Earthquake Relief Benefit, Cow Palace, Daly City, CA, 11-26-1989, Part 1 - America, Aaron Neville, Eddie Money, the Dynatones, and the Chambers Brothers

It's time for me to start posting another big collection of albums from a major rock festival. This time, it's from the Earthquake Relief Benefit, held in the San Francisco Bay Area in late 1989. I've found enough music to make 19 different albums! This actually was three concerts, all held on the same day, November 26, 1989. This is the first of six albums I'm posting that took place at the Cow Palace in Daly City, just south of San Francisco. 

This album gathers all the musical acts where I only had short sets. For the other five I have from this venue, each musical act gets their own set. The acts here are: the Dynatones, the Chambers Brothers, America, Aaron Neville, and Eddie Money.

These concerts were a reaction to the Loma Prieta earthquake, which happened on October 16, 1989, at 5:04 P.M. (I know the time well, because I was just getting out of a college class in the area when the earthquake hit. We were all okay, but the building suffered structural damage and was later closed for retrofitting.) Famously, a game of the baseball World Series was just minutes from starting at Candlestick Park in San Francisco. It had to be cancelled, but tens of millions of people around the world found out about the earthquake as it happened due to the T.V. broadcast. Although the epicenter was about ten miles northeast of Santa Cruz, there was a lot of damage in San Francisco and Oakland, due to poor construction there. 63 people died, most of them in Oakland. The earthquake registered 6.9 on the Richter Scale. 

There was lots of damage throughout the Bay Area, and thousands of injuries. It so happened the Bay Area had a vibrant music scene, and probably the most altruistic (and well known) concert promoter in the country, Bill Graham. Graham leaped into action, and got these three benefits concerts to take place only about forty days after the earthquake. They ended up raising about two million dollars to relief efforts. That was just a small amount compared to the billions needed, but it's nice to see that so many musical acts wanted to help out just the same. I would bet that even more would have liked to take part, but were tied up with concert tours or other obligations they couldn't get out of on such short notice.

Here's a Wikipedia entry about the earthquake:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1989_Loma_Prieta_earthquake

I understand about five hours of highlights from the different concerts were shown on a local T.V. station that night. The main way funds were raised was by people watching on T.V. and donating over the phone. But, for some reason, we have a lot more than just five hours of highlights. I'm posting about 15 hours of music in total. All of it has the excellent sound quality of a soundboard or FM radio bootleg. I think that's because a lot of it became part of Bill Graham's music archive, which later was made public through the company Wolfgang's Vault, then spread to various bootleg sites. You can find video footage of most of the acts on YouTube, although sometimes one has to dig deep.

However, I couldn't find all of the music acts. Some that were billed to perform at Cow Palace included Maria Muldaur, Grace Slick, Paul Kantner, Joe Louis Walker, Narada Michael Walden, the Solid Senders, and the Brass Band. I'm pretty sure some or even all of these actually did perform, since I found some mentions of them. Maria Muldaur actually sings a duet with Aaron Neville on this album, but I believe she got her own set as well. And Paul Kantner later performed a song with Crosby, Stills and Nash, so it stands to reason he got his own set too, perhaps with former bandmate Grace Slick. If anyone knows for sure about these acts, and/or actually has the recordings, please let me know. However, according to the promotional material I found, at least I was able to find all of the best known acts.

In case you're curious, the act that performed the longest in this album was Eddie Money. His portion lasts 21 minutes. Also, I'm only guessing about the order of the acts. The exception is the Dynatones. One can tell they were the first act since the emcee introduced them that way.

This album is an hour and 21 minutes long.

01 talk by emcee (Dynatones)
02 When I Think about Love (Dynatones)
03 Shoot Your Shot (Dynatones)
04 Hard Way to Go (Dynatones)
05 talk (Chambers Brothers)
06 People Get Ready (Chambers Brothers)
07 Love, Peace and Happiness (Chambers Brothers)
08 Tin Man (America)
09 I Need You (America)
10 Ventura Highway (America)
11 talk (America)
12 Sister Golden Hair (America)
13 A Horse with No Name (America)
14 Gypsy Woman (Aaron Neville)
15 Arianne (Aaron Neville)
16 Danny Boy (Aaron Neville)
17 Don't Know Much - Mickey Mouse Club Theme (Aaron Neville)
18 Amazing Grace (Aaron Neville & Maria Muldaur)
19 Two Tickets to Paradise (Eddie Money)
20 talk (Eddie Money)
21 If I Could Walk on Water (Eddie Money)
22 I Think I'm in Love (Eddie Money)
23 Take Me Home Tonight (Eddie Money)
24 Shakin' (Eddie Money)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/JKXrynpt

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/dmLzXRfeF7CQTte/file

The cover image shows Aaron Neville at this exact concert, from a screenshot I took of a video. I picked an image of him simply because the image quality was better than the screenshots I could have taken of the other acts here.

Laughter, Love and Music, Bill Graham Memorial, Golden Gate Park, San Francisco, CA, 11-3-1991, Part 1: Bobby McFerrin, Jackson Browne, Journey, Tracy Chapman, and More

On October 25, 1991 rock concert promoter Bill Graham died. The helicopter he was riding in went down in heavy fog as he returned home from a Huey Lewis and the News concert in Concord, California. Also killed were his companion, Melissa Gold, and his pilot, Steve Kahn. Federal investigators later said that Kahn was warned by air traffic controllers not to fly because of inclement weather. Just six days after that, a memorial rock concert for him was held in Golden Gate Park, in San Francisco. About 300,000 fans attended. There's enough music from this concert for four albums. Here's the first one.

