Show Review: Jerry Garcia Band – San Francisco, CA (01/11/82)

Jerry Garcia Band
01-11-1982
Old Waldorf
San Francisco, CA

Set 1

How Sweet It Is (To Be Loved By You)
Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door
That’s What Love Will Make You Do
Simple Twist Of Fate
I Second That Emotion >
Deal

Set 2
The Way You Do The Things You Do
I’ll Take A Melody
Valerie
Harder They Come
The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down >
Dear Prudence >
Tangled Up In Blue

Jerry Garcia – electric guitar, vocals
Bill Kreutzmann – drums
Jimmy Warren – keyboards
John Kahn – electric bass
Julie Stafford – vocals
Liz Stires – vocals
Melvin Seals – keyboards

The Midnight Cafe’s Review

A few weeks back, a friend of mine asked me if I had a copy of a Jerry Garcia Band show from 1982. I can’t remember the exact date, but I didn’t have it. I looked it up on bt.etree and found a copy. As that site often does for Jerry and Grateful Dead shows, they had bundled this particular show with several others. Being of the opinion that you can never have too much Jerry, I went ahead and downloaded all of them. Then I figured, in for a penny in for a pound, and I downloaded all of the sets of shows from 1982. I randomly listened to a few shows (or more like snippets from a few shows) and found that I really liked them. So, I thought it would be fun to listen to and review them all.

Starting in late 1981 and running through the Spring of 1982, Jerry was in and out of the studio recording what would become his last studio record as a solo artist, Run for the Roses. Some of those sessions exist on tape, but I’ll be skipping them for now, as well as all the shows he played with the Grateful Dead during this time.

He’d play quite a few of the songs that make it onto the record throughout the year. The album contains about half original songs and half covers.

Jerry gigged a lot in 1982. By my count, he played some 86 gigs as a solo artist, mostly with the Jerry Garcia Band, but some 23 times with only John Kahn on bass (and once with Bob Weir for the David Letterman show). In contrast, the Grateful Dead only played 63 times this year.

It is interesting to look at the Grateful Dead dates right next to Jerry’s solo gigs. He began the year in the studio, then played this gig at the Old Waldorf and again at the same venue two days later. Then he’s back in the studio for a bit and then spends the first half of February gigging around California. Then the Dead play some California shows then the Jerry Band does. There is a lot of that throughout the year where the Dead will do some gigs, and Jerry will fill in the holes.

The Dead do a proper tour in April and then a big one in July-August. And then they close out the year, as they usually did, with a New Year’s run in Oakland. The Jerry Garcia Band does a short East Coast tour in June, and then just him and John Kahn do several gigs in the Northwest to finish the month out. The Jerry Band is back at it for a big tour in October and November.

This is the kind of thing I normally don’t pay attention to. I didn’t follow Jerry while he was alive and have just listened to shows throughout my adulthood without much thought to where he was playing. This year might not be abnormal; I don’t know. But I do find it fascinating.

This show is a good one, but nothing spectacular. Etree lists two sources for this show – 84012 and 20687, both presumably coming from the same soundboard tape. 20687 was cleaned up a little bit by the misSHN in the rain people.

The opener, “How Sweet It Is (To Be Loved By You)” has the front half cut off; only 1:32 of it survives. “Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door is very mellow. Jerry plays and sings with sincerity, but softly. The keys lightly tinkle.

“That’s What Love Will Make You Do” from this period has become one of my favorite songs. The rhythm section creates this wonderful, danceable beat; Jerry usually sings with passion, and his guitar typically soars. This version is good, but not quite amazing. The keys do this thing where they switch from a typical piano sound to something more synth-like, then to a more organ sound.

“Simple Twist of Fate” at first puts us back into mellow ballad territory. Then Kahn takes a long, noodling bass solo then Jerry goes at it with his guitar, wailing with a very high-pitched, screeching tone. Then it settles back down, and there are some really nice keyboard moments.

I can’t remember when I first heard Smokey Robinson’s “I Second That Emotion.” Since my mother was a big Motown fan, I assume I heard the original long before I even knew who Jerry Garcia was. What I do remember is that in the mid-1990s I discovered the newsgroup rec.music.gdead; with it I found my people. At the time, it was common for deadheads within that newsgroup to respond to a post that they agreed with by saying, “I Second That Emotion.” I loved that, and the saying entered my vocabulary for many years.

Somewhere around this time, I heard a live version of the song by the Jerry Band, and it quickly became a favorite. They do a great job with it here. Jerry’s voice sounds a little weak, maybe even a little hoarse, but he absolutely nails the first solo. The band follows right behind. At some point, Jerry seems to just say “screw it” to the vocals, and they just jam on the thing for a while. Eventually, he’ll return to the song and sing it with gusto.

When I first started listening to the Jerry Garcia Band, I loved it when they would play Grateful Dead songs. I think that was because I didn’t really know his solo stuff or the cover songs he tended to play. There was always some Motown song that I knew or a Dylan cover, but a lot of those songs were unfamiliar to me. I was also still new to the Dead, and these were the days when you couldn’t stream every show they ever played, so I liked hearing their songs in any version I could get.

