Various Artists - Playboy After Dark (CBS Television City, Los Angeles, CA), Volume 4: November to December 1968

Here's the fourth volume of the episodes I compiled of the "Playboy After Dark" TV show. 

Imagine having James Brown in his musical prime perform for you and a small circle of friends in your living room! As you can see from the cover art for this volume, that's exactly what happened on this T.V. show. Except instead of it being your living room, it was a duplicate of the living room of Hugh Hefner's Playboy mansion in Chicago, redone to allow filming in ideal conditions in Los Angeles. But basically all the performances on all the volumes in this series are like that, with a couple dozen of people gathered around the musical act. And, also as you can see from the cover image, there was a suspiciously high number of very beautiful women there. Naturally, a lot of them were Playboy models.

It so happens there's a good number of soul music acts on this volume. If anyone knows the name of the instrumental performed by Buddy Miles, tell me so I can fix the song title.

By the way, Three Dog Night appeared on the show another time, but that performance was lip-synced. But luckily, this one was not. 

It seems Playboy head Hugh Hefner had a lot of say over which musical acts were included. He seems to have had a personal preference from pre-rock and roll crooners. So we got an unusually big spot here for Sammy Davis, Jr., who got to play six songs instead of the usual two or three. 

The music here is unreleased. The sound quality is excellent. 

This album is an hour and four minutes long.

01 Who Can I Turn To (Marva Whitney)
02 Celebrate (Three Dog Night)
03 Your Love (Marva Whitney)
04 Love Me So Hard (Three Dog Night)
05 If I Ruled the World (James Brown)
06 Say It Loud, I'm Black and I'm Proud (James Brown)
07 [Sittin' On] The Dock of the Bay (Checkmates, Ltd.)
08 I Can't Turn You Loose (Checkmates, Ltd.)
09 I Got You Babe (Buddy Miles)
10 Instrumental (Buddy Miles)
11 Tell Me All the Things (Joanie Sommers)
12 I Feel Fine (Joanie Sommers)
13 Just Squeeze Me [But Don't Tease Me] (Lou Rawls)
14 That's You (Lou Rawls)
15 Washington at Valley Forge (Nitty Gritty Dirt Band)
16 talk (Nitty Gritty Dirt Band)
17 Alligator Man (Nitty Gritty Dirt Band)
18 Your Red Wagon (Lou Rawls)
19 I've Gotta Be Me (Sammy Davis, Jr.)
20 The Joker Is Me - I'm Feeling Good - In My Dreams (Sammy Davis, Jr.)
21 What Kind of Fool Am I (Sammy Davis, Jr.)
22 Who Can I Turn To (Sammy Davis, Jr.)
23 Once in My Lifetime (Sammy Davis, Jr. & Anthony Newley)
24 Rockabye Your Baby with a Dixie Melody (Sammy Davis, Jr. & Jerry Lewis)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/NDa7p1Cd

alternate: 

https://bestfile.io/en/RayW1R6CnlrWuAa/file

The cover image is a screenshot I took of James Brown from one of the episodes in this volume. 

The Beach Boys and Friends - 25 Years Together, Waikiki Shell, Honolulu, HI, 12-12-1986

Here's a really interesting Beach Boys concert, featuring lots of special guest stars. It was a TV special filmed in Waikiki Beach in Hawaii to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the formation of the band, back in 1961. The Beach Boys stayed on stage the entire time. Often they performed their own songs, but sometimes they were the backing band for: Ray Charles, Gloria Loring, Glen Campbell, the Fabulous Thunderbirds, the Everly Brothers, Jeffrey Osborne, Belinda Carlisle, and Three Dog Night. That's a pretty impressive list.

I happened to stumble across a video of this concert on YouTube. I converted that to an audio file and cut it into mp3s. While doing so, I deliberately cut out some things. For instance, there were some long talking segments by actor Patrick Duffy in which he talked extensively about the history of the Beach Boys. It wasn't terrible, but it didn't have relistening value, so I axed it. I also cut out a few other little things, like some really bad jokes or cheesy comments made by the Beach Boys between songs. 

