Undead [Deluxe Edition] [2 CD]

Liner Note Author: Malcolm Dome.
Recording information: Klooks Kleek.
Recorded live in a small club in 1968, this set was Ten Years After's commercial breakthrough album. There's no estimating how many aspiring guitar heroes heard it and immediately wanted to kill themselves.
Leader Alvin Lee's fleet-fingered fret work, although no big deal by jazz standards, sounded pretty revolutionary in a rock context, and started a school of guitar playing in which speed matters above all other musical considerations which continues to this day. UNDEAD is a good, unpretentious set of mostly uptempo blues jams (the most famous being Ten Years After's signature "Goin' Home," immortalized in the WOODSTOCK movie). However, there's no mistaking the period in which it was made--a big clue being a cover of Gershwin's ultra-melodic "Summertime" that's primarily a vehicle for a drum solo.