But these days I find it a little annoying when the Jerry Band plays a Dead tune. If I wanted to hear those songs, I can listen to a Dead show. When Jerry is with his other band, I want to hear different songs. Which is to say, they play “Deal” in this set, and it is perfectly fine.

“I’ll Take a Melody” is not one of my favorite covers, but this is a very fine version. Garcia and keyboardist Melvin Seals do some wonderful interplay on it. Seals had just joined the band about a year before (and would wind up staying right up until Jerry died), but he was already perfectly integrated into the band.

“Valerie” is another song from Run for the Roses, and it is also a song I’ve never particularly liked.

“The Harder They Come” is a lot of fun. Somewhere in the middle, Seals starts playing really fast, and then Jerry just follows along. It is like speed rock for a moment. Then it slows down to a more standard tempo. I don’t know what keyboards Seals was playing, but it switches from a standard piano sound to something electric and out of a science fiction movie, to more of an organ sound. I dig it.

“The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down” is perfectly fine. As is “Dear Prudence” and “Tangled Up In Blue.” Prudence has a lovely gentle jam in the middle.

And that’s the gig. As I said, it is a good show. Not mind-blowing, but good. I know we’ll hear some even better shows in the days to come. I can’t wait.

—

Long ago, I created a playlist called “Great Bootleg Songs.” That’s a pretty boring name for a playlist, but it is also pretty self-explanatory. When I listen to a show and discover an incredible performance on a song, I throw it into this playlist. Whenever I don’t know what to play, I can put that playlist on and dig some great live music. I thought I’d start doing a thing at the end of these things, telling you which songs, if any, from this review deserve to go into that playlist.

Show Highlights:

I Second that Emotion
I’ll Take a Melody

Source info:

Source 1: SHNID 84012

MSC > DAT > Panasonic SV-3700 playback > M-Audio Audiophile 2496 to Wavelab 5.0 mastering with iZotope Ozone 3 > CDWAV1.9 > FLAC (level 8).

Comments: Very clean SBD with several pauses between tunes crossfades were applied to cover.
Flaws:
d1t01 – most of beginning of track is missing
d1t04 – beginning clipped.
d1t06 – Deal is cut.
d2t04 – First two verses are missing.
d2t06 – Tangled Up In Blue is painfully cut.

Source 2: SHNID 20867

MSC>DAT >CDR>WAV>SHNv3. Multiple track cuts – see info file for details.

Comments: Very clean SBD with several minor cuts.
Flaws:
d1t01 – most of beginning of track is missing
d1t04 – beginning clipped.
d1t05 – pop @ 01:32, 01:34 removed using pencil tool, SF6,
d1t06 – Deal is cut.
d2t05 – First two verses are missing.
d2t07 – Tangled Up In Blue is painfully cut.

Thanks to J.Powell for CDR source. DAE(EAC0.9b4, offset corrected, secure mode, QPS QUE 2410)>removal of pop/silent gaps(SF6)>tracking(cdwav)>sector boundaries confirmed(shntool)>SHN(shorten3.4) via C.Ladner.

Another installment of the misSHN in the rain division of TMNSP, 11/03.

Links, Etc.

Jerry Base entry for this show.

Jerry Garcia’s Middle Finger has some nice info about it as well.

Show Review: Paul Simon & Bob Dylan – Wantagh, NY (07/30/99)

Paul Simon/Bob Dylan
Jones Beach Ampitheatre
Wantagh NY
7-30-99

Tracks:

Paul Simon:

Bridge Over Troubled Water
Can’t Run But
The Boy In The Bubble
The Coast
Trailway Bus
Mrs. Robinson
Me And Julio Down By The Schoolyard
Further To Fly
Graceland
The Cool, Cool River
Slip Sliding Away
Diamonds On The Soles Of Her Shoes
You Can Call Me Al
Late In The Evening
Still Crazy After All These Years

Dylan/Simon duets:

The Sound Of Silence
I Walk The Line/The Wanderer
Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door

Bob Dylan:

Babe, It Ain’t No Lie
Mr. Tambourine Man
Desolation Row
Girl Of The North Country
Tangled Up In Blue
All Along The Watchtower
Shelter From The Storm
Maggie’s Farm
Not Dark Yet
Highway 61 Revisited

Encore

Like A Rolling Stone
It Ain’t Me, Babe
Not Fade Away

My review:

In the summer of 1999, Bob Dylan and Paul Simon embarked on a four-month-long, 38-date tour together as co-headliners (they would switch back and forth in terms of who was the opening act).

This night in Wantagh is the penultimate night of the first leg of the tour. After the next night’s show in Wantagh, they took a few weeks off and came back together in Florida on September 2.

Some kind soul recorded the SBD feed beamed out to the stadium on an FM channel to help those with hearing difficulties. Rattlesnake Records bootlegged that recording on a disc they called Something Is Happening On Mr. Jones’ Beach. Lossless Bob indicates at least one other bootleg of the show, but as far as I can tell, it comes from this same recording (probably just a copy of the Rattlesnake bootleg). A taper named Doinker also recorded the show. And then someone calling themselves OctopusRider did a matrix mix of the SBD and the Doinker recording, but only for the Dylan set.

