While several Current Ninety Three live outings have been recorded andin due time released, Antony and the Johnsons five years ofperformances have not seen the same light of day. Perhaps that and the(at the time) upcoming Antony/C93 shows in Portugal and San Franciscowere reasons for Durtro to present this EP length disc featuring threetracks apiece from last April's shows. Antony is at the piano,accompanied by Johnson Maxim Moston on violin. "You Stand Above Me" isonly one minute and thirty-six seconds but contains all the melancholyand drama one would expect. Antony bellows "while eternity cycleswildly, inside me," over plaintive piano notes, the vibrato of hispowerful soprano nestling into every crevice of my mind, body and soul.Antony naturally adapts Edgar Allan Poe's lovely 1827 poem "The Lake"to song, a much more fitting tribute than Lou Reed's ill-advised 'TheRaven' (excepting Antony's minimal rendition of Reed's "Perfect Day").What follows is the tender "Cripple and the Starfish," and what soundslike a well deserved standing ovation. For C93's songs, David Tibet isaccompanied by usual suspects Maja Elliott on piano and MichaelCashmore on guitar. "Walking Like Shadow," from C93 and Nurse WithWound's 'Bright Yellow Moon' is musically true. Ditto the brief versionof "Judas as Black Moth" from 'Soft Black Stars' which also benefitsfrom additional lyrics, "in the middle of the night as the cats cry inthe street, and the scent of flowers is heavy in your hair, the carsweeps by with a murdered child, the car sweeps by with a violatedgirl". The mammoth title track from 'Sleep Has His House' is reduced tojust the main lyrical passage here, the piano and Tibet's voice risingto a fever pitch as he breathlessly chokes on emotion in remembrance ofhis father. It is magnificent. Too bad there's only three songs each.I'd happily pay more for more. Maybe, just maybe, a future show willcome closer to me than 1300 miles away. - Antony - The Lake
- Antony - You Stand Above Me
- Current 93 - Sleep Has His House
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