyl only had 31 minutes of this piece) even features the great Harald Großkopf on the drumkit. Unfortunately, the 29-minute "Dymagic" features Arthur Brown on vocals. Schulze and Brown had already teamed up the prior year on Side Two of Schulze's Dune, but I guess neither learned his lesson.

But my issue with ...Live... goes beyond this one track. I can't exactly put my finger on it, so to speak, although I've tried. To Schulze's credit, these are all new compositions; he's not just recreating his studio work. But I guess the concert environment just doesn't suit what is fundamentally a studio endeavor.