The Marshall Tucker Band - Live From the Garden State 1981 (2004)

The Marshall Tucker Band celebrates the release of its first full-length concert on DVD with Live From The Garden State 1981 from their legendary 1981 MTV concert. MTB’s homemade blend of rock, country and jazz featured the band’s acclaimed songwriter and guitarist, Toy Caldwell. The band found enormous success during the 1970s, with most of their albums going gold. This DVD features the original lineup—with the exception of Tommy Caldwell, who died the year before—performing the best material from their classic period. It’s an essential release!

Program Listing

Take The Highway
Heard It In A Love Song
Tell The Blues To Take Off The Night
It Takes Time
Special Someone
Rumors Are Raging
Bob Away My Blues
Fire On The Mountain
Something’s Missing In My Life
The Time Has Come
Ramblin’

Can’t You See

This Ol’ Cowboy

Searchin’ For A Rainbow

Blue Ridge Mountain Sky

The Marshall Tucker Band "Live from the Garden State" 1981

This is an outstanding concert dvd with a song set of 15 great songs, performed extremely well by the very talented musicians in the Marshall Tucker Band. They perform before a packed crowed who really "get into" the concert. The band is from Spartanburg, South Carolina.

The line-up consists of: Doug Gray on lead vocals (he is an outstanding performer and has a great repore with the crowd), Toy Caldwell on guitar and lead vocals on "Can't You See", Paul Riddle on the drums, George McCorkle on the "blues" guitar, Jerry Eubank's on sax and flute, and a bass guitar player (I'm not sure of his name). They play very well together. George McCorkle can really "jam" on his "blues" guitar.

Some highlights I liked included: "Take the Highway", "Heard it in a Love Song", "It takes time", "Rumors are raging",(especially in a small town like Spartanbury, SC), "Fire on the Mountain", "Ramblin" (On my mind), and "Can't YOu See".

Then they leave the stage, but are called out for an encore and Doug Gray tells the crowd "there's no way we're going to leave now, besides I hear the traffic is real bad out-side". Then they perform "This ol' Cowboy" (it won't be the 1st time this ol' cowboy has spent the night alone), "Searchin for a Rainbow", and an excellent end-all song "Blue Ridge Mountain Sky" (About the Spartanburg, SC area, and about an old man that has the best beagle hound in the county.

Overall, this is a great 5 star classic concert dvd, and I highly recommend it. It's one of those concerts that leaves you will a wonderful feeling. September 30, 2008

Smokin' MTB

I must have seen MTB a dozen times, back in the day. They were always one of my favorites. This DVD will give you the best representation of what the MTB was like, and what they could put out in concert. I miss Tommy in this show, but Franklin Wilkie is an extremely capable replacement. Toy, Tommy, and now, George, will always be remembered!! If this DVD doesn't get your toes tappin', nothing will. April 3, 2008

Could have been so much better

Great band. Great songs. Good sound. What could go wrong? Well, I will list my problems with this DVD.
- About half of the DVD is zoom-in close ups of Doug Grays face - not very exciting.
-As other reviewers have mentioned, at times Toy Caldwell is blistering away on guitar and the camera is on either Gray or one of the other guys - very frustrating.
-The camera operators are so confused, when Caldwell goes into a solo they often zoom in on McCorkle or the bass player as if they can't tell who is playing the solo.
- Doug Gray is too front and center, his place from 1973 to 1977 is to the side so Toy Caldwell can be front center where he belongs.
-Gray's telling the New Jersey crowd how much he loves them gets old as does his constant substituting New Jersey into every place named in the songs. Annoying example: In Can't You See, when Toy sings "I ain't never coming back", Gray comes to the mic and says "I will" (as if people would come to see him without the great Toy Caldwell).
This DVD has some great moments and I do recommend it generally, just be warned that there are some frustrating moments. There is Doug Gray overkill on this, but he sounds good most of the time, especially when he is not oversinging. It is good just to be able to see the Marshall Tucker Band with Toy Caldwell and I hope an earlier release will be coming with both Toy and Tommy.
(Note-I actually give this a 4 star rating but Amazon won't let me change the rating above). March 5, 2008

Marshall Sort Of Tuckered Out

I've seen Marshall Tucker live and I felt like the performance, the night that they decided to film this movie....the music just didn't flow. It "felt" like every member knew that this was going to be a film/tape and they seemed to force the music, much more than when I saw them live. The time I saw them, it felt like a party and they made it feel that way by being loose and having fun. December 9, 2007

MTB Live....

....and Rockin'. This is a very good show from the early days of MTV. There are the obvious hit songs live and some other songs from the vault that are played with a blues sound. Their live version of the songs are great (taking their own sound) and do not sound like the album cut I am used to hearing. While I like a live version of the songs, I thought Ramblin' was a little too fast.

The 5.1 sound is good, but at times the center channel is a little quiet on the vocals. The video transfer is good with limited distortion - In a few scenes there is the obvious squiggly lines from the film (I think from the original broadcast).

Overall a good show and I would watch again.
November 29, 2007

More reviews at Amazon.com ...