Graham could be called a music promoter, and that much is true, but he was a lot more than just that. Grateful Dead guitarist Bob Weir called him "the most important non-musician in music." 

He's best known for owning the Fillmore and Winterland concert venues, but that's just a small part of the picture. There's no other promoter who has even come close to having the impact on music that he had, and I believe he's the only promoter inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. He helped start and nurture the San Francisco music scene in the late 1960s, and helped a great many musical acts get their big breaks and then stay famous. 

Rabbi Robert Kirschner said of him, "There was a lot more to Bill than the Fillmore and Winterland and associations with the whole pantheon of rock 'n' roll in that era. He was also a visionary. He basically invented the whole idea of 'rock theater,' where you went to a concert for an immersion experience." His concerts were always special. For instance, when went to concerts at the Fillmore in the late 1980s, everyone who went could take home a free concert poster, as well as eat a free apple or two if they wanted. Who else would go the extra mile to improve a concert experience like that?!

And although he could be a ruthless businessman, he also was at the forefront of using music to promote social causes, especially to help fund charities. Neil Young had some moving words to say about that during this concert. "Bill Graham made us all look good. Gave us a chance to show you that we could do something good instead of just going on with our careers. He kept pushing us to do things for other people and making a place available for us to do it, so that there was no way out. Thank you, Bill."

There's a lot more that could be said about Graham and his remarkable career, but I'll direct you to his Wikipedia page for that:

Bill Graham (promoter) - Wikipedia

Suffice to say that he was beloved by many rock musicians, so they showed up for this memorial concert despite having only a couple of days to prepare. I'm sure many, many more would have wanted to play, but there was limited time available. Generally speaking, only the big name acts closest to him were chosen. 

For this first volume out of four, I gathered together all the musical acts that only performed a couple of songs each. Generally speaking, they are in the correct chronological order. However, Robin Williams, Journey, and Tracy Chapman all appeared after the next act, Santana, instead of before it. 

Also, note that I believe I've included all the music from the concert. The concert lasted about five and a half hours. The four volumes I've put together total four hours and fifteen minutes. The difference is the time between the acts.

There was just one non-musical performer at the concert, comedian Robin Williams. Normally, I like to keep things to just the music, but I've made an exception in this case to include his stand-up routine. But I stuck it at the end of this album, making it easier for you to keep it, skip it, or delete it. In fact, he performed just before Journey.

I've leave it to you to find out more about the performers if you want. But I have one comment to make about Journey. From 1977 until 1987, Steve Perry was the lead vocalist of that band. But in 1987, he felt burned out and quit the band. For the next several years, he retreated from the public eye and just tried to live a normal life. But he came out of semi-retirement for this concert. This end up being the last time Perry played with Journey.

You can find an entire article about it here:

https://ultimateclassicrock.com/last-journey-show-steve-perry/ 

Also, here's a Los Angeles Times about this memorial concert, written right after it took place:

Bay Area Plays Tribute to Graham : Memorial: About 300,000 gather for free concert at Golden Gate Park honoring the rock promoter who died 10 days ago in a helicopter crash. - Los Angeles Times 

All the music here is unreleased, I believe. I'm pretty sure the entire concert was broadcast on a local radio station, which is why we have an excellent sounding recording of all of it. 

This album is an hour and ten minutes long. 

01 talk by emcee (Dirty Dozen Brass Band)
02 talk (Dirty Dozen Brass Band)
03 My Feet Can't Fail Me Now (Dirty Dozen Brass Band)
04 talk by emcee (Bobby McFerrin)
05 talk (Bobby McFerrin)
06 Did I Hear You Say You Love Me (Bobby McFerrin)
07 talk (Bobby McFerrin)
08 The Star Spangled Banner (Bobby McFerrin)
09 talk by emcee (Jackson Browne)
10 For a Dancer (Jackson Browne)
11 talk (Jackson Browne)
12 World in Motion (Jackson Browne)
13 talk by emcee (Jackson Browne)
14 talk by emcee (Joe Satriani)
15 Always with Me, Always with You [Instrumental] (Joe Satriani)
16 talk (Joe Satriani)
17 The Crush of Love [Instrumental] (Joe Satriani)
18 talk by emcee (Joe Satriani)
19 talk by emcee (Aaron Neville)
20 Ave Maria (Aaron Neville)
21 talk by emcee (Aaron Neville)
22 talk by emcee (Journey)
23 talk (Journey)
24 Faithfully (Journey)
25 Lonely Road without You (Journey)
26 Lights (Journey)
27 talk by emcee (Tracy Chapman)
28 All That You Have Is Your Soul (Tracy Chapman)
29 Where the Soul Never Dies (Tracy Chapman)
30 talk by emcee (Tracy Chapman)
31 talk by emcee (Robin Williams)
32 Stand-Up Comedy Routine (Robin Williams)
33 talk by emcee (Robin Williams)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/BGA5GZ1u

alternate: 

https://bestfile.io/en/XgCnvfog3Ukj8Gr/file

The cover image shows Steve Perry and Neal Schon of Journey at this exact concert. Perry is holding a microphone at the edge of the stage, and Schon is playing guitar. Oh, and I took the "Laughter, Love and Music" logo from a promotional poster for the event.