As most people who came of age in the Seventies and Eighties can (and will) tell you, Todd Rundgren's impact on pop music is near-incalculable. Both with The Nazz and as a solo artist, Rundgren co-wrote and recorded some of the great rock standards which helped to inspire band's including The Replacements, Ben Folds and Rufus Wainwright (and, surprisingly, writers and filmmakers including Nick Hornby and Stephen Frears) – to name only a few. Not only that, his talents as a producer helped to make other groups including The Band, Badfinger, Grand Funk Railroad, New York Dolls, Meatloaf and a multitude of others either big stars or at the very least get them on their way. Rundgren's resume is impressive and, framed that way, there's suddenly no wonder why Rundgren is placed in such high regard – but that doesn't mean everything he's done is golden, as Live at Hammersmith Odeon '75 illustrates. Captured at the historic venue with his (then) new band Utopia, energy and excitement seems to crackle the beginning of this recording from the moment Rundgren bids his audience hello – but the excitement fades pretty quickly listening now, because there's no debating that the record is an anachronism.
With enough knowledge of rock history, it's easy to understand how the audience at Hammersmith Odeon was excited to see Utopia in 1975; the band's 1974 debut had been the best-received Rundgren release since the singer's 1972 solo release Something/Anything? (which went Gold), and the shows were pretty solid in structure as they featured songs from that album as well as the cream of the singer's solo record crop (songs like “Heavy Metal Kids” and “Couldn't I Just Tell You). Those songs and the performances of them will still make this album of interest to the well-informed, but those without that benefit will be at a loss to figure what all the excitement is about. Those who walk in cold and uninitiated will be struck by how many things now regarded as “wrong” with rock in the Seventies are keystone tenets of this performance; it was decadent for the sake of decadence (how else would one explain Rundgren taking a moment after almost every song to introduce the next?), self-indulgent, overstates and soggy in the mid-section (although blessedly avoids the ten- and thirty-minute cuts which did appear on that first Utopia album) and stubbornly slick for a live recording. Those are the downsides of this performance and they're typified by cuts like “Mister Triscuits,” “Open My Eyes,” “Do Ya” and the medley of “When The Shit Hits The Fans,” “Sunset Boulevard” and “Le Feel Internacionale.” The proliferation of really weak tracks like that is certainly damaging to the album. But that isn't to say that the whole thing is totally lost though; the applause generated by “Couldn't I Just Tell You” (complete with flanged guitar and Velveeta-smooth synthesizers), “Heavy Metal Kids” and “Sons Of 1984” is absolutely deserved as Rundgren's wild guitar heroics and song craftsmanship are in effect and illustrate their flexibility. The performances of those songs even stand a chance of drawing a bit of fanfare now, twenty-eight years later.
The question, in weighing the good points throughout this live album against the bad, is whether or not new fans could be won by listening, or if Live at Hammersmith Odeon '75 is simply going to be regarded as a trifle to be enjoyed by only the most unwavering of Rundgren fans. There is no easy way to say either way; while the epic and indulgent pop strains were awesome in their time, they were very much of their time and may go as totally disposable and uninteresting now, even by Rundgren's old guard of fans.
Artist:
www.tr-i.com/
www.myspace.com/toddrundgrenmusic
www.facebook.com/people/Todd-Rundgren/
www.twitter.com/#!/toddrundgren
Album:
Todd Rundgren's Utopia Live At Hammersmith Odeon '75 is out now. Buy it here on Amazon .
