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Saturday, March 29, 2014

Saturday Night Live Music: "Steppin' Out"

A melodious, almost mournful, jazz reworking of the New Wave classic. This version has been around forever, thanks to the Joe Jackson's brilliant Live 1980/1986 double album, one of the greatest live albums of all time, but it can never hurt to listen to it again.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Love that album, although my favorite track is probably It's Different for Girls. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nNzzK1dUtCI

One of the greatest live albums of all time though? It has three different versions of the same song. That's kind of a disqualifier. I'd put Under a Blood Red Sky and Stop Making Sense ahead of it for sure. Greatful Dead Europe '72, Woodstock, Cheap Trick Live at Buddakan, The Who Live at Leeds. There's probably a live Queen album in there too.

Russell Arben Fox said...

I don't think Live 1980/1986 loses any points for having three versions of "Is She Really Going Out With Him?" on it, David; as Jackson defends himself in the liner notes, every version is completely different, and it's really hard to choose between them. As for the "one of the greatest live albums" claim, I stand by that too--though you'll note (check the link!) that I qualified it by speaking of live double albums, which is a smaller subset. The Who's Live at Leeds makes my list, among many others.