Camel - A Live Record (1978)

Camel is a British band known for its individual art-rock style, in which melody prevails over vocals. The first live recording of the team was the double work “A Live Record”, which included the best songs recorded during three different tours.

This LP, in my opinion, greatest merit of Camel in progressive rock’s field. Standing on a par with "Playing The Fool" Gentle Giant, "Seconds Out" by Genesis and Jethro Tull’s "Bursting Out", and in something even surpasses them, it revealed a kind of band's work anthology, depicting peak of the concert activities of Camel as a progressive band.

Never pretended to become innovators, here Camel presented a unique, existing only within this work and nowhere else, an alloy of jazz and art - rock. There is no place for dictatorship, but only teamwork and absolute understanding. Here there are no leaders and "laborers", and there is a high level musicians with incredible musical intuition and melodic sensibility.

The first part of “Live recording” is filled with singles that guys recorded during several of their tours. Also, it contains things taken from “Mirage” and “Rain Dances”: composition “Never Let Go” - owned by Andrew Latimer and taken from the band's debut album of the same name, and “Song Within a Song” from “Moonmadness”.

The second LP is no less interesting. It's fully assembled, a conceptual album based on a children's play - "The Snow Goose". This work was included in band's concert tour, which took place in 1975. At it's audition, everyone can appreciate the fruits of the collective performance of the rock group and Symphony Orchestra of London. The recording was made in 1975 at the Royal concert hall in London.

The inspiration for writing "White Rider" was a fantasy novel "Fellowship of the Ring", authored by J. R. R. Tolkien. The success of the resulting work prompted the rock group to the idea of creating an entire album based which will be an outstanding literary work. Initially, as the Muse was chosen as the novel "Siddhartha" written by Hermann Hesse. Camel even wrote a few songs for this reason. But after a while, a new source of inspiration - the novel "The Snow Goose". Today, "The Snow Goose" is the best available records of art-rock collective. In sound, it is not inferior to Studio variation.

Climax of the album (ending of "Dunkirk") sounds really powerful and impressive, but the atmospheric songs like "Sanctuary" or "Fritha" sound much more dramatic. In General, each of the songs on this album played live, has become more bright emotional coloring, in contrast to the pale and stingy on the emotions of their Studio records. I must also add that the performance of "The Snow Goose", presented on this album is a rare concert recording, listening to which, I sincerely regret that not having had the pleasure to attend the concert.

By far, this is one of the best live recordings of all time, and perfect introduction to the work of Camel, this unstable, controversial, but definitely a unique band.

So… Camel - A Live Record (1978)