This live rendition of "Bus Stop Boxer" is from the new Eels concert album "Live at Town Hall," recorded at a concert I actually attended, and, as regular readers will recall, found kind of disappointing, a strange mix of gimmickry and monotony. I can only assume that the album as a whole is similar, but hearing just this one track is quite pleasurable, largely because it's not surrounded by so many more songs that sound so numbingly similar (a problem more of E's often repetitive songwriting than of arrangement). This arrangement, with string quartet, celeste and musical saw, is a bit on the genteel side, but it's a gentility that's knocked sideways by E's despairing, powerful vocals.
-- T.B.
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