Review of "Complicated Life" Ray Davies bootleg

RAY DAVIES: COMPLICATED LIFE (2 CD set)

(BOOTLEG) Siren's Music #SM-005/6

Track listings as shown on label as follows:

CD 1: All tracks (plus #1-11 on CD 2) from Yomiuri Hall show, 12/18/95  

1. Dedicated Follower of Fashion*
2. Sunny Afternoon*
3. Apeman*
4. Victoria*
5. 20^th Century Man
6. Muswell Hillbillies*
7. London
8. That Old Black Magic
9. Tired of Waiting For You
10. Set Me Free
11. See My Friends
12. X-Ray
13. Stop Your Sobbing*
14. You Really Got Me (A slow, bluesy instrumental-the way this song was originally arranged)
15. Animal
16. Cadillac (Partial performance, interrupted by a story)
17. Smokestack Lightning (Partial performance, interrupted by a story)
18. You Really Got Me*
19. A Well Respected Man*
20. All Day and All of The Night

* Indicates shortened performance Total Time: 74:20

CD 2: Parco Theater show, 12/16/95 (tracks #16-18); The White Room show (track#19)

1. Americana (A spoken word song, with some Jimi Hendrix guitar added by Pete Matheson)
2. Dead End Street
3. I Go To Sleep
4. Two Sisters
5. The Money-Go-Round
6. Lola*
7. Village Green Preservation Society*
8. To The Bone
9. Days
10. Waterloo Sunset
11. You Really Got Me*
12. Shangri-La* (Really only a few lines and it fades out)
13. Autumn Almanac
14. This Strange Effect
15. Powerman* (Also only a few lines and it fades out)
16. The Ballad of Julie Finkel
17. Harry Rag (acappella version)
18. Village Green
19. Waterloo Sunset

* Indicates shortened performance Total time: 74:14

Comments: I consider this to be an exceptional 2 CD set of live concerts performed in Japan late in 1995. Compared to the Santa Ana, 1995 release, I consider the sound quality to be superior (less background hiss). I rated this release as a "B+" in terms of sound quality. (It is an audience recording, but less background hiss is evident. The recording is still not of top-notch, soundboard quality, so I cannot give it an "A" rating.) The content is more extensive (as one would expect from a 2 CD set), however, audience participation is not as pronounced as found on the Santa Ana show. Although clapping and singing along with RDD is very spirited, some jokes appear to go over their heads.