(2020) Anthony Phillips - The Living Room Concert (Expanded Edition)


Review:
Cherry Red’s Esoteric Recordings imprint has had a long relationship with ex-Genesis guitarist Anthony Phillips including numerous reissues and last year’s release of his latest album, Strings of Light. Now, Esoteric has reissued and expanded another treasured album from Phillips: his 1995 acoustic live set The “Living Room” Concert. The album was culled from Phillips’ June 25, 1993 performance as part of the Living Room Concert Series on the U.S. public radio program Echoes. As the series title implies, the concert was recorded at Phillips’ home. As live performances in front of an audience are rare in Phillips’ career, the intimate show was a special one – even if the audience wasn’t physically present. The intimate broadcast consisted of solo, often ethereal tracks played on guitar and piano, including both instrumentals and vocals.  He drew on albums including The Geese and the Ghost (the epic, multi-part Mike Rutherford co-write “Henry: Portraits from Tudor Times,” “Which Way the Wind Blows,” “Collections,” “Sleepfall”), Private Parts and Pieces Vol. 1 (“Reaper,” “Flamingo,” “Field of Eternity”), Vol. IV (“Sistine,” “Lights on the Hill”), and the then-current Vol. VIII: New England (“Last Goodbyes”).  Phillips also dug back to the Guitar Quintet he had composed in 1976 for a 12-string guitar adaptation of its first movement; he entitled it “Conversation Piece” for its appearance here. The “Living Room” Concert features a handful of Phillips’s spoken introductions to his performances: alternately mellow and urgent, conjuring many moods while displaying his virtuosic musicianship in styles ranging from classical to New Age.  The melodic gifts that have made him an in-demand composer for film, television, and library music are also evident.  The emphasis is on instrumental music but there are some lovely and even pop-leaning moments like the pretty, McCartney-esque “Sistine” and “Which Way the Wind Blows,” sung in the songwriter’s own charming and modest voice.  (Old friend Phil Collins handled vocal duties in its original appearance.)  Phillips switched over from his primary instrument of guitar to piano for the stately closing trio of “Last Goodbyes,” “Collections” (on which he also sings), and the beautifully majestic “Sleepfall.” Esoteric’s expanded edition adds three previously unreleased bonus tracks. A then-current composition, “Jaunty Roads,” was heard on the radio but not included on the original CD release. The vocal-and-guitar showcase “Lucy: An Illusion” and the Genesis-era “Let Us Now Make Love” from the second and sixth volumes of Private Parts and Pieces, respectively, were performed in Phillips’ home but not included on the original broadcast.  The latter is reinvented here as a piano instrumental rather than a full-band vocal piece.





Tracklist:
01.Reaper
02.Which Way the Wind Blows
03.Henry: Portraits from Tudor Times
04.Conversation Piece
05.Flamingo
06.Field of Eternity
07.Sistine
08.Lights on the Hill
09.Last Goodbyes
10.Collections
11.Sleepfall
12.Jaunty Roads
13.Let Us Now Make Love
14.Lucy: An Illusion



Media Report:
Genre: folk-rock, prog-rock
Format: FLAC
Format/Info: Free Lossless Audio Codec, 16-bit PCM
Bit rate mode: Variable
Channel(s): 2 channels
Sampling rate: 44.1 KHz
Bit depth: 16 bits