Where The Faces Shine, Vol. 2: The Official Live Experience

HOW much did I spend on this???The performances, as far as I can tell, are pretty good. The recording is one of the worst I've heard. Sounds like it was recorded with a pocket recorder from the balcony seats. "Muddy" is being polite.Remember those Dead-heads you knew in college? Remember those crappy bootleg tapes they traded with each other ("I have Saratoga, April 28, 1974")? THOSE are better!I spend a lot of money on this and when I started listening, I could barely sit through it.Buyer's regret.

The sound quality is good- the shows are greatThey must have gotten ALOT of negative feedback on the first collection(which they admit in the liner notes)- I'm happy I saw all of these tours- in NYC- so it's a great document- turn up the volume!

What can I say? It's genius, it's Iggy Pop.jj66

This set is far more balanced than the first Where The Faces Shine box set : the first one scores incredibly highly for its interviews with the personnel involved (inc Glen Matlock and Brian James), and for its striking photography, but did not score so high for sound quality.This gets good marks for both presentation and sound quality...this time around instead of interviews with the players we get a good essay from Kris Needs. As hinted, the music is presented in better quality than last time...having read a negative review regarding the sound quality - which I personally am quite happy with - it still may not be for everyone, but the vast majority of what is on offer here is very high quality by bootleg standards, and close to or not far off official live album standards. Less than a quarter is from private recordings, the rest is from mixing desk recordings and is fine to my ears.The first two discs in particular - The Ritz New York City 9th December 1982 and Keystone Palo Alto, California. 13th February 1983 - are very high quality recordings, both in terms of sound and performance, the second gig being prefaced by an interesting pre-recorded intro by Iggy about his life being in "Little Boxes", honest and open in Iggy's unique way.Disc Three: Odds 'N' Sods includes all the pre-Blah Blah Blah demos in one place at last - including Fire Girl, which is the unlabelled final track on the disc. If there's one fault on this disc it's an uncleaned up vinyl scratch on "Sick of You"...one of the things that prevented giving me the box 5 stars. The track is live from Bristol 1987, from a high quality audience recording. The vinyl bootleg may have been the most common source of that track, but why not seek another fan who had it without the scratch (I did!)? Or try removing it...there has been good vinyl scratch removal software for at least a few years now...a shame as it is a classic version of the track, if not the best version, and to feel forced to listen to it on another source, or grimace and bear a scratch noise that should not be there is annoying to say the least, especially when that disk is otherwise a fine round up of Iggy recordings from 1983-88. I say this sort of thing in the hope Easy Action clean up (pun sort of intended!:) their act, which they certainly did for the California Hitch Hike CD...Disc 4 and 5 concentrate on a Detroit gig from 1986. It's a mixing desk recording, and like some it lacks guts a bit, but as Easy Action say, Iggy puts his all into it being a hometown gig.Disc 6 is a warm up show for the 1988 tour, recorded at the Whiskey A Go Go, and again Easy Action opine that this gig represents Iggy giving his all more than some of the other recorded gigs. I'm not one to argue : I have found that the highest quality recordings can be beaten in terms of performance and emotional power by gigs in lesser audio quality, and this gig and the one above aren't bad audio quality at all, they are still above average.Ultimately much as I love some live 86-88 Iggy live material - and I must not leave out the live 88 DVD in the package which is great to have - for me the best parts are disc 1-3, the two high quality '82 and '83 gigs and the very useful compilation of demos and live tracks on disc 3.There is plenty here for the Iggy fan, and arguably the rock fan who is curious about Iggy. The latter type of collector who buys this may need to be one who is prepared to open their wallet and take a chance as this may not be cheap at any given time (it was a good deal when I bought it, especially with the bonus live 89 disc which I doubt no longer comes free with this), but I think most would find this a good deal and a good listen too.

This is a 6-CD box set, however my review (for now) is for disc one - only. Simply cannot get enough of this twenty-one track power-house live performance that the grandpappy of punk Iggy Pop gave this appreciative crowd at The Ritz in New York on December 9, 1982 during his 'Zombie Birdhouse' tour. Was great to (almost) feel like I was there - with songs to thoroughly soak in - such as "Little Boxes", "Run Like A Villain", the total ass-kicking "Eat Or Be Eaten", "Platonic", the unreal mayhem of "Search & Destroy", "Life Of Work", "Loose", the Kingsmen garage rocker "Louie Louie", "Bang Bang", the sedate "Fall In Love With Me" and "Your Pretty Face Is Going To Hell". Where does the chaos end? I might decide to purchase and download one [or more] of this posting's other gigs sometime. But for now, this is it. So highly recommended, it hurts.

This is soul-music that you listen to with your heart. Folks who dig a real clean technical sound may not be satisfied....Personally, I love it. Famous Jonny Mambo "World's Self-Proclaimed Greatest Iggy Fan" and DJ @ WCOM, Carrboro, NC

Für mich als Iggy Fan ist die Box klasse - sie dokumentiert Iggys Konzerte in den 80ern und ich freue mich , daß es dies als Konserve gibt. Iggy `s Konzerte waren und sind die beste Art Iggy `s Musik zu hören. Allerdings ist die Aufnahmequalität sehr bescheiden. Die Aufnahmen Ende der 80er sind besser und bleiben doch dürftig ( auch die DVD ). Aufnahmetechnisch bessere Qualität gibt`s erst bei Aufzeichnungen ab Anfang der 90er Jahre (zB swingin Pig Ausgabe 91, Telluric Chaos, Escaped Maniacs )In der Serie "Live USA " gibt es auch eine Aufnahme der Zombie Birdhouse Tour - die ist in der Qualität zwar auch nicht so toll aber wesentlich besser wie die CD in dieser Box.Also die Box ist für mich eher eine klasse Doku über Iggy`s Konzerte als eine musikalische hochwertige Konserve.

INDISPENSABLE POUR LES "DINGOS" d'IGGY ! AISNSI QUE LA BOX VOLUME 1!