i love it.....i've only listened to it once so far....but it is my second favorite "EVA" cd....behind "Live at Blues Alley". have some kleenex ready if Eva can effect you that way....this is a very intimate recording.
i was in Tower on Saturday and saw it and another Eva cd "Method Actor"; which is more of a curiousity than a good recording.....but entertianing enough that i'm glad i bought it.
i hope there is more Eva like "Imagine" that can be released in the future. |
i cried when i heard her rendition of Danny Boy, but them i'm irish, what would you expect. imagine is excellent also. the other cuts w/out the band are very enjoyable, i'm just not fond of the cuts with the band as her voice is subsumed in the band music. sonic's wise some what typical of her other disc's, clearly she hadn't found good recording engineers before the end, although "live at blues alley" is the best of the lot. apart from the nicks and picks, this is EVA and its indispensible to anyone who who loves her. I found method actor interesting but i won't play it much - except for the promise of eva to come, it sounds like kids in a garage with a recorder having fun. its good for historical purposes though. |
Sorry to take an opposite viewpoint, but I found it more intimate and better recorded but didn't care for the covers as much as some of her other material. Blues Alley and Time After Time were, IMO, much better in terms of material. Guess that's why they make chocolate AND vanilla.
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Smp; I'm a big Eva fan too, but hadn't heard of this release. Thanks for the tip. Cheers. Craig |
Blues Alley is still my favorite but this is a good disc. It is somewhat raw, unproduced, but that is fine with me. Nothing to get in the way of that magic voice. |
Garfish my pleasure."Imagine" received to-day from CD Now and have played a couple of times - the title track is just spine tingling as is "Who knows where the time goes" ,but not quite as good as Sandy Denny version who is my all time favourite vocalist. Pity all her recordings are of such ordinary quality having been recorded in the late 60's early 70's. Although her recently released double CD "No more sad refrains" is an excellent selection of her work. Also the recording seems to be a bit better than on her various CDs.Sadly she like Eva is no longer with us. |
I havent heard the new cd enough to make up my mind, but I have some impressions. If you are an Eva fan (I certainly am), you will want this cd. If you have never heard her before, you should start with the earler cds. Friends of mine say they break up over her rendition of Danny Boy. I don't. I don't think there's a song on this cd that she makes her own the way she does with, e.g., Wade in the Water, People Get Ready, Time After Time, Over the Rainbow or Fields of Gold. But that's to be expected. Except for the Chuck Brown cd and Blues Alley, we're talking about compilations. The best material came out first.
I'm still glad I have the new cd, and I am going to give it a more thoughtful hearing soon. Maybe today. |
As you can tell, I'm with Paulwp (esp on his choice of favorite tracks). No goosebumps here, even tho its the best audio quality so far. Worth having, but somehow its doesn't seem that Eva made an emotional connection with these songs. |
I bought "Imagine" and found the studio ambiance is wonderful. Her voice is clear and effortless and her guitar is very good. What is missing for me is her emotion that is so strong on her earlier recordings. At times the raw, not perfect nature of this recording is better than the early ones, it shows Eva as she was experimenting with well known songs, but the finished quality is not at the point of the earlier disks.
As I think about what little I know of Eva, she was a perfectionist and had very little self confidence. My guess is these recordings did not meet her or her parents expectations for Eva and thus have become secondary releases. For any Eva fan this is a must own disk, it is very good, but for those who want to own just two or three it's not to the standard of "Live at Blues Ally", "Songbird" or my daughter and my 'cuddle' disk "Time After Time". |
JD- you've got it right. Guitar and voice excellent, performance only so-so. Its a little sterile sounding. For me, the emotional impact of her work is primary and I must admit to being a little disappointed. |
"Imagine" is, I think, a compilation of songs in the vaults that did not make it onto other albums.
Regardless, an interesting posthumous release. |
I think it's a great CD; her version of "Fever" is especially good. I was surprised to learn that Eva Cassidy died in 1996 at the age of 33 from melanoma. What a loss to the music world. |
