With the touring circuit experiencing a post-pandemic boom, live albums are back in fashion. The Mail’s music critic rounds off the current crop.
DUA LIPA
Live from the Royal Albert Hall (Warner)
Accompanied by an orchestra, band, backing singers and a burgundy-clad Elton John – who arrived for an encore of Cold Heart (Pnau Remix) – Dua dazzled when she headlined the Royal Albert Hall for the first time in October. The show has since spawned an ITV special (still available on ITVX) and now a live album, released on double vinyl (£40), CD (£12) and digital.
Adrian Thrills: Dua dazzled when she headlined the Royal Albert Hall for the first time in October.
Adrian Thrills: the most glamorous pop-It Girl is an unstoppable force
Adrian Thrills: Some glaring omissions kept the show from truly being a career-long spectacle
The concert focused on this year’s LP Radical Optimism. Greeted with lukewarm reactions upon its release in May, the dance bangers were given new life in a symphonic setting. End Of An Era, co-written with Tame Impala’s Kevin Parker, took on the mantle of a 1970s Philadelphia soul anthem. Piano ballad Anything For Love was sung with drama and poise.
A number of glaring omissions, including the singles Physical, Break My Heart and New Rules, kept the show from truly being a career-wide spectacle. But pop’s most glamorous It Girl, despite shying away from heartbreaking onstage revelations, is an unstoppable force. You wonder what she’ll do next. A Bond theme perhaps?
FLORENCE + THE MACHINE
Symphony of the Lungs (UMC)
The grandeur of the Royal Albert Hall was also the perfect setting for Florence Welch to reinvent her gothic debut album Lungs as a symphonic suite. Backed by Jules Buckley’s orchestra, the theatrical diva was in her element during her BBC Prom. It can be viewed on iPlayer and will also be released as a digital album, with a CD (£14) and double vinyl LP (£40) due in March.
Adrian Thrills: The grandeur of the Royal Albert Hall was also the perfect setting for Florence Welch
The theatrical diva was in her element. It is available to watch on iPlayer and is also available as a digital album
The excellent acoustics of the Royal Albert Hall can amplify any vocal shortcomings, but Welch took advantage of the opportunity. She played the album in its entirety and added four B-Side tracks to make it a substantial and stylish show.
DEF LEPPARD
One Night Only: Live At The Leadmill (Mercury Studios)
Ahead of a tour that saw them visit Wembley Stadium and Bramall Lane – home to frontman Joe Elliott’s beloved Sheffield United – guitar giants Def Leppard played a benefit concert at Sheffield’s Leadmill nightclub, one of several British music venues currently facing an uncertain future.
The performance to just 850 fans has now been immortalized on a live album available on CD (£13), double vinyl (£36), DVD/CD (£20) and Blu-ray/CD (£22).
Leppard are heavy metal heroes, but their sound also has a pop edge. They once played a show in Nashville with Taylor Swift, and highlights from the hour-long album include the pop-metal crossover hit Pour Some Sugar On Me and a version of the glam rock band Sweet’s 1975 single Action.
TEARS FOR FEAR
Songs for a Nervous Planet (Concord)
Live albums are becoming more and more innovative. This one is a hybrid and combines a performance by Tears For Fears from Tennessee with four new songs recorded in the studio. It is available as a double CD (£15), double LP (£32) and digital.
Bath duo Roland Orzabal and Curt Smith were portrayed as a synth-pop band with a poetic face when they emerged in the 1980s with singles such as Mad World and Pale Shelter (both recorded here), but they have grown into an accomplished live act: their A smooth wall of sound combines electronics with traditional rock guitars and keyboards.
Tears For Fears performed during the final of The Voice earlier this month
There are songs from 2022’s The Tipping Point here, plus older sing-alongs including Everybody Wants To Rule The World and Shout. Woman In Chains, from 1989’s Seeds Of Love, is a slow-burning centerpiece. Of the new songs, Astronaut is a stunning ballad, and The Girl That I Call Home is a love song dedicated to Roland’s wife Emily.
WHITNEY HOUSTON
The concert for a new South Africa (Legacy)
Remastered to mark the thirtieth anniversary of Houston’s 1994 tour of South Africa – the first visit by a major Western star in the post-apartheid era – this album captures Whitney in her prime. A film of the performance, from Durban, was shown in UK cinemas in October and an edited version is now out on CD (£14) and double vinyl (£36).
Highlights abound, with Whitney’s towering voice hitting the high notes of Saving All My Love For You, before a finale featuring songs from her 1992 soundtrack for The Bodyguard: a funky cover of Chaka Khan’s I’m Every Woman and a ten-minute Take on I’ll Always Love You.
Prices may vary.