For a few brief years in the early 80’s Canada’s Coney Hatch were a band that you wanted to see. With their first three albums ‘Coney Hatch’ (1982), Outa Hand (1983) and Friction (1985) they certainly gave it a shake even if Anthem their label maybe didn’t quite have the traction to propel them into the big time. They briefly returned in 2013 with ‘Four’ but sadly we didn’t even get to hear about it. Now ten years later they are here again with a first ‘live’ record that boasts a couple of new studio tracks.
For me if you’re going to tag a couple of new numbers onto a live record they need to be great and the live record itself needs to be essential. Here we get a couple of more than decent songs – the wonderfully Melodic Pop rocker ‘It’s About a Girl’ and the broodier ‘Heaven’s on the Other Side’ which has an early Def Leppard feel and is equally as cool. The big question is always going to be why only two? Are there more? And if so why not an EP with a couple of live tracks?
It’s all a bit confusing honestly, as in the press release the big emphasis is on the new tracks not the live recording and there is no indication of either where or when the recording was made. Presumably it’s the set from the Heat Festival in 2018 which as far as I’m aware is their only recent date over there.
The live section of the CD opens with a twenty second introduction to the band in German and the album is referred to as both ‘Postcards’ and ‘Postcard’ from Germany within the space of a paragraph in the press release (It’s ‘Postcard’).
That aside it’s a great setlist but if I’m honest not the greatest live album you’ll hear. The mix is rather middle heavy at times with backing vocals sometimes higher than the lead vocal of Carl Dixon. Andy Curran also takes 5 of the lead vocals and also seems to have lost little sonically over the years.
For me though it’s song selection that misses a few tricks (Yes I know it’s Festival set) – things like the first Top 20 hit in ‘Hey Operator’ and the gritty ‘I’ll Do the Talkin” (Probably my favourite song along with ‘We Got The Night’ that opens) from the first record. Instead we get the somewhat tepid ‘Blown Away’ from ‘Four’ and the even more lukewarm ‘Boys Club’ from the same album.
That aside it’s all there with all the best from those first three classics wit numbers from ‘Friction’ sounding particularly impressive. As an introduction to the band I’d still recommend checking out those first three records but for fans the lure of the live album just might swaay yu to put the hand in the pocket for this one!
‘Postcard From Germany’ is out on August 11th, 2023, on digital and on a special limited edition CD hand-signed by the band! Pre-order “Postcard From Germany” here.
8 / 10
Tracklist:
1. It’s About a Girl (Studio Recording)
2. Heaven’s on the Other Side (Studio Recording)
3. We Got the Night
4. Stand Up
5. Blown Away
6. Boys Club
7. She’s Gone
8. This Ain’t Love
9. Wrong Side of Town
10. Girl From Last Night’s Dream
11. Fantasy
12. Fallen Angel
13. Don’t Say Make Me
14. Devil’s Deck
15. Monkey Bars