A remaster, a raft of believed-lost session outtakes and part of a 1975 concert in support of the album make the deluxe edition of Feats Don’t Fail Me Now a successful entry in Little Feat’s ongoing reissue campaign.
The 1974 LP comes out of the refresh sounding crisp and clear; the recently discovered session recordings, taped in a converted-to-studio barge that sunk in 1977, contain some real gems; and the onstage recordings from Paris reinforce the classic Feat’s live prowess.
Dubbed Hotcakes, Outtakes & Rarities, the studio material comprises alternate versions of such tracks as “Spanish Moon,” “Rock and Roll Doctor” and early versions of numbers that would wind up on later LPs, including the Last Record Album’s “Long Distance Love,” “Day at the Dog Races,” which would appear on Time Loves a Hero, and a skeletal “Front Page News” previews Down on the Farm. “Spanish Moon,” meanwhile, boasts first person lyrics – as in “if that don’t kill me soon” – and “Oh Atlanta” finds the narrator wanting to “fuck her tonight.”
The Paris show begins inauspiciously with Lowell George’s barely audible vocals threatening to mar “On Your Way Down,” before the sound wizards fix things up nicely. What follows is a typical-for-the-era set of songs including “Skin it Back,” “Fat Man in the Bathtub,” “Rock and Roll Doctor,” “Willin’” and others. Not essential for Feat collectors but Feat fetishists will revel in the trove of previously unreleased concert documentation.
No Comments comments associated with this post