LIVE & RARE: ONWARD FLIES THE BIRD

Once upon a time, this was the only Hawkwind album I owned. I picked it up dirt-cheap at a closing-down sale, and it was a budget CD to begin with. Despite the sentimental value of it having been the album that introduced me to this great band, I must warn all of you to steer clear of it. The sound quality is poor, even for a live album and the liner notes are non-existent. Furthermore this appears to be a disjointed compilation of performances, rather than a recording of a single concert, although the fact that the group seems largely devoid of keyboards and wind instruments (with the exception of a couple of songs) and is playing in a punchier, rather than spacey fashion would seem to imply that most tracks were recorded in the 80s.

The only advantage that this album has over the definitive Hawkwind live album Space Ritual is its range of songs (from 1971's You Shouldn't Do That to 1981's Angels Of Death). In fact the pleasing late 70s songs, particularly the one keyboard-led song High Rise (which with a blend of organ and synth is by far my favourite tune here), Hash Cake' 77 and Who's Gonna Win The War are probably the only reasons I'm still holding to this trashy album. I'm still going to advise you to give it a miss. ... 18% on the MPV scale