SOMETIME IN NEW YORK CITY Woman is the nigger of the world Sisters, O Sisters Attica State Born in a Prision New York City Sunday bloddy sunday The luck of the Irish John Sinclair Angela We’re all water Cold turkey (live jam) Don’t worry Kyoko (live jam) Well baby please don’t go (live jam) Listen the snow is falling (bonus) Happy Xmas (War is over) (bonus)

Since Yoko started releases updated version of John’s albums, this is the one, along with “Walls and bridges”, I was most anxiously waiting for, because I have always felt it had by far the worst sound of all of John’s albums, maybe of all Beatles releases ever.

So it’s really refreshing to finally be able to listen to these tracks with a good sound. Anyone who follows my site knows I have restriction to remixing albums, specially on the Beatles universe, but in this case it was a necessary thing to do. All of the tracks now allow the listener to actually enjoy the music and notice every single instrument that’s being played.

I also confess I’ve always been a fan of this album. I know many people don’t like it, but I do, including Yoko’s tunes, which are quite enjoyable. She can’t sing... so what? Look what professional singers are doing to music. This is at the very least well composed and well played basic rock’n’roll.

John’s tunes have always been the subject of many criticism and I’ll admit “Sunday bloddy sunday” isn’t my favourite song, but “Woman is the nigger of the world” and “New York City” alone would justify the full album. “The luck of the Irish” has that gorgeous melody and “John Sinclair” maybe isn’t John’s best track, but just listening to that dobro work makes it worth the CD price.

With all this, this CD is more than welcome.

I do have two complains, though. First, the non-inclusion of “Scumbag”. This leaves a sense of uncompletness, that I bet will require still another reissue in the future. Whatever problem John’s state might have Frank Zappa’s, they should solve it before releasing the CD. Another thing is the bonus, which I really didn’t like, specially when we know there’s a lot of rare material from these sessions out there. I love “Happy Xmas”, but I just don’t think it fits the album. Those are two side of John’s engaged art: the political and the pacifist. While of course they go to the same direction, the differ a lot in tone and musical and production style. It seems to be like it’s a purely commercial movement, since the album is considered to be too acid, while “Happy Xmas” is more well accepted.

This page is generously hosted by Get your own Free Home Page

Many thanks to everybody at Geocities!!