I listened to the SBD. It is missing “Babe, It Ain’t No Lie.”

The SBD is marred by some volume fluctuations, and it sounds very flat. At least to my (admittedly not great ears.) I listened to the first several songs in my car on the way to work. I immediately didn’t like the sound. It sounded not only flat, but cold and distant. I tried it on my cheap earphones, and it sounded worse.

That afternoon I took my daughter somewhere and put on some Big Thief for her listening pleasure. She immediately complained about the sound quality. We played around with the car’s settings and realized that something was off. The back speakers weren’t working at all, and there was no equalizer adjustments for the front speakers.

No wonder this recording sounded so terrible. The radio worked fine, but when I connected my phone up, something screwed up. It took me a couple of days to fix it. But what an improvement once I did. Now, as I mentioned, the sound still isn’t pristine. It still sounds a bit cold, and there are those annoying fluctuations. But it is highly listenable. I just did a quick test listen to the matrix, and it sounds terrific. You just don’t get the Simon performance.

I have a few Paul Simon concert recordings. The ones from the 1980s onward are all performed with a big band, creating what I call the Graceland sound. The shows are filled with lots of percussion and horns, and a large vocal section.

The opening track this night, “Bridge Over Troubled Water,” has none of that. It sounds more like something Daniel Lanois would produce. It is haunting and atmospheric. Simon can no longer hit those high notes, but he still does a nice job with it.

“Can’t Run, But” gets a little more robust, but not much. But by the time he hits the third song, “The Boy in the Bubble,” things get really good. There are big horns, big guitars, and big backup vocals. Graceland is one of my favorite albums, and this song is one of my favorites from that album, and this version is wonderful.

When I was a teenager, first discovering Paul Simon (or Simon & Garfunkel, rather), I absolutely hated “Mrs. Robinson.” The reasons were mostly stupid (but would probably make for a good My Life In Music post; look for that soon). I always skipped it when playing the record, or when it came on the radio. I’ve since gotten over those stupid reasons, but I still don’t really care for the song. It has some clever lyrics, but it’s never really done anything for me. This is a perfectly fine version.

“Me and Julio” is always fun, and this is an energetic performance. “Cool Cool River” is great, and it concludes with this wonderful cacophony of horns. He doesn’t have Ladysmith Black Mambazo with him (if you ever get to see them live, I highly recommend it; they are awesome), so the opening to “Diamonds on the Soles of Her Shoes” is toned down quite a bit. They do try a bit of acapella singing, but it doesn’t work very well. Once they get into the tune, though, it turns out well.

“You Can Call Me Al” and “Late in the Evening” are super fun with lots of great horn work.

Dylan comes out to duet with Paul on three songs. They sing together on “The Sound of Silence,” which is interesting. Simon has a traditionally good voice; it is very pretty, whereas Dylan has…well, he has Dylan’s voice. I love it, but he’s never been known as a technically great singer. It is full of grit and gravel. Put them together, and it’s not exactly a beautiful harmony, but it works. Next, they do a medley of “I Walk The Line/The Wanderer,” and it is clear they are both having so much fun.

But it is “Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door” that’s the showstopper. I believe it is Simon’s band still on the stage, and the addition of horns makes this rendition something special. They turn it into a reggae number, and it is just amazing. Bob and Paul trade off verses, with them both singing the chorus. Again, it is clear they are having a great time. Toward the end, they launch into a chorus of “I hear ya knockin’, but you can’t come in,” and I just love it.

Bob in 1999-2000 is some of my favorite Dylan ever. Larry Campbell and Charlie Sexton on guitars is where it is at. But the whole band really gels perfectly well. For my money, Paul Simon was the warm-up, and this is the show.

I’ve always loved how, during this period, Dylan always opened with an old traditional number. It really sets the stage. “Oh, Babe It Ain’t No Lie” fits that bill. Then we get into it with “Mr. Tambourine Man,” which finds everyone in fine form. There is a nice bit of duelling guitars at the close. Next comes “Desolation Row,” and it is fantastic. Great acoustic guitar playing. Bob’s vocal is so tender and pure on “Girl From the North Country.”

During this period, “Tangled Up In Blue” often had an extended acoustic jam that I usually just love. It feels a little off-balance here, but is still quite good. Larry Campbell sits at the pedal steel guitar for “Shelter From the Storm,” and it is amazing.

“Not Dark Yet” is one of my favorite late-period Bob Dylan tunes, and this version is fantastic. Long ago, I created a playlist for some of my favorite live versions of songs, and this went immediately into it.

“Highway 61” puts Larry back on pedal steel. There is some very fine electric guitar work.

The encore begins with “Like a Rolling Stone.” It is very good. Then we get treated to a ten-minute version of “It Ain’t Me, Babe” featuring some terrific acoustic guitar jamming. Then we close it out with a raucous “Not Fade Away.”

Great show overall. This is definitely not Paul Simon’s best performance. I’ve heard him do much better. It doesn’t help that the soundboard recording fluctuates so much. But it’s still good stuff. But it’s the Dylan set that makes this a must-have. That and the duets.

