Albert King Live In Sweden 1980

Recorded at a single show on May 29, 1969, in Madison, WI's 400-seat club The Cue, these tapes were first released in 2003. The performance finds Albert King, who had just turned 46, arguably at his career peak. Even though there are just five tracks, it's enough to understand why he remains one of electric postwar blues' most seminal figures. Since this shares no songs with Live Wire/Blues Power, which was recorded a year earlier, and features concert versions of "Crosscut Saw," "Personal Manager," and "As the Years Go Passing By" from his legendary Born Under a Bad Sign album, it's an important document. King's in excellent form too, ripping into the tunes with edgy energy, even if many of his solos and licks will be familiar to blues listeners…

This is a live recording from the City Blues legend Albert King in L.A. Many great artists were presented there: Koko Taylor, Clifton Chenier and many others. He played some of his standards and the people liked that! A mix of jazz blues!

Live Wire/Blues Power is a live album from Albert King recorded in 1968 at the Fillmore Auditorium in San Francisco, CA. Featuring originals and King’s rendition of classics, the album demonstrates Albert King’s blues prowess. According to Rolling Stone, this album is “Just the unadulterated pure and simple blues.

Live Wire/Blues Power is one of Albert King's definitive albums. Recorded live at the Fillmore Auditorium in 1968, the guitarist is at the top of his form throughout the record - his solos are intense and piercing. The band is fine, but ultimately it's King's show - he makes Herbie Hancock's "Watermelon Man" dirty and funky and wrings out all the emotion from "Blues at Sunrise."

Recorded at Albert King's appearance at the 1973 Montreux Jazz Festival, Blues at Sunrise: Live at Montreux is a typically engaging live record from the guitarist. King is in good form and the set list is a little unpredictable, featuring standards like "Blues at Sunrise" and "I'll Play the Blues for You" as well as lesser-known items like "Little Brother (Make a Way)" and "Don't Burn Down the Bridge."

Previously titled The Pinch when it was issued on LP in 1977, this material was actually recorded in 1973 and 1974. These are some of King's most soul-oriented sessions, with contributions from the Memphis Horns and a couple of the MG's. Blues-oriented fans may find this one of his lesser efforts, putting less emphasis on King's guitar work than usual, and more on the vocals and arrangements. This approach has its merits, though, as it's one of the more relaxed items in the King catalog, with none of the occasional excess that creeped into his blues guitar solos.

This compilation has a leftover feel; the liner notes provide no sources and dates, admitting only that these are "Stax recordings, some never before available on LP." If you're a big fan of one or both of the artists involved, though, it's not bad, with a quality that's generally consistent with their fully-baked Stax-era albums, though the King half of the program is somewhat superior to the Milton tracks.

Originally titled King Does the King's Thing, here's Albert King adding his own touch to a batch of Elvis Presley tunes. Because King's style is so irreducible, the concept actually works, as he fills this album with his traditional, high-voltage guitar work and strong vocals. That isn't surprising, since four of the nine tunes on here originally started as R&B hits covered by Presley, including an instrumental version of Smiley Lewis' "One Night." No matter what the original sources may be, though, this is a strong showing in King's catalog.

Interestingly, while always priding themselves on being a kick-ass live band, ZZ Top never got around to issuing a full-length live album during their 1970s/1980s peak. But as they say, it's better late than never, and 2011 finally saw the arrival of an archival live ZZ Top recording, Live in Germany 1980. Featuring half of the audio portion of their 2009 Double Down Live DVD, Live in Germany 1980 does a fantastic job of displaying all of the group's pre-Eliminator classics in a concert setting…