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« Live (original release) | Live (30th Anniversary release) » Live Booklet BitsLive on BroadwayRon Delsner presents Mott The Hoople Executive Produer: Fred Heller Engineer: James Reeves in the Record Plant Mobile
Studio
May 7th 1974: All the way from nowhere to the Uris Theatre in New York, where the ghost of Broadway tradition exchanged it top hat and tails for a pair of shades and a weeklong electric siezure. To my thinking, there could've been no better rock & roll band to open up Broadway's belly than Mott The Hoople. They earned the right to that much frosting on the cake with five years of diligently rendered service. And they further earned it by virtue of the fact that they could look all the pomp and circumstance full in the face and still giggle about it over in the corner: "Is that really us?". In retrospect, however, the Broadway aspect of the situation comes up an also ran; just another entry for Mr Guiness to note and file away. The deck was stacked with pop aristocracy on opening night, but the event was the string of performances that most of the gentry didn't stick around for. Nights when the people who'd been along for most or all of the ride could get down to the real celebration. What was to celebrate? Five full years of ups, downs and somewhere-in-betweens that might be the story of any rock & roll band. But Mott the Hoople has not been just any rock & roll band. They may well be the consummate illustration of the old "do it yourself" principle of rock & roll; blue collar sensibilities and a mouth that actually works. Which meant that from the beginning Mott was always somehow more special that any of the one-night superstars who measured their success in the numbe rof miles they could put between themselves and their audience. Without a commensurate energy feedback from their audience, Mott's story would probobaly have lasted closer to five minutes than five years. As you'll hear on these tales of two cities, the circuits were overloaded from both ends of the line, and this kind of artist-audience crossfire is about the closest you can come to a blueprint for rock & roll magic. It burns as brightly on "All The Way From Memphis" as it does on "Rock 'n' Roll Queen", which says to me that this celebration is not of the past but of the future. Nothing stops here, least of all the changes, but one thing is certain; the best is still ahead of us. Now that's something worth celebrating! Ben Edmunds. CREEM Magazine. October 1974. 
Live at HammersmithMel Bush presents Mott The Hoople Recorded at the Odean Theatre, Hammersmith, London.
December 14th 1973 Engineer: Bill Price with Gary Edwards in the Island
Mobile Studio
Mott The Hoople returned to London with a sensational show that puts them right back amongst the swashbuckiling few who close their shows with pandemonium, fighting on-stage and all the makings of a genuine riot, though in keeping with the Christmas generosity everything seemed to be smoothed out quickly afterwards and the group and the stewards and the hall manager, who had seemed on the brink of fisticuffs with each other at the end of the show, were later drinking amicably together. The aggro started during the encore. Mott were just battering their way through a brutal, aggresive version of "Walking with a Mountain" with the regular crowd milling away upfront, when the safety curtain started to drop and a grey-suited gentleman who looked like the hall manager started purposefully towards centre-stage, where Ian Hunter and Ariel Bender were letting it all hang out for the benefit of the audience. Stan Tippins, the group's road-manager, remonstrated with him and was eventually compelled to propel him out of view, but in the meantime the curtain had sunk to shoulder height, and Stan, giving wild gestures at the band to pack the show in and call it a day (this mind you was the second house), thrust a burly shoulder under the curtain. Roadies poured onto the stage to aid him, Hunter and Bender sounding as if they would play for ever, were wailing and roaring away and ducked under and advanced up a cat-walk bridging the orchestra pit. The lieutenants took this as the signal for advance, and with the energies of the stewards divided, swarmed over the cat-walk, the pit, mingling with photographers, one actually breaking through to embrace Ian Hunter. The situation got increasingly heated with punches being flung, fans hurled off the stage, and threats and imprecations hurled between Hunter, the stage crew and the theatre management. Apart from one girl whose leg was broken trying to climb a drainpipe into the dressing room, everything turned out OK and the post gig party went ahead as planned, with various celebraties standing around and congratulating the band, and for once Mott The Hoople were admitted to the party, which was all well and good as it was Buffin's wedding reception too. He, his bride Paula and Stan Tippins were lurching around arm in arm and looking pleased with themselves, though the wedding cake, by some oversight, had nott been supplied with a knife, with the result that most of it was used in biuts as missiles, and eventually a well-known photographer deposited it uncerimoniously on the floor and jumped on it, to the applause of several equally cynical and irresponsible parties. Celebraties included Paul Rodgers and Mick Ralphs (of Bad Company), Andy Mackay and Eddie Jobson of Roxy, Guy Stevens, Mott's first manager, Andy Williams (the same) and (so I'm told) Mick Jagger and David Bowie. Mott delivered a set brightened by the genuine rush of adrenalin inspired by a near riot. Not all their gigs are musically superb, but this was a real touch of the old Mott, the shambollic rabblerousers. It's good that they're not falling into a cosy middle-age of success. It keeps you on the edge of your seat when you know that such things can still blow up at a moments notice. Martin Hayman. Sounds. December 1973.
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