Bob Links has another review of the concert.

Lossless Bob has six LB#s for this show; you can find them here.

I have three sources. You can see text files and artwork here.

YouTube has a video of the show, recorded from the audience.

Show Review: Van Morrison – Amsterdam, The Netherlands (09/29/86)

Van Morrison
Carre Theatre
Amsterdam, The Netherlands
September 29, 1986

Tracklist:

1. Celtic Swing
2. Northern Muse (Solid Ground)
3. Cry For Home
4. She Gives Me Religion
5. Tore Down a la Rimbaud
6. Vanlose Stairway
7. Beautiful Vision
8. It’s All in the Game>Make It Real One More Time
9. Domino
10. Cleaning Windows
11. Oh the Warm Feeling
12. Here Comes the Knight
13. Dweller on the Threshold
14. Help Me
15. And the Healing Has Begun
16. Gloria
17. In The Garden
18. Full Force Gal
19. Rave On John Donne

Neil Drinkwater – Keyboards
Ritchie Buckley – Saxophone
Jerome Rimson – Bass
Arty McGlynn – Guitar
Martin Drover – Trumpet
Ray Jones – Drums
Helen Bradley – Backing Vocals
June Boyce – Backing Vocals

Source 1:

Artwork

SHN Lineage: CDR > WaveLab (digital remastering) >CDR >WaveLab (DAE) > shorten v3.3

Known Flaws:

t8 – 2 seconds frequency interferences inbetween 0:03 and 0:05

Comment:

These shn files decode to the original remastered wav files as received from wolf himself.

Source 2:

FM Stereo Broadcast

SOURCE: DATA DVD (FLACS)

CDDA Test shows Tracks to be between 42/43% CDDA. Most probable cause for this is a DAT Transfer

somewhere in the linage using 32 kHz at 16 bits instead of 44.1 or 48 kHZ. This has ocurred on

some Dylan Bootlegs and they become mistaken as Lossy.

If I had any doubt that this recording was Lossless I can assure you it would not be in my collection.

Front Artwork (Adapted) and Rear Artwork by JTT

Source 3:

Here’s another of my favorites. This one re-mastered in 2001 by the legendary Wolf. I’m not sure of the linage but it sounds like a SB or FM to me. The first song of the concert was not included in the recording. (Moondance) (inst.). Please correct me if I’m wrong. I’m just in this to share what I have.

Enjoy, twofthrs

I also have some random artwork that doesn’t come with any of the sources. I don’t remember where I got it. But you can have it too (click here)

The Midnight Cafe’s review:

This is a very good show with superb sound, but not a great one. It begins with a nice version of “Celtic Swing”. Vanomatic indicates they played an instrumental version of “Moondance,” but none of my sources have that. My post on the old blog also has “Moondance” on it, and that was definitely something he was doing regularly at the time, so I think it is safe to say he played it that night, but again I don’t have a copy of it.

The next three songs, “Northern Muse (Solid Ground)”, “Cry For Home”, and “She Gives Me Religion” are played very quickly. I don’t mean the tempo is fast; they just don’t last very long. They are each under three minutes. There are times when Van would basically play a medley of his hits at the start of the show, almost like he was trying to get through them to satisfy the casual fans before moving on to what he really wanted to do. This isn’t that. Those songs aren’t his greatest hits, and they aren’t quite a medley. But it does feel like he’s just trying to get through them. They aren’t bad performances. Van and his band are too good for that, but they feel rushed. Most of the show is good, but it feels a bit lacking. It doesn’t have that little something that makes his best shows so special. It lacks that Celtic Soul we all come for. Again, it isn’t bad. In fact its quite good. Had I been there in person, I would have raved about it. This is a very good band putting on a very good show, but for the most part Van just doesn’t seem to be in that special place he sometimes goes to.

“Tore Down A La Rimbaud” isn’t much longer; it clocks in at just three minutes and eight seconds, but it has some jaunty horns and a terrific little sax solo. The horns are really what stand out in this show. They really bring these songs to life. “It’s All in the Game/Make It Real One More Time” is where Van finally does seem to be feeling the spirit move him. He does that thing where he starts repeating himself as if thrown into a trance. It is glorious.

“Oh the Warm Feeling” has this lovely xylophone-esque intro. Probably just keyboards sounding beautiful. I’m terrible at instruments. ”Dweller on the Threshold” has some fantastic horn sections.

“And the Healing Has Begun” is where it is at. It is one of my favorite Van songs, and they just nail it here. There is some really beautiful guitar picking accompanied by some fine keyboard tickling. In my notes, I literally wrote: “Oh yeah, this is the stuff.”

I’ve probably underrated this show. It is a very fine performance. Indeed, Van doesn’t quite move into transcendence very often. Those early songs do feel truncated. But the sound quality is great, and non-transcendent Van is still wonderful. And there are a few moments where he gets the spirit, and those are very fine indeed.

