The subtitle of this double-CD compilation might lead you to believe that this is a retrospective or best-of covering the band's finest era. That is not the case; in fact it's a ragtag quilt of live performances, including nothing from any of the studio recordings that the musicians made during this period. Disc one will be of most interest to hardcore
Soft Machine collectors as it contains the rarest material. It kicks off with six tracks of free-jazz doodling that almost certainly predates
the Soft Machine's official formation by a few years (only one cut, the live 1963 performance "Dear Olde Benny Green Is A-turning In His Grave," is given a date). Yet that same material is also by far the musically weakest on the set, presenting rather lo-fi, cacophonous, unstructured, vocal-less, somewhat amateurish outings by various combinations of players that passed through early
Soft Machine lineups. Those players include
Robert Wyatt (the only one to appear on all six songs),
Mike Ratledge,
Hugh Hopper,
Brian Hopper, and
Daevid Allen (who's only on "Dear Olde Benny Green Is A-turning In His Grave"); original
Soft Machine member
Kevin Ayers is not present on any of these six tracks. Disc one finishes with three 1967 tracks for which no dates or sources are given (these have also shown up on the Middle Earth bootleg); there are good performances on "We Know What You Mean" and "I Should've Known," sonic torture on the 13–minute "Hope for Happiness," and substandard fidelity to varying degrees on all three tunes. Disc two, with a few exceptions, boasts better sound quality, and features live performances from 1969-70, as well as an undated recording of "As Long As He Lies Perfectly Still" that is probably from the 1990s or early 2000s, and only has one noted
Soft Machine member aboard (
Hugh Hopper). The second CD is a decent representation of their live sound as they were moving into full-bore jazz fusion; with the plethora of live
Soft Machine from this era that's already been issued, it's not all that easy to tell what might have been issued elsewhere without access to a ridiculously complete
Soft Machine library. ~ Richie Unterberger