Arlo Guthrie
3/23/91
Ventura Theater
Ventura, CA
1st Row, Left-Side Balcony: Nakamichi CM-300 CP-1’s >Sony WM-D6C,
XLIIS Cassette Master Transferred: Sony TC-D5M >HHb CDR 800 PRO,
Tayio Uden CD Masters Extracted To One-Track WAV Files >Audacity (Track Splits, Minor Edits, Amplify, & Normalize) >FLAC (Level 8) + Tags Via xACT 2.53
Recorded, Transferred, FLAC’d, Tagged, & Front-Cover Artwork By OldNeumanntapr
Disc I:
- Chilling Of The Evening
- I Ain’t Got No Home
- When The Ship Comes In
- The Motorcycle Song
- Darkest Hour
- Coming Into Los Angeles
- Keep The Dream Alive
- Wake Up Dead
Disc II:
- Oklahoma Nights
- Gabriel’s Mother’s Highway Ballad #16
- When A Soldier Makes It Home
- City Of New Orleans
- Amazing Grace
- All Over The World
- Can’t Help Falling In Love
- Highway In The Wind
OldNeumanntapr Notes-
This was the first time that I had seen / recorded Arlo and I was stoked to finally get to see him. My ex wife Nikki was six months pregnant with our daughter Lucy. I had her take my Sony D6 in for me with an ace bandage under her skirt, and I took the microphones, cables and blank tapes. I remember that there was a search going in and one person was stopped because they had an 110 Instamatic camera, and the bouncer made them take it back to their car. They tried to say that there was only a few frames left on the roll but the bouncer wasn’t buying it. We sailed in without a hitch because NO One wants to frisk a pregnant woman! The Ventura Theater was built in the late 1920s in the architecture of Spanish Colonial Revival, and first opened in 1928. It’s a really cool old theater and makes for a great place to see a live show. The seats were taken out years ago on the floor and that level, in three tiers, was converted to a dinner theater. The best seats are up front, but it’s also the riskiest place in which to record from. I recorded this show from the front row of the balcony. It’s a little boomy up there, but far safer for recording. You can actually hear the fan in the spotlight during the quiet parts. There were two spotlights in the balcony and I was sitting about three seats to the left of one of them, on the left side. The last time I have been to the Ventura Theater (The new owners modified the name to the Majestic Ventura Theater in the early to mid 90s) was to record John Prine in 1999. I have been told that the balcony is now closed off permanently and a sound wall was built between the back of the floor section and the bar area, which is under the balcony. This was possibly to improve the sound in the front part of the theater. I ran the Nakamichi microphones in a modified Levi jacket. I had holes sewn into the bottom of each front pocket, so only the capsule/wind screens would protrude from the jacket. I had long hair that I would wear down, to hide the mics from view, and used shortened XLR >RCA cables to connect to my recorder which I kept in a small hip pack. I wish I could have used the CP-4 shotgun capsules but that would have been far more noticeable, at least to the spotlight operator. My friend Jim used to tape his stereo mic to the top of the railing at the front of the balcony and drape his coat partially over the top. Whatever works, I guess. I liked the set list, and got to hear both The Motorcycle Song and The City Of New Orleans, so I was happy. Arlo told some great stories, as usual, and he talked a bit about the Gulf War. He said that he wanted to write a song about it but ‘it kept changing’. I was able to get my ticket signed after the show. Tape flips have been edited in Audacity. There was one after the sixth song on the first disc, and one in the middle of ‘Amazing Grace’.
Do NOT Convert To MP3.
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