Show Review: Bob Dylan – Rome, Italy (06/19/84)

Bob Dylan with Mick Taylor & Carlos Santana
Rome, Italy
June 19, 1984

Highway 61 Revisited
Jokerman
All Along The Watchtower
Just Like A Woman
Maggie’s Farm
I And I
License To Kill
Hard Rain (acoustic)
Tangled Up In Blue (acoustic)
It’s Alright Ma (I’m Only Bleeding) (acoustic)
Simple Twist Of Fate
Masters Of War
Ballad Of A Thin Man
When You Gonna Wake Up
Every Grain Of Sand
Like A Rolling Stone (band introduction)

encore:

Mr Tambourine Man (acoustic)
It Ain’t Me Babe (acoustic)
The Times
I Shall Be Released
Tombstone Blues
Blowin’ In The Wind

Band:

Mick Taylor – guitar
Ian MacLagan – keyboards
Greg Sutton – bass
Colin Allen – drums
Guest: Carlos Santana – guitar, last 4 tracks

Soundboard
Liberated Boot: Live At Palaeur
Silver CD > CDR > FLAC

Artwork: Front Cover, Back Cover, Poster

online Review:

“Live At Paleur is a soundboard recording taken from Dylan’s 1984 tour of Europe. It captures a highly enjoyable performance from Dylan and his Mick Taylor-fronted band. This recording sets Dylan’s vocals way out in front but I personally enjoy that mix. The band are a little buried on some of the songs and there are occasional echoes on the vocals but if you don’t mind these things then this is a great recording. It’d give an 8 or an 8.5 out of 10. Dylan sings most of the songs in the confident, swaggering style that characterised many of live performances in the 1980s. While this style is certainly not my favourite of Bob’s “vocal characters”, it works to good effect on many of the songs here. One thing that cannot be disputed is that ‘Live At Palaeur’ is a much better document of this tour than the patchy official release ‘Real Live’. Ballad Of A Thin Man on ‘Real Live’ is a horrible, rushed parody of the song that appeared on ‘Highway 61 Revisited’. Here Ballad… is one of the highlights of the set. The versions of Maggies Farm, Masters Of War and Tombstone Blues on this release also put their Real Live incarnations to shame. Other highpoints include the brilliant, rewritten Tangled Up In Blue, an interesting post-Gospel rewrite of When You Gonna Wake Up? (”When you gonna wake up? maybe you never will”), a passionate I & I and a beautiful performance of Every Grain Of Sand, which was still a relatively new song at that time. It’s clear that Bob’s having fun when he lets the audience sing on the chorus of Times They Are A-Changin’ and Blowin’ In The Wind. All in all, this is a highly entertaining show and I don’t hesitate in giving it my stamp of approval (for whatever that’s worth…) “

enjoy 🙂

The Midnight Cafe’s Review

When I listen to these shows, I try to make notes when something stands out. If a guitar solo is particularly interesting, or if there is some flub, I’ll write it down. If a song does something different – not necessarily good or bad, just different than I’ve heard it played before I make a note. But when a song is just played well – even really well – but it doesn’t do anything different, I tend not to make a note of it.

This show is really good, but very little actually stood out to me. A big reason why is that the mix is weird. It sounds muddled. Mick Taylor’s guitar is turned down really low to my ears. One of the other sources purports to be from Dylan’s monitor mix, and it also complains about the quality; I’m guessing this may be from the same source.

Dylan comes in loud and clear, but the guitar and keyboards often sound very distant. This gives the recording a feeling of not quite being there. Like you are listening from another room or something. It is too bad, too, because Mick is often killing it, taking some great solos. When I really concentrate, I can absolutely dig what he’s doing. Ian MacLagan does some good stuff on keys as well, but you can barely hear him half the time.

I listened to this on my way to work via my Honda CRV’s crappy speakers and then while I was at work via my crappy earphones. I suspect that if you listened to this with a really good sound system and maybe played around with the levels a bit, this might come out really good. Not perfect, but good.

But through my speakers it sounds just pretty-okay. It is still highly listenable, and it is a good show, but it won’t be going into my regular listening pile.

I did really like “I and I “ which has some nice echo on Dylan’s vocals. “Tangled Up In Blue” has some wonderful alternate lyrics. “Just My Imagination” is cut on this recording for some reason, but it seems to exist on other sources. I had no idea Carlos Santana played on the encore, and apparently I wasn’t impressed by him.

Lossless Bob has eleven sources listed for this show. I only have this one.

Show Review: Neil Young & Crazy Horse – Chicago, IL (11/15/76)

Neil Young
1976-11-15
Auditorium Theater, Chicago, Illinois, USA
w/ Crazy Horse

Early Show

Disc 1 (32:01)
01. The Old Laughing Lady>Guilty Train
02. Human Highway
03. After The Gold Rush
04. Pocahontas
05. Too Far Gone
06. The Needle And The Damage Done
07. A Man Needs A Maid
08. Sugar Mountain

Disc 2 (57:01)
09. Country Home
10. Don’t Cry No Tears
11. Bite The Bullet
12. Down By The River
13. Lotta Love
14. Like A Hurricane
15. Drive Back
16. Cinnamon Girl
17. Cortez The Killer(cut)

