Outside of Kiss and maybe The Who, no band in rock history was so perfectly able to sum up and speak to the teenaged experience as Cheap Trick was at the height of its' game. The band was able to encapsulate the sound (Kiss may always have the image locked), subject and cartoonish libido of that magic time in life when the hope of getting laid was representative of the ultimate in the human experience and the greatest sight in all creation would be to see a guitarist so good, he needed an instrument with five necks just to adequately articulate every note in him. That, in a nutshell, was Cheap Trick and truth be told, the band's shows from the late Seventies through the Eighties were an incredible sight to behold. The live records weer something else too; to this day, At Budakan still sells with more than just nostalgia addicts every time it gets reissued and, now when the band puts on a show, devout followers perpetuate the cycle by bringing their kids.
Who else (again, other than Kiss and maybe The Who) has that kind of staying power? Nobody.
That said, there's not a song (probably not a performance either) on Cheap Trick's installment of the Setlist series that fans won't recognize, and there will even be a few that everybody knows – right down to the performances. Some foolish readers would balk at that, and ask what the point might be then, but they don't get it; each song here is a classic, and the performances of them included here are essential. “Mrs. Henry” from The Whiskey A-Go Go in 1977? Essential. “I Know What I Want” from Daytona Beach, FL in 1988 (taken from the Sex, America, Cheap Trick box set)? Essential. “I Want You To Want Me,” “Surrender,” “Can't Hold On” and “Downed” from At Budakan? All essential listening, and “The House Is Rockin' (With Domestic Problems)” taken from a show at the L.A. Forum in 1979 is essential too. The drooling fan-boy in me is screaming, “You don't need this comp! How can you not own these records?!” but I do understand. Who Knows? Maybe you were in a coma. Maybe you were raised in a bizarre compound in the middle of nowhere that allowed plural marriage but not rock n' roll and you only recently escaped. Maybe you were born yesterday, or maybe you've spent three decades too broke to buy good music. Any of those are acceptable reasons (but only just) to not have copies of the songs included on Setlist already and, if that's the case, Congratulations! You were born/woke up/escaped. Celebrate! Setlist: The Very Best Of Cheap Trick Live is an excellent primer to get you on the path, and the perfect gift to yourself for any of those aforementioned achievements/triumphs.
Artist:
www.cheaptrick.com/
www.myspace.com/cheaptrick
Album:
Setlist: The Very Best Of Cheap Trick Live is out now. Buy it here on Amazon .
