Rockpile - Let It Rock - Non-Album Tracks (1979)

This is the third of four stray tracks Rockpile albums I'm posting. It's kind of an imaginary alternate history, pretending that Rockpile put out an album every year while they were still in existence.

Rockpile, as you may know, was basically a musical alliance between guitarist Dave Edmunds and bassist and songwriter Nick Lowe, with the two of them talking turns being the lead singer. It was a strange situation, because from 1977 to 1980, Rockpile never put out a studio (or live) album until 1980, because Lowe and Edmunds were on different record labels. Yet during those years Edmunds and Lowe always toured together as part of Rockpile.

As with the other albums in this series, I have avoided using any of the studio tracks from Edmunds or Lowe, when they were usually backed by all of Rockpile. Instead, this is entirely made up of live versions of songs Rockpile did in concert.

Edmunds put out an album in 1979 called "Repeat When Necessary." Three of the songs here are versions of songs from that album. Lowe also put out an album in 1979, "Labour of Love." Four of the songs here are versions of songs from that. That counts for seven of the 13 songs. The others are generally cover versions that never appeared on album, such as versions of the classic songs "Let It Rock" by Chuck Berry and "Jailhouse Rock" by Elvis Presley.

Note there's one kind of strange song here, "Little Sister." What's unusual about it is that the lead singer is actually Robert Plant, while he was still part of Led Zeppelin. This is because in 1979 there was a benefit concert known as the Concerts for the People of Kampuchea. Rockpile played, and Led Zeppelin didn't, but Plant joined them as a guest for this one song, which is a cover of an Elvis Presley hit.

That song, plus another one from that same concert, "Crawling from the Wreckage," were officially released as part of a live album for that benefit. The rest are all officially unreleased. But the sound quality is generally very good for the unreleased songs too. Most of them come from a concert that was professionally recorded and played live on the radio at the time. The last song, "What Looks Best on You," clearly comes from an audience bootleg and is rougher sounding than the rest, but it's still very listenable.

01 Rockin' Little Angel (Rockpile)
02 Girls Talk (Rockpile)
03 Cracking Up (Rockpile)
04 Switchboard Susan (Rockpile)
05 Queen of Hearts (Rockpile)
06 Let It Rock (Rockpile)
07 Jailhouse Rock (Rockpile)
08 Born Fighter (Rockpile)
09 Cruel to Be Kind (Rockpile)
10 Little Sister (Rockpile with Robert Plant)
11 Crawling from the Wreckage (Rockpile)
12 Three Time Loser (Rockpile)
13 What Looks Best on You (Rockpile)

https://www.upload.ee/files/15266516/Rockpl_1979_LtItRock_atse.zip.html

The photo for the cover art was taken in Chicago in November 1980. I'm using it because I was able to find lots of good photos of the band in 1980 but none in 1979.