Late Show

01 Heart of Gold
02 The Old Laughing Lady
03 Journey Through the Past
04 Too Far Gone
05 Give Me Strength
06 The Needle and the Damage Done
07 A Man Needs a Maid
08 Tell Me Why
09 Sugar Mountain

10 Country Home
11 Don’t Cry No Tears
12 Peace of Mind
13 Lotta Love
14 Like a Hurricane
15 After the Gold Rush
16 Are You Ready for the Country?
17 Down by the River
18 Inca Queen
19 Opera Star
20 Eldorado

Tour: 1976 US Tour with Crazy Horse
Band: Crazy Horse, Line Up 3
Neil Young – vocals, guitar, keyboards, banjo, harmonica
Frank Sampedro – guitar, keyboards, vocals
Billy Talbot – bass, vocals
Ralph Molina – drums, vocals

Sources:

Source 1
Early Show Only

Lineage: Audience Master > Unknown generation > DAT > CDR > EAC > xACT 1.5b3 > flac(8)

Source 2
Late Show Only

SBD Recording
Artwork: Front, Back, Front 2

Source 3
Late Show Only

The “Joel Bernstein” 1976 soundboard collection I put up recently was very popular,
so here’s another 1976 soundboard.
I haven’t been at Dime too long, so I don’t know if it was put up recently.
If you missed it before, it’s definitely a keeper.
The sound is really superb.
I beleive this emerged among collectors as a commercial bootleg,
so I don’t know the lineage, but it sounds like it could be straight from the master or very low-generation.
Supposedly several songs were performed after these, but they were not recorded.
This recording was taken from the “Chicago Hurricane” bootleg. There’s a little sound dropout at 2:39 on Disc 1, Track 6, but it’s after the song has ended. This was on my original.

The Midnight Cafe notes:

Out of the four main artists that I used to post about every week, Neil Young is the one I know the least about. Truth be told, I’ve always been more of a Jack of All Trades and an Ace of None than one of those folks who know every last detail of an artist’s career. But I am pretty well versed in Dylan and the Dead and Van Morrison. I love me some Neil Young, but I have to admit I’ve not listened to every record, and I’m pretty hazy about most of his tours.

I mean, I know there was Buffalo Springfield and his tenure with Crosby, Stills, and Nash, and of course Crazy Horse. I also know he’s played with lots of different bands with names like The Ducks and the Restless and Promise of the Real, but I’d be hard-pressed to give you dates on any of those or who was in them. But I’ve definitely listened to recordings of all those guys.

The point I’m belaboring to make is that I don’t know how to put this particular show into any type of context. I believe 1976 is a well-regarded year in Neil Young lore. He did a big tour of Japan and Europe with Crazy Horse in the spring, and a tour with them of the US in the Fall. In the summer, he toured with Stephen Stills, with whom he released an album called Long May You Run, but it ended badly.

This show comes from the middle of his American tour with Crazy Horse. He often did two shows a day on this tour. Each performance began with Neil performing solo on acoustic guitar and sometimes piano, and then Crazy Horse came out for a full electric set.

There is a soundboard recording of the late show, which apparently came from Joel Bernstein, a photographer and producer who hung out with Neil around this time. I don’t know all the details of that. Only audience recordings exist of the early show. I tried listening to the early show, but I couldn’t do it. It isn’t a terribly bad recording; I’ve certainly heard worse, but I just wasn’t in the mood. This is partially because I mislabeled it as a soundboard and was really annoyed when it was definitely not that. But the late show is a true soundboard, and it sounds terrific.

Listening to the acoustic set, I realize I don’t know what to say about it. Neil is in fine form, and he plays the songs well, but they sound more or less as they do on the records. For the most part, he’s not doing anything different with them, and he’s not blowing me away with raw emotion. Don’t get me wrong, they are great. I love these songs, and he performs them well; I just don’t know that there is more to say about them.

It opens with a nice version of “Heart of Gold.” My copy has some digital static a couple of times right at the beginning. “The Old Laughing Lady” is really good with a lovely harmonica bit in the middle. At the very end, Neil starts singing what the setlist calls “Guilty Train,” but I can’t find any information about it. It is just a snippet, really, but all the lyrics websites only list the lyrics, “Guilty train
Don’t whistle my way again,” which is repeated. Does anyone know anything about this song? If it even is a song.

“Journey Through the Past” is a lot of fun with this barroom-esque piano work. Neil switches to the piano or an organ during “A Man Needs a Maid,” and he also blows his harmonica, which gives it a really beautiful, haunting quality. The band comes out on “Country Home,” and they rock. About two minutes into the song, Neil seems to get confused, and he repeats the line “Leave myself behind” a few times. For a moment, the band seems like they don’t know what to do, and then they just jump into a great little jam.

“Lotta Love” is very pretty, but at the end it gets really soft for some reason. “Like a Hurricane” starts off kind of weird. Neil does this intro where he plays really fast and just kind of noodles for a minute, and then it kicks off into the actual song. It is loud and ragged and glorious. In the intro to “Are You Ready For the Country,” Neil says it is their first time playing the song. As it was written in 1972, that seems unlikely. Was he just talking about him performing it with Crazy Horse, or was this really the first time he’d played it live? Is there a Neil Young Base out there with listings of all his live performances? Whatever the case, it is a rollicking version.

