Search - Gary Moore :: Back on the Streets

Absolute Rock Masterpiece!!! But....$80?!?!?! Go find a used

JP | Macon, GA | 07/25/2007

(5 out of 5 stars)

"While I like both the blues and metal I've always preferred Gary the straight ahead rocker to Gary the bluesman or Gary the late-80s metalhead. So this and "Dirty Fingers" remain my 2 favorite Gary Moore Albums to this day. I had just about worn the album out so was very excited to come across an import CD 12-15 years ago. It was $25 but I was happy to pay it!! But $80?!?!?! Don't know about that, this thing must be really rare these days, though I have occasionally seen other copies in stores for the usual $15-$30 that imports go for. But I will say this; if you are a Gary Moore fan at all, and you don't already have this, your collection is incomplete.



I've always considered this and Dirty Fingers to be almost companion pieces that wouldn't have been out of place as a double album. Released less than a year apart (both have the original release date as 1978) Fingers has the straight ahead AOR rock songs while Streets has the "lets show what we can really do" rock instrumentals that will be familiar to anyone who has heard his work with the GREATLY underappreciated Coliseum II. My personal favorite is the magnificent "Flight of the Snow Moose" but "Hurricane" and "What Would You Rather Bee" are also fusion standouts and all 3 would make any Jeff Beck fan stand up and pay attention.



It also contains the original release of "Parisienne Walkways" and, with all due respect to the late great Phil Lynott, the greatest version of "Don't believe a Word" that has ever been released. In fact, it was after this that Phil had Thin Lizzy begin playing that song as a blues tune in their set. But...herein lies an almost insignificant, but at the same time great, mystery!!! On my original album, after the last vocal "Don't believe a word...not a single word" Gary very softly says "I might just say anything I want to" right before the guitar jam. On the CD......IT's NOT THERE!!! I never would have imagined such a small change could so drastically change a song and can't fathom why anyone would mix it out!!! But, I guess if you'd never heard the album, you'd never even know what was missing!!



Other (vocal) tracks include the title track, Song for Donna and another Lynott penned song; "Fanatical Fascists". And they kind of offset the missing line in "Word" by adding a bonus track "Spanish Guitar" that wasn't on the original album. So......if you like Gary, try to find this!!! If you're filthy rich, pay $80 for it!! Either way it's definitely one of Gary's finest moments!!!

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