Pretend you're hearing the concert out in the parking lot
08/13/2002
(3 out of 5 stars)
"This release is truly only for fans of Soft Machine who have their other available concert material already. The sound quality rates only one star, although the performance itself would rate five stars. The person who recorded this concert (Brian Hopper) claims that you'll hear the concert as it was for a member of the audience. Given that Brian's brother Hugh has said that the goal of each band member during this time was to play louder than the others, the muddy distorted sound may indeed be close to what the audience actually heard. Again, the performance is great, but start with Backwards, Noisette, or Virtually if you haven't heard those yet."
For completists only
Purple Tentacle | Netherlands | 10/05/2002
(2 out of 5 stars)
"You can't fault the performance on this album and this is considered by many to be one of the best Soft Machine line-ups.
Unfortunately, this concert was recorded by Hugh Hopper's brother with a portable tape-recorder and the sound quality on this release is atrocious. The drums are inaudible, there's noisy hiss all over the recording and to top it off, there are speed problems with the recording resulting in a jangly sound in a lot of places. This is definitely a 'completists only'-release."
Softs Crazies Only
Slave | Las Vegas, Nevada United States | 05/03/2003
(3 out of 5 stars)
"Yes... the sound is very dated... what do you get with a hand-held tape recorder in 1970... tapes speed fluxs and all the worts... well... that being said you can guess quality of sonics but not the performance. The performance is fantastic and it takes my bootleg weary ears to tell. Buy at your own risk but how can I say don't... it's Soft Machine!"
Track Listings (8) - Disc #1