“Down by the River” is one of my favorite Neil Young songs. It has an excellent groove, and it is a great launching pad for some classic Neil Young jamming. He does not disappoint this night. One of my favorite parts of the song is after the big jam; he comes back to the first verse singing, “Be on my side. I’ll be on your side,” and he just nails that moment here. From the big rowdiness of that song, he transitions to the subtle beauty of “Inca Queen” with this lovely synth keyboard and some very fine guitar picking. “Opera Star” and “El Dorado” finish us out, and they are rocking.

It is a very fine show overall. Well worth grabbing.

I’m a funny man. When talking about a GarciaLive release, I noted that in order to write more of these music reviews, I was just going to give them one good listen (instead of the three I initially was trying to do) and then just jot down my thoughts. These aren’t intended to be in-depth, full-on reviews, but just thoughts on a show. I listened to this show on my way to and from work, and I made notes whenever a song was good or interesting. The plan was to come home that night and write a review. That was Monday. By the time I got home, I was too tired to talk about anything. Then Tuesday came and Wednesday, and to be honest, I just kept forgetting to write. Here it is Thursday, and I’m finally getting this thing out. I could have listened to the show a couple of more times!

Maybe next time.

Show Review: Bob Dylan and the Band – Oakland, CA (02/11/74)

Furthering my attempts to add more music discussion at The Midnight Cafe, I thought I’d add to my reviews of officially released live music by reviewing some unofficially released tunes as well. That’s maybe slightly a falsehood in this case, as Dylan has released all of these shows in a magnificent boxed set, but he left out all The Band’s solo performances. And this review is not of the officially released discs but of a ROIO.

Some time ago on my music blog I posted a Bob Dylan and The Band show from 1974, or maybe it was a compilation. I don’t remember. It doesn’t matter. The point is, I posted something from their tour together at that time, and I made a comment about how it was one of the greatest tours ever. The thing is I didn’t really know that to be true. I hadn’t really listened to much of that tour. I don’t think I’d even listened to Before the Flood all the way through. But I knew it was a big tour that played big venues to big crowds. I knew people were excited about it because this was the first tour after Bob Dylan’s long hiatus and that while The Band had toured with him in the 1960s, they were now a major rock and roll act in their own right.

Sometime after I posted my unrealized praise, I came to realize that quite a few hardcore Dylanheads weren’t really down with this tour. In fact, many downright loathe it. Turns out Dylan and at least some members of The Band felt it was a sellout tour, good for the pocketbook, but not for the soul. So I thought it would be fun for this, my first bootleg review in a long time to tackle a show from this tour.

I randomly picked this performance and this particular source. Dylan and the Band played some 40 gigs over the course of about two months (often playing two shows per day). This show was towards the end of the tour. They’d play three more gigs in Los Angeles after that, and then they were done. Lossless Bob lists some fourteen sources for this show. I have five of them. I chose LB-4455 to listen to. It is a nice sounding soundboard recording. Oddly, it contains parts of the early show and parts of the late show. The set lists were identical (or nearly so) and this bootleg basically cuts it in half. The split occurs in the middle of the Dylan solo acoustic set.

The tour changed a little bit from the early shows to the end of the tour but by this point they were playing mostly the same songs every night. It broke down like this: Dylan and The Band performed together, then The Band would play some of their songs without Dylan. The Band would leave and Dylan would do a few solo acoustic numbers. Then he’d leave again, allowing The Band to play a few more of their tunes, followed by Dylan being backed by The Band.

After listening to this performance a few times, I can definitely see where the hate is coming from, but also feel that it is overblown. This performance is a big rock and roll show. It is loud and brash, rowdy and racous. It is a big stadium rock and roll show. That’s great for bands like The Rolling Stones, but one usually expects something different from Bob Dylan. His music is suited for a more intimate setting where you can get more nuance.

But often, it actually works. It starts with a rambunctious “Most Likely You Go Your Way (and I’ll Go Mine).” The music is played loud and fast, Dylan practically spits his words out. I dig it. It is a powerful way to start the show. This is followed by “Lay Lady Lay”, which is a little more laid back but still rowdy. The song is meant as a seduction, but any girl listening to this would likely run for her life. Garth Hudson is playing some kind of new electric piano. It sounds like an organ here. Or maybe it is an actual organ. I’m terrible at figuring out who is playing what instrument.

I’m not going to do a song by song review. I just don’t have that much to say. I’ll try to list the highlights and maybe anything that seems weird or bad.

“Rainy Day Women” has a carnival feel which really works for the song. “It Ain’t Me, Babe” hangs onto that carnival sound. There are some droning organ chords which I kind of dig, but I can see how it might drive some folks nuts. Then the piano kicks in and it sounds great. Ditto Robbie Robertson’s guitar playing. The guitars get loud and rocking during “King Harvest.”

