Todd Rundgren: Another Live : Music Reviews : Rolling Stone

Album Reviews

Another Live is Todd Rundgren's best effort since A Wizard, a True Star—four albums and almost three years ago—and simply one of the best recorded and performed live rock sets. It not only recapitulates the style he perfected some time ago, but also sees the first successful realization of the more ambitious and religious tack he has lately pursued.

Rundgren and Utopia devote most of the second side to past approaches. "Heavy Metal Kids" and "Just One Victory" do remarkable justice to their more complex studio versions—Rundgren can do more outside a studio than most producers can inside one. The sextet also reels off a dashing rendition of West Side Story's "Something's Coming," and on the Move's "Do Ya" they duplicate the same crushing sound that group fashioned on their own live recordings. Utopia err only in burying the high vocal harmony so vital to that tune's chorus.

The heart of Another Live is its new material. Unlike Initiation or the first Utopia album, Rundgren's new work doesn't sprawl. The six still draw from recent jazz-rock fusions. Roger Powell joins Ralph Schuckett and Moogy Klingman to form a superb keyboard trio which accounts for most of Utopia's futuristic tones, while Rundgren himself continues to be one of the better (and most overlooked) rock guitarists. His shift to acoustic guitar on "The Wheel" is as new as it is effective. The only relatively weak link among them is John Wilcox, a capable drummer but one who doesn't equal Kevin Ellman from the first Utopia lineup.

The crowning point is "The Seven Rays," one of the most palatable unions of rock and quasi-religious lyrics yet concocted. Rundgren smartly avoids preaching and the beat is definitely there, propelled by clever chording and an intent vocal. Having joined the seemingly incompatible, Rundgren's music is back under his very considerable control and much the better for it.