KING BISCUIT FLOWER HOUR PRESENTS GREG LAKE IN CONCERT

Gary Moore playing King Crimson and ELP songs!? It actually works! It really works! Especially 21st Century Schizoid Man I find truly amazing in this version, I actually like it better than the original! This version is a bit more streamlined and much more in the hard rock vein, but no less progressive. My version of this live album is called Nuclear Attack and has a different running order compared to the one listed above. But I'm pretty sure it is the same recording.

In my version the album opens with the aforementioned 21st Century Schizoid Man and continues with Fanfare For The Common Man. This instrumental, made famous by ELP, is obviously also very different here compared to the ELP version of the same. Here it is performed by a five piece band instead of by a three piece band, with excellent guitar play by Gary Moore. Great!

This segues into the first song from Greg Lake's first solo album (in support of which they are touring here). Unfortunately, they chose the worst song from that album; a generic and stereotypical rock 'n' roll number co-written by Bob Dylan and Greg Lake. The low point of this live album, I usually skip it (as I do when I listen to the studio album).

After that it is time for a song to represent Gary Moore's past. Parisienne Walkways, (co-?) written by Phil Lynnot of Thin Lizzy. Great guitar work (apart from an annoying long note that hurts my ears!) and Greg sings it very well.

Next up is Nuclear Attack (another track from Greg's self-titled first solo album) which is a great hard rocking song with moog synthesiser. It is opened up by a short snippet from Karn Evil 9 (wrongly listed as part of track two). All in all there are four tracks from Lake's first solo album, Retribution Drive and The Lie being the other two. These are all good songs, but nothing that will blow the prog fan away.

We are treated to two more great classic songs from Greg's past with Lucky Man and In The Court Of The Crimson King. I don't think I need to comment on those apart from that they are absolutely great and that they are strongly associated with Greg Lake. The guitars are once again fantastic!

Too bad, the album closes with another generic rock 'n' roller. You Really Got A Hold Of Me! Why Greg, why?

The combination of Greg Lake and Gary Moore turns out to be great! The combination of King Crimson, ELP and Greg's solo numbers also works very well (with the exception of Love You Too Much).

Good, but because of the inclusion of couple of stinkers it cannot be called excellent (even if some songs are just that).