Here’s where I admit I’m not actually a huge fan of The Band. They were all incredibly talented musicians and great live performers. I freaking love The Last Waltz, but a lot of their songs just don’t do it for me. I’ve never been able to “get” Music From the Big Pink. I’ve got numerous recordings of their concerts without Bob and while the performances are often good, I can rarely get into them because of the songs.

I do love “Up on Cripple Creek” but, unfortunately, it cuts out on this recording. “All Along The Watchtower” which brings Dylan back in with The Band cuts in. Dylan’s solo acoustic songs are fine. I love these songs and he performs them well. But this isn’t Dylan in the 1960s. The nuance and fire is gone.

“Ballad of Hollis Brown” with The Band is terrific. It is not a favorite song of mine, but this version is fantastic. Great keyboard work, terrific guitar lines. “The Weight” is another song I do love from The Band is it is played with great enthusiasm here. Enthusiasm is a good word for the rest of the songs on this set. The last few songs are played with high energy.

So, yeah, this is good stuff. It is a big rock and roll concert played with verve. But it does feel like maybe something is missing. It has to be weird playing in front of 20,000 people all cheering and shouting. That personal connection is going to get lost. Nuance and subtlety are hard to find in a massive arena. I look forward to listening to other shows on this tour, but I probably won’t do that for a while. It is easy to see why Dylan completely deconstructed his concerts the next year with The Rolling Thunder group. But I’m also glad he did something like this.

You can view the entire setlist with notes about this recording here.

I’m not sure how I want to post this sort of thing. I had initally thought I’d upload all the images and text files (but not the music – if you want that send me a message and I can point you in the right direction.) But that seems like a hassle and maybe not that interesting to anyone. So, I’ll ask. Would anyone be interested in seeing that sort of thing? Would you like to have all the source information, just not the music? Is that worth it? Leave me a comment if you have thoughts on this, or anything else.

Shows in History: The Grateful Dead – Philadelphia, PA (03/24/86)

On the old music site, I used to periodically do a Shows in History post where I’d link to all the shows that had taken place on today’s date throughout history. It was a fun way to highlight a bunch of different shows, and I always enjoyed seeing the wide variety of acts one could potentially have caught on a particular day.

Though I no longer post download links to shows, I still think that idea is a fun one.

I am going to try and actually listen to one of the shows that was performed on today’s date (whatever date that is) and maybe give a short review of it or some random thoughts. I know that won’t happen every day, as some days are weird, and busy, and I won’t have time to sit and listen to a full show.

Knowing me, this will be the only time I do this at all.

Today’s show is from the Grateful Dead back in 1986. That’s no one’s favorite year for the Dead. It is the infamous year that Garcia’s addictions/poor health put him in a diabetic coma in July.

But while this is certainly not Peak Grateful Dead nor the best that Jerry ever did, this is a pretty darn good show. The big news here is they played “Box of Rain” something they hadn’t regularly done in over a decade and a half. They’d played it a few nights before in Hampton, which was the first time they’d busted it out in some seventeen years. So it wasn’t a complete surprise when Phil started singing it this night, but you can hear the crowd roar in exultant joy.

The first set is well played but not spectacular. The second set features a very nice “Lost Sailor>Saint of Circumstance” with Bob doing a weird little rap in the transition about freedom. Weirdly, the set ends with just one song being played after the “Drums/Space” combo, but it’s a very nice version of “Morning Dew.” It all ends with a quick little “In the Midnight Hour” for the encore.

So yeah, not the greatest of shows, but still a very good one. If you’ve written off 1986 entirely, I’d give this one a go (and you can do just that over at the Archive)

Here’s the full setlist:

Grateful Dead
3/24/86
The Spectrum
Philadelphia, PA

–Set 1–
Alabama Getaway ->
Greatest Story Ever Told
Dire Wolf
Little Red Rooster
Brown Eyed Women
My Brother Esau
Ramble on Rose
El Paso
Box of Rain

–Set 2–
Mississippi Half-Step Uptown Toodeloo ->
Man Smart (Women Are Smarter)
High Time
Lost Sailor ->
Saint of Circumstance ->
Drums ->
Space ->
Morning Dew

–Encore–
In the Midnight Hour

Other shows that took place on this day:

Jackson Browne – Osaka, Japan (03/24/77)
Led Zeppelin – Los Angeles, CA (03/24/75)
Bruce Hornsby – Daytona Beach, FL (03/24/87)
Bela Fleck – Dublin, Ireland (02/03/24)
Queen – Himeji, Japan (03/24/76)
Eric Clapton – Charlotte, NC (03/24/78)
Steve Earle – Dallas, TX (03/24/89)

Those links just go to show information; there is nothing to download. I feel a little guilty that I spent some fifteen years providing you all with thousands of shows to download and then just one day stopped and transitioned to talking about movies.

Maybe someday I’ll go back to sharing shows, but that won’t ever be on this site. But I still want to talk about music more. That seems only fair. One idea I have is to do regular show reviews. And maybe provide lots of information about the different shows – setlists, artwork, various reviews, etc. That’s a lot of work, and I get so involved with my movie stuff that I forget to do that sort of thing. So this is like a step in that direction. I hope you like it. If you do, please leave me a comment.