Great concerts can become the stuff of legend, but those performances rarely make great records – usually unable to truly capture an electric live atmosphere, convey sound quality comparable to a studio setting, or, of course, present the artists’ visual hijinks. As such, it’s even rarer then when a band makes its breakthrough because of a live album.
KISS famously did on “KISS Alive,” a 1975 landmark that, after four generally unsuccessful studio albums, for the first time conveyed the band’s vaunted live performance beyond the concert hall into the bedrooms and basements of a new audience – even though (and because) parts of it were actually dubbed over in the studio.
Another was Peter Frampton, who, while not entirely unknown, hit No. 1 in 1976 with “Frampton Comes Alive,” which showcased the British singer-guitarist’s unique voice box, to become one of the top-selling live albums of all time and catapulting him into superstardom (not to mention and ill-advised turn in the lamentable film version of Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band with the Bee Gees).
Then there was Cheap Trick, a Chicago band that was struggling to breakthrough in North America, but, in now cliché rock fashion (later mimicked in “This Is Spinal Tap”) inexplicably made it big in Japan. Riding that success, the band recorded their first live album, “Cheap Trick At Budokan” in 1978, which ably captured the zeitgeist of 12,000 screaming Japanese fans and went on to become the band’s biggest album ever – including reaching No. 1 in Canada – and spawning a sequel some years later.
Such was the success of ‘Budokan’ that earlier studio versions of the albums hits “I Want You to Want Me” and “Surrender” (the latter ironically giving a shout-out to KISS) just never sounded right.
So, Cheap Trick live it is, here in a clip from The Midnight Special TV show (hosted by Wolfman Jack!).
Lyrics
Mother told me, yes, she told me I’d meet girls like you
She also told me, “Stay away, you’ll never know what you’ll catch”
Just the other day I heard a soldier falling off
Some Indonesian junk that’s going round
Mommy’s alright, daddy’s alright, they just seem a little weird
Surrender, surrender, but don’t give yourself away
Father says, “Your mother’s right, she’s really up on things
Before we married, mommy served in the Wacs in the Philippines”
Now, I had heard the Wacs recruited old maids for the war
But mommy isn’t one of those, I’ve known her all these years
Mommy’s alright, daddy’s alright, they just seem a little weird
Surrender, surrender, but don’t give yourself away
Whatever happened to all this season’s losers of the year?
Every time I got to thinking, where’d they disappear?
When I woke up, mom and dad were rolling on the couch
Rolling numbers, rock and rolling, got my KISS records out
Mommy’s alright, daddy’s alright, they just seem a little weird
Surrender, surrender, but don’t give yourself away
Away
Away
Surrender, surrender, but don’t give yourself away
Surrender, surrender, but don’t give yourself away
Surrender, surrender, but don’t give yourself away