I'll be there, with a love that will shelter you

Continuing my trip back through the 1968 album charts.

24/03/68 : Four Tops Live! - The Four Tops

Another live album (for a change, not from The Talk Of The Town) but I think this one would have made the grade even in a normal year - I like The Four Tops sound and am interested to see how it came across in a live performance.

And, the answer is - pretty well.  It's an interesting mix of slower and more frenetic numbers and there are some interesting covers in there as well.  Their best known (by me, at least) songs are all there with "Reach Out I'll Be There", "The Same Old Song" and "I Can't Help Myself" all showcasing their live vocal abilities well.  On the cover front, we have our second versions of the year for "It's Not Unusual" (featuring a weird Welsh/American lilt in places) and "Climb Ev'ry Mountain" (which I wasn't expecting to hear!).  They also do fine versions of "You Can't Hurry Love" (which is as good as you'd expect) and "The Girl From Ipanema" (which I was surprised we haven't had a version of from Andy or Engelbert this year).

They also do a perfectly acceptable version of "If I Had A Hammer" which caused me to get totally lost down a Wikipedia rabbit-hole because I didn't know who did the original.  Obviously, it was first recorded by The Weavers, who were a folk quartet featuring Pete Seeger and Lee Hays who wrote the song.  The most successful versions were by Peter, Paul & Mary (#10 in the US, but not released over here) and Trini Lopez (#4 here, #3 in the US - and I don't think I'd ever heard it) - it's also suffered minor chart success here whilst being absolutely massacred by Handy Andy (seriously, it's so bad I'm actually recommending you check it out).  However, a slightly better known terrible version was done by Leonard Nimoy (I actually "prefer" this to Handy Andy's) which resulted in me learning the following, errr, "interesting" information - "Sado-masochistic performance artist Bob Flanagan pounded nails into his scrotum while playing Nimoy's version".  Don't say you don't learn things here!

Going back to The Four Tops, I do unfortunately have the usual 60s live album complaint about the sound quality - I'd also say the various levels in the mix are not always as consistent as you might hope for.  However, it is a very decent live album which I thoroughly enjoyed and I felt it gave me a good handle on The Four Tops live experience.  It also featured some excellent chat from Levi Stubbs - the man didn't suffer fools gladly.  I had a good chuckle at "We've had a few requests, but we're not going to do any of them - we're going to continue with the show" and "Don't applaud nobody!" (when the audience dared to clap just as they started a song).

We're at #24 in the charts this week on their 60th week of a 72 week run, with it having peaked at #4 in its ninth week.  It's interesting that most albums in '68 never peak in their first couple of weeks and. no matter how long they spend in the charts, never reappear in the charts once they drop out.  The top five this week were Bob, best-ofs from The Supremes, The Four Tops and Otis, with TSOM rounding things off, the highest new entry was The Supremes and there were no new women in the charts.

Wikipedia doesn't have a lot on the album other than it was recorded at The Roostertail in Detroit as part of a series of concerts showcasing Motown artists.  It was well received critically, with the general view being that it really captured their sound and commercially, particularly over here where it spent three months in the top ten.

"Customers also listened to" The Supremes, The Temptations, Shorty Long and The Tymes - a couple of new names there for me, which surprised me.  I really liked this album though - it was exactly the sort of thing I was hoping to stumble across in this year, so thank you to the four of them - one of whom, Abdul "Duke" Fadir is still with us and STILL in The Four Tops at the grand old age of 87. 

17/03/68 - An astonishingly successful album
31/03/68 - A very variable album