Jackie Leven – Live At Bergen Men's Prison, Norway / Munich Blues (Cooking Vinyl/Bonnier Amigo)

The Norwegian Blues Union reviews in its magazine Bluesnews (no. 59, April 2009) the double CD with which Leven makes recordings from his now inactive fan club available through regular channels. Through the fan club Leven released many live and special recordings under various titles; now he wants to make several of them available for sale, and the first two arrive as a double CD at the price of a single one.

The first concert is from Munich in spring 2000 with his partner Deborah (vocals) and his “ever faithful” Michael Cosgrave (keyboards, trumpet). More important, however, is the solo recording from the men’s prison in Bergen in February 2003, which the reviewer had seen go for three to four times the normal CD price on eBay. The setting – some of Norway’s toughest criminals who had probably never listened to Leven’s sensitive Scottish soul and singer-songwriter art – was so special that it put “our dear friend of Norway” on his toes. The sound is very good, and Leven speaks quite openly about his relationship with heroin and his years in Scottish and English prisons (a self-report the review merely relays). With some of his very best songs, from “Extremely Violent Man” to “Poortoun” and “Call Mother A Lonely Field”, this is “perhaps the best solo recording I have heard of Jackie”. Bergen is one of his favourite cities in the world, and by the time he finished his seven songs even the toughest prisoners had surrendered.

The Munich concert, three years earlier, is more an ordinary concert from a longer German tour, but also a very sharp evening. Leven himself was “really out of sorts”, anti-social and unusually uninterested in meeting his audience, but fantastic sound and an attentive crowd got him and his musicians to deliver a “razor-sharp show” – with entirely different songs from Bergen, from “Looking For Love” to the lovely “Stranger On The Square” and the magical “Paris Blues”. He closes with one of his rare covers, “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feelin’”, which he makes his own. Combined with his storytelling gift and the humorous, ironic comments along the way, these are two of the best concert recordings Leven has released; getting both on a double CD is “a steal”.