Search - Carla Bozulich :: I'm Gonna Stop Killing

Live, for the fans

Pharoah S. Wail | Inner Space | 10/10/2007

(3 out of 5 stars)

"(edit: 8/13/08 - Seeing this review again while looking for something, I must say it comes off as me liking this less than I do. Outside of Town and Remember Me make this Essential! I just wouldn't rate it as highly as other things she's released, overall. This Outside of Town is a masterpiece by one of her best bands ever. And since I'm here, her work with Simone Massaron on the Dandelions On Fire album is wonderful. This site is still carrying it but it won't allow me to make a product link right now, for some reason.)



Carla Bozulich's budget-priced, 50-minute "EP" is a lovely little slice of what it is she sometimes does.



Except for the first 2 tracks taken straight from her fantastic The Red Headed Stranger album, this is all stuff recorded in concert. While 3/9/03 (from which much of this album is taken) circulates on CD-R, it does not exist in the sonic quality found here. Even if you have that on CD-R and don't want to buy what will just be a sonic upgrade of those tracks, I feel the 3 highlights of this album come from the other dates (which I've never seen circulating on CD-R). The really cool, spread out though less vicious Outside of Town, as well as Remember Me are my album favorites.



Remember Me finds Carla as a desolate, smokey goddess. She seems to own an artistic realm that is solely her own. Carla and Nels could have done this Remember Me in my living room last week, in some diseased toilet of a punk club in the '80s, or in a gay cabaret in 1930s Berlin and it would have slayed audiences in all 3 spots.



I give this 3 stars because I wish the first 2 tracks would have been more live stuff from another date, and because a couple of the other songs don't do a ton for me. Still, the stuff that's worth it is worth it. So this is really it... if you're already a bonafide Carla fan, you know you want this. Buy it. If you're just getting into her but you don't have Evangelista, The Red Headed Stranger or Scarnella you should buy those first. This is a lovely addition to any Carla collection but those are essential. Though out of print now I think, What Part of 'Get Thee Gone' Don't You Understand? and Lost Somewhere Between The Earth and My Home are also well worth tracking down."