Why does it seem that so many great bands choose to record live albums in support of some of their weakest material? Judas Priest did it with Priest…Live!, Iron Maiden did it with A Real Live / Dead One, Pretty Maids did it with Alive at Least and here Pink Cream 69 does it with the simplistically titled Live which was recorded during the Food For Thought Tour. There are two big drawbacks to this record, one is the tracklist which is heavy on the awful Change record and on the somewhat better but not really Food For Thought album. The second major setback from this being a stellar live is the fact that there are FADEOUTS between several songs. This for me, this kills any atmosphere that was built up and brings the set to a screeching halt. Yes, I realize that Change and Food For Thought were the two most recent albums and that of course the tour was heavy on those two albums but that still doesn’t change the fact that the songs off those cds aren’t near as strong as their previous work or what came after this.

The biggest draw to this album is that there are several Andi Deris era songs that are rarely played live anymore. Do You Like it Like That?, Talk to the Moon, Welcome the Night, and Keep Your Eye on the Twisted are all done here with Readman on vocals and they all sound better surprisingly! His voice fits this band like a glove, I’m glad that the guys realized this and went on to make some killer melodic rock after the release of this album instead of trying to be grunge some more. In fact, many of these songs sound much better live. Yesterdays, the only true Pink Cream 69 song from Change sounds so much better in this setting, and even the mediocre Light of Day is listenable. On Better Days David also whips out the guitar to give it that full sound you hear on the album and it helps out a lot. My favorite cut off Food For Thought also becomes my favorite one on here as well. Now, on to the ugly side of things. As you can probably tell from my comments on previous Pink Cream 69 reviews, Change is a train wreck, in fact, I don’t even own that particular cd although I’ve heard it several times. There isn’t much one can do to save awful songs and there quite a lot of them on here. No matter how hard I try I can’t listen to these all the way through, a band like Pink Cream 69 doing alternative grunge music doesn’t sit well with me so I end up skipping a good fourth of this cd every time I listen to it. At least the songs picked from the Food For Thought album are the better ones with Diggin Through the Past, Better Days, Until I Wake, and Big Shot. Seeing as these are about the only songs that I like off of that particular cd, I’m glad that they were the ones chosen to be represented here.

I really hope Pink Cream 69 decides to record another live album, preferably a double disc set, and this time without any fade outs, in the near future. This one doesn’t do the band justice at all, and I think the only reason new fans will buy this is to hear the Andi Deris songs sung by Readman. As a band, they have put out much better material than what is being shown on here and have evolved so much that this cd is obsolete and only die hards will own this.