Amongst the many hundreds of concerts I’ve attended over the years, I still Slade as one of the best live bands I have been fortunate enough to see. I saw the classic line up of Noddy Holder, Jim Lea, Don Powell and Dave Hill twice, in Cardiff and Bristol, on the ‘til Deaf Us Do Part’ tour when I was around 14 years of age, and having initially fell in love with the band through their ‘Sladest’ album around 1974-75, I think this is proof positive that when you fall in love with a band early on in life they stick with you forever, especially when they are as awesome as Slade.

I’ve also collected the band’s back catalogue with an almost religious fervour over the years, and with Salvo having provided the almost definitive reissues of their recorded output as recently as 2006, including the ‘Slade Alive! (The Live Anthology)’ two CD set (which features three of the albums/concerts included here plus the ‘Slade Alive Vol. 2’ set which isn’t included here) you’ll forgive me if I admit that the purpose behind this all new ‘All The World Is A Stage’ 5CD box set is somewhat frustrating.  With only the CDs ‘Live At The New Victoria’ recorded on April 24 1975 and ‘Live At The Hucknall Miner’s Welfare Club’ recorded on June 26 1980 proving to be of any real interest, and at around £40 for the set, I have to say that’s a lot of money to spend when things are getting pretty tight at the moment.

Granted the ‘Alive! At Reading’ CD (which I’m sure some will also be buying this set for given its almost legendary status) restores the classics’ Tak’ Me Bak ‘Ome’, ‘Mama Weer All Crazee Now’ and ‘Cum On Feel The Noize’ (all missing from the Salvo reissue along with the ‘You’ll Never Walk Alone’ singalong) but it’s still not the full fifteen song set, and to include ‘Slade Alive!’ and ‘Slade On Stage’ but miss out ‘Slade Alive Vol. 2’ simply feels like an opportunity missed to finally give Slade fans as near a definitive live document of the band as they always excelled in that setting.  Or why not simply ditch the already released albums and just go with previously unreleased live sets, I’m sure there must be enough fans who would have snapped that 5CD set up?

To that effect, I find myself only briefly dipping into the review streams of ‘Slade Alive!’ and ‘Slade On Stage’ (they sound just as I expect them to), before moving quickly to ‘Alive! At Reading’ and that triumphant Sunday back in 1980 when Slade stepped in at short notice to replace Ozzy Osbourne’s Blizzard Of Oz and Gary Moore’s G Force on the Reading Festival bill and then proceeded to not only steal the show but also kickstart their ‘80s reawakening. There are a few sonic dropouts throughout this set, but it’s great to once again hear it in most of its glory, as my tape recording from the Friday Rock Show had long since disappeared from my collection, most probably leant out to a friend and never returned. 

Moving on to ‘Live At The New Victoria’ from April 1975 and not only does it capture the band live at the time I first started listening to them, but it also has a set list that centres largely around the band’s then new album and film ‘Slade In Flame’. The volume on the stream of this recording seemed to drop ever so slightly compared to the Reading set but it’s a rip-roaring run through a dozen of some of the finest songs the band ever penned. Okay ‘The Bangin Man’ might be stretching that definition a bit but this set is worth investing in just for the versions of ‘How Does It Feel’ (which is also my all-time favourite Slade song), ‘Far Far Away’ and the B-side ‘OK Yesterday Was Yesterday’ where Noddy slips into an impromptu Tommy Cooper impression for the song’s introduction. Amazing stuff indeed!

The ‘Live At The Hucknall Miner’s Welfare Club’ 1980 CD that closes this set out is (as far as I can tell) pretty much the full live set that Slade did a few nips and tucks on for their Reading 1980 set, and here the band sounds absolutely fantastic from opener ‘Dizzy Mama’ through to ‘Born To Be Wild’ which brings things to a suitably high energy end. I’m not sure how large the crowd was at this show but compared to the turbocharged sound Slade generate onstage they sound positively timid. This is the sound of Slade firing on all cylinders, yet seemingly on the verge of also splitting up due to their lack of commercial success at the time. Mind blowing stuff indeed.

Unfortunately, as I’ve only received a stream of this box set to review, I cannot tell what the twelve-page booklet or clamshell packaging is like, but what I can tell you is that the (mainly) previously unreleased live material really is exceptional.

As I said at the top of this piece Slade will always rank as one of the best live bands I’ve seen in my forty plus years of gig going and ‘All The World Is A Stage’ turns that fact up way past eleven…and then some. Magical stuff, even if the set is seemingly somewhat overpriced. I’ll let you decide if you snap one up now or wait for the price drop that will no doubt follow.

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Author: Johnny Hayward