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Editorial Reviews

801 provided Roxy Music guitarist Phil Manzanera with one of his most intriguing side projects. Although the band only played three gigs in August and September 1976, this album captures a night when everything fell right into place musically. That should only be expected with names like Eno and Simon Phillips in the lineup. (Still, the lesser-known players -- bassist Bill MacCormick, keyboardist Francis Monkman, and slide guitarist Lloyd Watson -- are in exemplary form, too.) The repertoire is boldly diverse, opening with "Lagrima," a crunchy solo guitar piece from Manzanera. Then the band undertakes a spacy but smoldering version of "Tomorrow Never Knows"; it's definitely among the cleverest of Beatles covers. Then it's on to crisp jazz-rock ("East of Asteroid"), atmospheric psychedelic pop ("Rongwrong"), and Eno's tape manipulation showcase "Sombre Reptiles." And that's only the first five songs. The rest of the gig is no less audacious, with no less than three Eno songs -- including a frenetic "Baby's on Fire," "Third Uncle," and "Miss Shapiro"'s dense, syllable-packed verbal gymnastics. There's an unlikely cover of the Kinks' "You Really Got Me," while Manzanera turns in another typically gutsy instrumental performance on "Diamond Head." This album marks probably one of the last times that Eno rocked out in such an unselfconsciously fun fashion, but that's not the only reason to buy it: 801 Live is a cohesive document of an unlikely crew who had fun and took chances. Listeners will never know what else they might have done if their schedules had been less crowded, but this album's a good reminder. Later reissues of 801 Live added two more Eno songs as bonus tracks, "Golden Hours" and "The Fat Lady of Limbourg," tilting the album more toward the singer/synthesizer player. In 2009, MacCormick unearthed a tape of an 801 band rehearsal at Shepperton Studios 11 days before the show heard on 801 Live, and the recording was reissued yet again, this time as a two-CD "Collectors Edition," its running time more than doubled. The rehearsal contains the same material, minus "Golden Hours" and plus a reprise of "Lagrima." There's no cheering crowd, Eno's vocals are sometimes lower in the mix, and the playing is a little looser (with the tracks tending to run on a bit longer), but this is more a "dress rehearsal" than just a run-through, in the sense that it shows the band to be performance-ready. Thus, it's a useful gloss on the long-enshrined live recording of 801. ~ Ralph Heibutzki & William Ruhlmann, All Music Guide All Music Guide

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