The Quireboys – Live In London

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As the title indicates this is a live recording of bar-room rockers The Quireboys in London, on their 2002 tour following their run on the Monsters of Rock arena tour, including three songs from their comeback disc This Is Rock ‘N’ Roll. The beauty of a Quireboys show is they don’t do bad performances. Fans of their music will always be satisfied after seeing them live, and so was the case here, but the release has met with some controversy. The Quireboys themselves have spoken out against the release of this live CD/DVD set, urging fans not to buy it, but have so far given no better reason than “we didn’t say they could”. This kind of stance is always understandable when a label tries to release a sub-standard product that the band doesn’t want to see the light of day, but what’s going to count against The Quireboys this time is the quality of this recording is actually rather good. The audio is better than the video, but even there, given that it was recorded in the cramped confines of The Marquee, the filming is actually of a surprisingly high quality as well. The set is more or less what would be expected following the release of a new album (three new songs, the rest the usual classics), but the inclusion of excellent, oft-overlooked album track Whippin’ Boy from their debut album, is a great surprise, its groove proving just as potent as on the original disc. The band may not be happy about this release coming out, but really they should have no complaints as the quality is high enough to do their reputation no harm at all. Perhaps they are lining up an official live release of their own and were afraid this would detract from the sales, but really the only people in 2010 buying Quireboys releases are Quireboys fans (a fanbase which does seem to have expanded of late, or perhaps simply returned at long last), who will happily buy both given the chance, so they shouldn’t worry.

Written by Andy Lye
More: Live Albums, Live DVDs, Quick.Play Reviews, Rock, The Quireboys