Throwing Copper made the members of
Live into stars, but it didn't necessarily earn them respect. Evidently, the bandmembers thought that the problem lay with
Jerry Harrison's crisp, commercial production, so they hired
Jay Healey as a co-producer and set out to make a messy, hard-edged visionary statement. Borrowing heavily from
Jimmy Page's bag of tricks,
Live spikes
Secret Samadhi with Eastern-tinged strings, sitars, and powerful overdubbed guitars ("Lakini's Juice" is propelled by a slide guitar riff out of
Physical Graffiti). Meanwhile,
Ed Kowalczyk's lyrics and singing remain indebted to early
U2 -- he wants to say something big in a big way. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine