Various Artists - The Carlsberg Concert - Songs and Visions, Wembley Stadium, London, Britain, 8-16-1997

This is a really fascinating concert, with a format I've never seen before. I highly recommend it. Basically, the idea was to get ten famous musicians to perform one classic song a year, in reverse order, going back to the start of rock and roll in 1955. The stars: Toni Braxton, Seal, Robert Palmer, Jon Bon Jovi, Steve Winwood, k.d. lang, Chaka Khan, Mary J. Blige, Rod Stewart, and Eikichi Yazawa.

Occasionally, the "one song per year" format that meant having the star sing their own hits. For instance, Rod Stewart sang "Maggie May," Robert Palmer sang "Addicted to Love," and k.d. lang sang "Constant Craving." But more often, they sang songs they probably have never sang in public before or since. For example, Seal sang "Stairway to Heaven," Rod Stewart sang "In the Midnight Hour," Bon Jon Bovi sang "Sympathy for the Devil," and k.d. lang sang "I Will Survive!" 

Even more intriguingly, the stars sometimes sang unexpected duets. For instance, Seal and Steve Winwood teamed up to sing U2's "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For," and Chaka Khan & Robert Palmer sang a duet version of "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction." The backing band was the same for all the songs, so there was no time wasted between songs. Stewart was the emcee, making very brief comments between all the songs. If you watch a video of this concert on YouTube, you'll see that each time he introduced a song, iconic images from the year the song was a hit were shown on a huge screen behind the stage.

For better or worse, the "one song per year" rule was only loosely enforced. Sometimes, they played two songs for one year, and more often years went by with no songs at all. They sometimes fudged the years songs came out. For instance, Rod Stewart in his banter implied that "Stairway to Heaven" was released in 1973, when it came out in 1971. The first and last songs were also wildly out of order. And the rule was only even loosely enforced until 1963. At that point, the concert turned into an Elvis Presley tribute, with seven Presley hits in a row. But those are just quibbles. The bottom line is that these big stars sang nothing but classic songs for the whole concert.

In terms of the stars, the one I had never heard of, and chances are you have never heard of, is Eikichi Yazawa. He is very little known in most Western countries, but he's a big star in Japan, filling stadiums there. He has the nicknames "The Boss" and "The King of Rock" there as well. The reason he isn't better known elsewhere is that his hits songs are sung in Japanese. He only did one song in this concert on his own, "Don't Be Cruel." I watched the YouTube video of it. He danced and held the stage with lots of charisma, but unfortunately one can hear a clear Japanese accent on his singing. Still, kudos for the concert organizers in giving him this big platform.

By the way, it may seem odd at first that one of the songs chosen was "Some Guys Have All the Luck," because it wasn't as big of a hit as the other songs here. But that's Robert Palmer had a hit with it in 1982, and then Rod Stewart had a pretty differently arranged hit with it in 1984. So it made perfect sense for the two of them to sing a duet version of it here. I wouldn't be surprised if this was the only time they sang the song together.

I found two main sources for this concert. One was a high quality video file, and the other was a video downloaded from YouTube. It's a good thing I found two, because each of them had songs the other one didn't. Furthermore, "Don't Be Cruel" sung by Yazawa wasn't included on either one. But I managed to find a YouTube video of it, as mentioned above, and I included it in the proper order (since the video kept going with the next song). 

This is called "The Carlsberg Concert" because it was sponsored by the Carlsberg Beer Company. (You can see the company logo in the background in the cover image). It was conceived and directed by someone named Tony Hollingsworth. I had never heard of him before, but it turns out he came up with some really unusual and intriguing concerts. For instance, at the same time I found this one, I found another one where he paired big name American and British music stars like Bob Dylan, Joni Mitchell, and Jon Bon Jovi with Japanese musicians. I plan on posting that one as well, eventually. Here's his bio page. 

Tony Hollingsworth 

It seems this "one song per year" format has never been repeated in a big concert like this in the many years since. That's too bad. I had never heard about this concert until I randomly stumbled across it the other day. If you know of other "various artists" concerts that you think I should post at my blog, please let me know. It seems there are many of these, like this one, that once appeared on TV and have only existed in video format, so they've gone way under the radar when it comes to being audio bootlegs. 

