Normally we skip CDR’s in our reviews, mainly because most of them have poor audience recordings or uninteresting compilations of what is available elsewhere. But sometimes there are some interesting new releases on CDR. In this specific case, we make an exception since on first sight it does look very interesting.

Design

The cover art is simple, but lovely. Three terrific candids of Elvis in the late 60’s alone are almost reason enough to buy this release on the “Stay Away”-label.

Content

Like we said in the introduction, the content looks very interesting on first sight. The nearly complete session of Guitar Man (Takes 1-6, 10 and 12) is pretty good regarding sound quality. Unfortunately, the sound does get less on the takes of “Going Home” (Takes 16-26, 30). Especially when listening on headphones it sounds too sharp. Nevertheless, it is still very good to listen to.

Also the other two songs, “Stay Away” and “U.S. Male” are not as good as “Guitar Man” regarding the sound quality. Biggest problem with those two is the volume. Some distortion can be heard since the volume is too high. The “Stay Away” session is nearly complete (takes 1-4, 6-9 and 11-15), while “U.S. Male” is really complete (takes 1-12, including “Wings of an Angel”), which is great to have.

Conclusion

We can only conclude that the collectors will have many of the takes, but not this (nearly) complete. The sound quality is certainly not perfect, but to those that love to hear the evolution of a song, this CDR is very enjoyable and a must have, in our opinion.