Cold Cuts is the third live album by English acoustic roots duo Show of Hands. Following the duo's successful Royal Albert Hall performance in 2001 which was televised as The Big Gig, the duo released the studio album Cold Frontier in September of that year, which saw the duo use a more basic instrumental set up that what they had grown accustomed to. A critical success, they followed it with The Cold Frontier Tour in November 2001. The tour was unusual in that the duo opted to perform both obscure older material and cover versions in re-arranged formats, in addition to material from Cold Frontier. Many of the tracks had never featured on a Sho of Hands album before. A critical success, the duo and Mick Dolan had recorded performances from the tour for usage as the live album Cold Cuts.
The album was released on 22 July 2002 by the duo's own record label Hands on Music. It reflects the unusual tour's track listing and re-arrangements, and was a critical success, being seen as more than just a souvenir for the tour and being a worthwhile acquisition in its own right. Despite being their sole live album to contain unreleased material, the album is often overlooked by the duo. Unlike other CD-released albums by the duo, none of its songs feature on their retrospective compilation album Roots: The Best of Show of Hands (2007), nor is the album referred to in its booklet.
Background and tour
After releasing their sixth studio album Dark Fields (1997), Show of Hands focused on releasing albums of material by other artists, namely an album of traditional folk music, Folk Music (1998), and an album of contemporary cover versions designed to reflect the duo's contemporary influences, Covers (2000). The latter album presented a stripped down sound with no overdubs or multitracking. They followed this with their second concert at the Royal Albert Hall which was filmed for their VHS concert film The Big Gig – Show of Hands @ The Royal Albert Hall (2001). The film was filmed by ITV franchise holder Carlton Productions, who broadcast it on ITV Carlton as two dedicated half-hour programmes.
Cold Frontier was their first album composed by Steve Knightley of the duo since Dark Fields. Recorded in early 2001 by the River Exe in Countess Wear, Devon, the album saw the duo return "to a more basic instrumental setup" than what they had grown accustomed to. One description noted that the duo had "created their own unique musical style by combining the narrative strengths of English and Celtic traditional music with instruments and textures from other cultures." The album was critically acclaimed,
Music
thumb|Four of the songs were recorded at The Phoenix, [[Exeter.]]
Cold Cuts was recorded over each concert of the tour and, according to the duo, features "the new, the rearranged, and the previously unreleased songs" that they played on the tour. The album features a track list faithful to the material on the tour, featuring songs from Cold Frontier, obscure older material and showcase some new arrangements of songs from other writers both familiar and unfamiliar. An inspired medley, where "The Battle of the Somme" and "Time After Time" frame "The Keeper", features over three songs.
Release
The album was released 22 July 2002 by the duo's own record label Hands on Music, with the catalogue number HMCD17.