The music is unreleased, and the sound quality is excellent. I did make a few fixes, such as brief volume drops, but nothing major. Oh, but one consistent problem was that all the lead vocals were low in the mix. So I boosted that for all the songs using the UVR5 audio editing program.

This album is two hours and 37 minutes long.

01 Papa Was a Rolling Stone (Rod Stewart, Chaka Khan, Mary J. Blige & Steve Winwood)
02 talk (Rod Stewart)
03 Unbreak My Heart (Toni Braxton)
04 talk (Rod Stewart)
05 Kiss from a Rose (Seal & Mary J. Blige)
06 talk (Rod Stewart)
07 Keep the Faith (Jon Bon Jovi)
08 Sympathy for the Devil (Jon Bon Jovi)
09 talk (Rod Stewart)
10 Constant Craving (k.d. lang)
11 talk (Rod Stewart)
12 Nothing Compares 2 U (Rod Stewart & Mary J. Blige)
13 talk (Rod Stewart)
14 Ain't Nobody (Chaka Khan)
15 talk (Rod Stewart)
16 Bad Medicine (Jon Bon Jovi)
17 talk (Rod Stewart)
18 I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For (Seal & Steve Winwood)
19 talk (Rod Stewart)
20 Addicted to Love (Robert Palmer)
21 Some Guys Have All the Luck (Robert Palmer & Rod Stewart)
22 talk (Rod Stewart)
23 Every Breath You Take (Chaka Khan & k.d. lang)
24 talk (Rod Stewart)
25 Another One Bites the Dust - Good Times (Mary J. Blige)
26 talk (Rod Stewart)
27 I Will Survive (k.d. lang)
28 talk (Rod Stewart)
29 Is This Love (Seal)
30 talk (Rod Stewart)
31 Tonight's the Night (Rod Stewart)
32 talk (Rod Stewart)
33 Stairway to Heaven (Seal)
34 talk (Rod Stewart)
35 Maggie May (Rod Stewart)
36 talk (Rod Stewart)
37 Travelin' Band (Jon Bon Jovi)
38 Proud Mary (Jon Bon Jovi)
39 talk (Rod Stewart)
40 You're All I Need to Get By (Seal & Toni Braxton)
41 talk (Rod Stewart)
42 Gimme Some Lovin' (Steve Winwood)
43 talk (Rod Stewart)
44 [You Make Me Feel Like] A Natural Woman (Mary J. Blige)
45 talk (Rod Stewart)
46 In the Midnight Hour (Rod Stewart)
47 talk (Rod Stewart)
48 Like a Rolling Stone (Seal, Jon Bon Jovi & Robert Palmer)
49 talk (Rod Stewart)
50 [I Can't Get No] Satisfaction (Chaka Khan & Robert Palmer)
51 Dancing in the Street (Steve Winwood & Chaka Khan)
52 talk (Rod Stewart)
53 All My Loving (k.d. lang & Chaka Khan)
54 talk (Rod Stewart)
55 Love Me Tender (Toni Braxton)
56 Hound Dog (Steve Winwood)
57 That's All Right, Mama (Jon Bon Jovi)
58 All Shook Up (Robert Palmer)
59 Jailhouse Rock (Rod Stewart)
60 Don't Be Cruel (Eikichi Yazawa)
61 Heartbreak Hotel (Rod Stewart, Robert Palmer, Jon Bon Jovi, Steve Winwood & Eikichi Yazawa)
62 Hey Jude (Everybody) 

https://pixeldrain.com/u/bD6sqiV8

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/l69yltKzWGqfd88/file

The cover image shows a promotional photo taken in conjunction with this concert. The version I found was very wide but vertically narrow, so I split it into two parts, to allow me to make everyone appear larger. From left to right, top row: Eikichi Yazawa, Toni Braxton, Seal, Robert Palmer, and Jon Bon Jovi. From left to right, bottom row: Steve Winwood, k.d. lang, Chaka Khan, and Rod Stewart. Mary J. Blige seems to have missed the photo shoot. I used the Krea AI program to fill in some detail. 

Seal - PBS Soundstage, WTTW Studios, Chicago, IL, 2-2009

Next, it's Seal's turn for a "PBS Soundstage" episode. This is from 2009. It's an unusual concert for him since it's nearly all cover versions.

In November 2008, Seal released a studio album called "Soul." It was his first covers album, consisting entirely of covers of soul classics. It did pretty well, selling about half a million copies in the U.S. and another half a million in Britain. Apparently, this was his first concert in which he performed songs from that album. He went all in, playing only songs from that album until the last two.

