In the Flesh: Live

It's nothing short of remarkable that Roger Waters has built a successful career on obsessive ruminations on alienation, megalomania, and guilty fame, largely on the backs of one of history's most long-lived arena acts. The musical legacy Waters has shared with "another band" (as he sharply refers to his former Pink Floyd mates in this collection's self-penned liner notes) has served two distinctly different functions: part and parcel of the latter's nostalgia act; autobiographical foundation for the former's ongoing, if decidedly egocentric, Rage at the World. That's essentially the rationale this live collection uses to lean heavily on Waters's Pink prime, from Dark Side of the Moon through The Final Cut. And if that frame sometimes overshadows the images of Waters's solo work--well, no one said he wasn't a pragmatic entertainer. Still, his cynical eye insures the juxtapositions work well; the Falkland-conflicted Britain of The Final Cut's "Get Your Filthy Hands off My Desert" and "Southampton Dock" is neatly bookended by Amused to Death's "Bravery of Being out of Range." There's a telling musical contrast with Floyd here, too, and it's one that goes beyond the album's stellar recording techniques. Waters's ensemble breathes new life into even the coldest of the Floydian dirges, while giving the hoary psychedelic romp "Set the Controls for the Heart of the Sun" a welcome R&B groove. Waters concludes by offering up the previously unrecorded "Each Small Candle"--and an equally unexpected ray of hope. --Jerry McCulley