After the Flood: Live from the Grand Forks Prom, June 28, 1997
For those late to the Soul Asylum party, which began in 1981 on cozy Minneapolis stages as Loud Fast Rules, the "Best-Live-Band-in-the-Country" badge pinned on them by countless longtime fans from David Letterman to George Wendt may seem like an exaggerated yarn.After the Floodfinds the foursome at the pinnacle of their runaway-train popularity, a potent, airtight foursome living up to its reputation on a Saturday night at an airplane hangar in North Dakota, circa 1997, playing for high schoolers in a northern town ravaged by floods that summer. The applause meter on "hits" like "Black Gold," "Misery" and "Runaway Train" proves that most of the audience hopped aboard during 1993’sGravedancer’s Union. And while the band fails (purposely neglects?) to sample from its essential punk rock back pages--Made to Be BrokenorWhile You Were Out--it manages to revive those legendary stage chops on a half-dozen covers, including a metalish jaunt through Alice Cooper's "School’s Out," a straight shot of Johnny Nash's "I Can See Clearly Now," a flannel-soul edition of Marvin Gaye’s "Sexual Healing" andLuLu’s "To Sir With Love," on which chameleon vocalist Dave Pirner wails with grace.-- Scott Holter