I couldn't find the audio or video of this at YouTube or any of the usual places one finds bootlegs. However, I tracked down a streaming service that has it. I recorded that to my computer and then converted it to audio and broke it into mp3s. The last two songs, the only two originals, are presented as bonus tracks, and are separated from the rest of the concert. But I think it's likely they actually were played in that order. One can tell because he announced that the horn section was leaving, and the two "bonus tracks" were then done without the horn section. I edited things a bit so those two fit into the show without any obvious gaps.

Seal's "Soul" album was criticized for sounding too slick and overproduced. I suspect the songs sound better done live here.

This album is 59 minutes long.

01 A Change Is Gonna Come (Seal)
02 talk (Seal)
03 I Can't Stand the Rain (Seal)
04 talk (Seal)
05 It's a Man's, Man's, Man's World (Seal)
06 Knock On Wood (Seal)
07 talk (Seal)
08 If You Don't Know Me by Now (Seal)
09 talk (Seal)
10 I've Been Loving You Too Long (Seal)
11 talk (Seal)
12 Here I Am [Come and Take Me] (Seal)
13 talk (Seal)
14 People Get Ready (Seal)
15 Stand by Me (Seal)
16 talk (Seal)
17 Kiss from a Rose (Seal)
18 Crazy (Seal)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/73SWxVCv

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/To2JaFvMz4rsTXq/file

Seal - MTV Unplugged, Brooklyn Academy of Music, New York City, 4-9-1996

I have to admit I don't know much about British singer-songwriter Seal or his music. He's best known for the songs "Crazy" and "Kiss from a Rose," and has sold over 20 million records. But the other day, I got the song "Crazy" stuck in my head, and decided to seek out more of his music. He's usual as singer-songwriters go, because he has a soulful voice, and has typically put a lot of dance pop production to his songs, often including elements of trip hop or house music. 

I do like a lot of these modern production elements on his songs. In particular, his first two albums are his most acclaimed, and producer Trevor Horn did a good job with those. That said, being more of a classic rock guy, I was curious to hear if he's done those songs from his early albums without those modern production elements. It turns out there's one concert recording that's ideal for someone like me, his 1996 MTV Unplugged performance, presented here. It's a long stretch to call it an acoustic performance, since he plays with a full band. But it does have a stripped back sound compared to his records. 

This concert has never been officially released. In fact, he hasn't put out any live albums until the 2000s. But the sound quality is excellent, since it was professionally recorded. It lacked one of his biggest hits though, "Killer." This song was credited to Adamski, and was a big number one hit in 1990. But it was co-written by Seal, and he sang lead vocals on it too. It turned him from a musical nobody to a star in a matter of weeks, leading to a recording contact and the rest of his music career. So, since he didn't do it for the MTV Unplugged show, I found a version he did for a French TV show in 1992, and added that at the end. It happened that he did one more song for that show, a cover of "Hey Joe," the classic rock song made famous by Jimi Hendrix, so I added that in as well.

I believe all the songs here are written or co-written by Seal, with three exceptions. First, there's "Hey Joe" which I just mentioned. He also did "Stone Free" by Hendrix, and "Quicksand" by David Bowie.

As I said above, I don't know much about Seal's music career as a whole. But I think this is a solid, impressive concert performance (even though he almost never talked between the songs), and it includes all of his big hits.

This concert is 45 minutes long. But the album as a whole is 55 minutes long, thanks to the two extra songs at the end.

01 Stone Free (Seal)
02 Prayer for the Dying (Seal)
03 Future Love Paradise (Seal)
04 Blues in E (Seal)
05 Crazy (Seal)
06 Quicksand (Seal)
07 Kiss from a Rose (Seal)
08 Violet (Seal)
09 talk (Seal)
10 Deep Water (Seal)
11 Don't Cry (Seal)
12 Hey Joe (Seal)
13 Killer (Seal)

https://www.upload.ee/files/15634933/Seal_1996_MTVUnpluggdBrooklynAcdemyofMusicNYC__4-9-1996_atse.zip.html

I could have used a screenshot from the exact concert featured here, since the video of it can be found on YouTube. But I opted for a photo from a different (and unknown) 1996 concert, because the image quality was markedly better.