Live at the BBC (Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel album)

Live at the BBC
Compilation album by Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel
Released	15 August 1995[1]
Genre	Pop, Rock
Length	57:08
Label	Windsong International Records
Producer	Tony Wilson (tracks 1-5) Jeff Griffin (tracks 6-9) Paul Williams (tracks 10-14)
Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel chronology
Yes You Can (1992) Live at the BBC (1995) Poetic Justice (1996)

Live at the BBC is a live compilation album by Steve Harley & Cockney Rebel. The collection of fourteen tracks features three different sets of performances for the BBC: two in 1974 and one in 1992. The album was released in the UK by Windsong International Records.^[2]

Background

The collection is made up of three performances the band played for the BBC. The two 1974 performances featured the original Cockney Rebel line-up that split by the end of the same year. The first five tracks were recorded for John Peel on 28 May 1974, while the following four tracks were recorded Live in Concert on 22 January 1974. The final five tracks featured Harley with a different line-up of musicians, and were recorded for Nicky Campbell in 1992.^[3] This performance followed the recent release of Harley's Yes You Can album. There are two abridged versions within the 1992 tracks, "Make Me Smile (Come Up And See Me)" and "Riding the Waves".^[3]

In 2012, the remastered four-disc box-set anthology compilation Cavaliers: An Anthology 1973-1974 was released. This featured the same two 1974 BBC performances, as well as a performance on the Old Grey Whistle Test during the same year. The notable inclusion on the anthology was an additional track as part of the Live in Concert performance. The song "Hideaway" was not included on the Live at the BBC compilation.^[4]

Release

The album was issued on CD in the UK only by Windsong International Records. The independent label specialised in releasing recordings made for or by BBC Radio One for broadcast on the In Concert radio programme. In 1998, the album was re-issued under a new title: On Air. Both versions used the same close-up photograph of Harley on the front cover.^[5] Both editions of the album have since become out-of-print.^[6]

Track listing

Critical reception

Professional ratings
Review scores
Source	Rating
Allmusic	[7]
Q Magazine	[8]

Upon release, writer John Bauldie reviewed the album for Q Magazine. He stated: "A timely reminder, now that the '90s version of the Rebel seem to have been put (hopefully temporarily) to bed again, of just how good the first Cockney Rebel were, for nine of the 14 tracks here were recorded by that orignal eccentric line-up, five in session, four in concert. The session is excellent, especially the opener, Bed in the Corner, where Harley's voice laughs, swoops and darts with impressive flexibility as the electric piano and violin of Milton Reame-James and Jean-Paul Crocker trace intricate patterns around and about his warblings. The concert tracks, notably Sebastian and Death Trip, are absurdly but impressively melodramatic, while the 1992 session, three songs and two fragments, which completes the collection services to remind that it wasn't Steve Harley who changed, just the times."^[9]

Dave Thompson of Allmusic reviewed the album, and wrote: "Two groups of sessions recorded 18 years apart certainly make for a disconcerting listen. Live at the BBC begins, as one would wish, with a straightforward examination of the original Cockney Rebel legacy. Then vocalist Steve Harley presses the fast-forward button and suddenly it's 1992, and he's on another of those interminable comebacks, mixing old classics with new half-hopers and, though you can kind of see the connection, it's still hard to believe that the verbosity, vision, and doom-laden prophecy of the olden days could ever have become so self-satisfied. In 1974, Harley sung with the desperation of a man clinging by his fingertips to the last shreds of decency and sanity, while crazed violins curdled his blood and fairground melodies haunted his daydreams. In 1992, he didn't. Simple (and sad) as that. So don't play the later stuff. The early performances alone are worth the price of admission and then some. Rearranged with brutal simplicity, the Psychomodo material is vastly different than the album versions. The live material, cut earlier in the year, captures Cockney Rebel in even more uncompromising form. The biggest disturbance is the crash of your chair falling over, as you race to switch the CD off before the last five tracks begin. But that's a small price to pay for all that came before."^[7]

Personnel

• Steve Harley - vocals (all tracks), acoustic guitar (tracks 1-9), guitar (tracks 10-14)
• Jean-Paul Crocker - violin (tracks 1-9)
• Milton Reame-James - piano (tracks 1-9)
• Paul Jeffreys - bass (tracks 1-9)
• Stuart Elliot - drums (tracks 1-9)
• Milton McDonald - guitar (tracks 10-14)
• Nick Pynn - guitar, violin (tracks 10-14)
• Ian Nice - keyboards (tracks 10-14)
• Tony Wilson - producer (tracks 1-5)
• Jeff Griffin - producer (tracks 6-9)
• Paul Williams - producer (tracks 10-14)

References