Pothead - "Live in Berlin" (Janitor Records 011)
Uploaded to Aural Innovations: July 2004
Pothead is lead by an American duo (Brad and Jeff) who transplanted themselves from Seattle to Berlin in the early 90’s and stayed. They are joined by Sebastian on drums. While relatively unknown outside of Germany, the band have built up a large and dedicated following in Germany. This is the bands first live releases and it was recorded at a special concert in Berlin in December 2003 on the Tuf Luv tour. It contains 19 tracks in 75 minutes and while a lot of songs from Tuf Luv are featured (Rock Child, Dr. De Structo, Stadium, Troop, Constantinople). The band dips into its back catalog of 8 previous CDs as early as '94-'96 with Black War (Rumley Oil Pull Tractor), Stop and Y-Road from Learn To Hypnotize. No songs from Burning Bridges were featured but all other releases are represented. A new song (?) The Long Road (Live Jam) is also included. The sound is excellent and you really get the feel of the live gig. The band has a guest keyboard player on Festung. As it is not mentioned that she plays piano on Stadium, I can only assume that they played to a backing track (with piano and harmonica) on this song, which I think is strange in a live setting. The band’s CDs have a huge variety from really heavy riffing stuff to melodic ballads and you get a strong sampling of both but mostly rocking out! This is a great live CD to complement your Pothead collection or get your first taste of the band. This is a great band I highly recommend you go check out their web page as they have a lot of MP3s you can hear as well as streaming live and production videos to check out. Cool web page.
For more information you can visit the Pothead web site at: http://www.pothead.de.
Reviewed by Scott Heller