Jul 162011
I was never a huge Thin Lizzy fan apart from their mighty fine singles — but these guys put on a pretty good show. I’m impressed how well they fair in a big setting. Any recos for stuff? Should I just make my own playlist via iTunes, song by song?
They were a fun band, and I don’t play them very often, but when I do I’m always a little surprised at how much I still like them. They seem to age pretty well, if you ask me. Jailbreak is probably their best album, even though the “concept” is just standard Sci Fi stuff. The songs are really good, and the riffs are catchy as hell.
I also like Vagabonds of the Western World. It has some dumb moments, but they were a hard rock band from the 70’s after all. The Rocker is one of their classics, and I haven’t watched that whole show you linked, but I bet it’s on there. Nightlife is a really good album, too. It’s more mellow than their other albums and it’s way different from all their other albums, but even if it’s the one album that’s different from all the rest, I think it holds up as their most solid album.
Definitely make your own playlist. I have yet to find a decent “best of” compilation out there. What you could do is sample and compare the hits on all of the compilations to get a good overview
If you’re looking for some really good gems I recommend:
-The live version of Seger’s Rosalie,
-Fighting My Way Back from the album Fighting
-She Knows and Showdown are some underrated mellow tunes from Night Life
Chinatown and Killer On The Loose are good rockers from the otherwise forgettable album Chinatown
Thanks for the recos. yeah, thinking of making my own best of via itunes. I wish I could figure out how to simply capture and convert stuff off of youtube. I have some buddies who might know how to do this.
Hey, Machinery — I know mwall will back me up on this one: you really can’t go wrong with “Live and Dangerous.”. Sure, the are two or three clunkers on it, but it’s a double-LP, so just buy the thing and dump the trackkssss you don’t want. Agree with previous track suggestions from the mostly crappy “Chinatown” album, but would add “We Will Be Strong.”
For me, there’s no need to buy “Jailbreak.”. All the trackkssss from that album that are worth hearing are performed louder, faster and better on the “Live…” album.
I use http://www.zamzar.com/ It will email you an audio copy(mp3,flac, aac) of any video at youtube. It’s free and easy. I’m sure there are better programs for purchase that townspeople can recommend.
Ay-yi-yo! That is very sad concert footage indeed! Leather-and-stud biker vest? Feathered hair? SYNTH PLAYER?!
No, no, no, no, NO!
Better to hone in on Lizzy in the glory years — 1976/77 or so. This is the Lizzy you need to see:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j6t6zhpDpPs&feature=related
what a cool program. takes a while for batch coversion, but for a handfull of songs you can’t beat it.
This backs my argument that you tube is a bigger threat to the music industry than anyone else, esp. since they started having official videos. You can find just about any song in the world and download the video and/or audio for free. A little knowhow and you can make decent DVDs as well.
One thing YouTube didn’t have today was the official video for the Dead Milkmen’s “Smokin Banana Peels”! In trying to keep some of our old, key posts functioning every few months or whenever they’re cited in a new post, it’s funny to see what does and doesn’t get wiped clean on a regular basis. Keeping the Ja-Bo video up to date, for instance, is a bear. The copyright owners of that bad boy – or more likely those working for Jagger and Bowie to help the artists maintain a modicum of post-’80s respectability – must have an entire team scouring the Web for new postings of the century’s biggest Rock Crime.
Yep, here I am, backing up bakshi on this one. “Live and Dangerous” is a top notch live record. The energy rarely flags, and the guitar playing is great. Didn’t Lynott once say that he wanted the band to be remembered as “one of the greatest guitar bands ever”? This record comes close to proving the claim. Sure, the lyrics run the gamut from culturally intriguing dumb to just plain dumb, but for the most part that’s not really what Lizzy was about. Lynott’s a rocker, remember?
Interesting. I was trying to convince my wife that Thin Lizzy was worth listening to, and I quickly found myself rhapsodizing about the greatness of the lyrics to “Boys Are Back In Town.” I really think the simple, honest, snapshot of dude-dom works in that song, with no qualification. The lyric works because it’s exactly what it appears to be — it’s a narrow-minded (and I mean that kind of literally) recollection of dudely summer moments. We did both agree that it probably worked a lot better for male listeners.
That’s obviously one of their best lyrics, bakshi, I would agree (and there aren’t many to choose from). Lynott lyrics work best I think when they’re saying something related to his working class roots, describing an environment that he knows something about. The cock rocker fantasy lyrics are much duller–but they’re also actually just irrelevant, a filler to hang some rocking on, and they rarely bother me.
Does anyone here have something against Dedication, the 18-song Lizzy Best Of? I think it’s a pretty decent collection of the band’s music. I’m not a Lizzy deep tracks guy, and there are maybe a couple things missing, but I don’t think it’s a misguided Best Of.
I also like the lyrics of “Still In Love With You,” a more realistic version of the man’s gotta leave tunes like “Free Bird” or “Angie”–Lynott’s song actually explores the fact that there are real consequences for blowing out the door.
I can’t imagine listening to 18 songs by Thin Lizzy. No offense to anyone and nothing against them: but it is not conceivable.
I rarely listen to all of them in one sitting, but I do that with a lot of albums on which I still like most of the songs.
I really dig Thin Lizzy and got into more than “The Boys are Back in Town” through Dedication. There are good deep tracks on all of their records (except maybe Chinatown) if Dedication turns you on. Plus, I think it is the only place to get the title track. Add “King’s Call”, a Lynott solo, and I think you’ve got it.