I gotta say, I put a lot of effort into making this a better listen. One big problem was there was a constant noise coming from the crowd all the time, through every song. Probably, microphones were stuck in the crowd to capture that audience noise in order to supposedly increase the excitement level. Or some of it could have been added in later. That has happened even to officially released live albums occasionally. Regardless, I used the MVSEP to get rid of most of the crowd noise, except for the bits you'd expect at the starts and ends of the songs. The sonic difference was dramatic, like suddenly being able to hear after taking ear muffs off. 

The last two songs have "[Edit]" in their titles due to extra editing on them. For "The Spirit of Rock and Roll," an announcer came on near the end of the song and talked over it. Luckily, that didn't last too long, and I was able to patch it by bringing in a section from elsewhere in the song. "Good Vibrations" was much more difficult. For some stupid reason, the song was repeatedly interrupted by brief comments made by random people, saying things like "Happy anniversary to the Beach Boys!" These comments clearly were filmed on the beach at a different time and spliced into the footage. This happened about ten times, through random points in the song. Worse, the volume of the song itself was briefly turned way down, ruining the rhythm. I found a different live version of the song from the 1980s and patched in bits of that, or patched in sections from elsewhere in the same version. It was a real pain in the ass to fix, but all those dumb comments are gone now.

I think this is a really interesting concert, a lot better than what I'd expected from the Beach Boys at this point in their career. The main negative is that the band tried to cram in too many songs for the limited time they had for their TV special. So many of the songs are short versions, sometimes in medleys. There's even a couple that are a minute or less. But there are a lot of plus sides. One nice thing is that Brian Wilson usually didn't tour with the band, but he was here and involved. In fact, he looked as healthy and fit as he ever did, after some rough years in the late 1970s and early 1980s. 

And while the Beach Boys mostly played their expected classics, there was a couple of really nice surprises. One was a version of "Heaven" near the end of the concert. This was released on a Carl Wilson solo album and never officially done by the Beach Boys. The other one that is even more interesting is the closing song, "The Spirit of Rock and Roll." At the time, Brian Wilson was working on his first solo album. But there were many false starts before the album, simply called "Brian Wilson," was released in 1988. At one point, there was nearly enough material for an album to be released, only for it to be scrapped and most of the songs discarded. Some of this later became a popular bootleg called "Sweet Insanity." "The Spirit of Rock and Roll" was one of those discarded songs. So it's interesting that it was not only chosen for inclusion in this special, but it was the finale. This appears to be the ONLY time the song was ever performed by the Beach Boys, as opposed to Brian Wilson solo.

But maybe the most interesting thing of all were the special guests, the vast majority of whom have stood the test of time. Gloria Loring is better known as an actress than a singer, but she had a good voice and had a big hit in 1986 with "Friends and Lovers," which she sang here. Other than that though, the guests mostly sang Beach Boys songs, while being backed by the actual Beach Boys on backing vocals and instruments. For instance, not only did the back up Ray Charles singing and playing keyboards on "Sail On, Sailor," but Charles was the one playing the prominent keyboard part in the "Good Vibrations" finale. I particularly liked hearing Belinda Carlisle singing a Beach Boys song as well as a soul classic.

Everything here is unreleased, I believe. The sound quality is very good, though not great. 

This album is an hour and ten minutes long. 

01 talk (Beach Boys)
02 Help Me, Rhonda (Beach Boys)
03 Fun, Fun, Fun (Beach Boys)
04 California Girls (Beach Boys)
05 California Dreamin' (Beach Boys)
06 talk (Beach Boys)
07 Sail On, Sailor (Beach Boys & Ray Charles)
08 Sloop John B (Beach Boys)
09 Do It Again (Beach Boys)
10 talk (Beach Boys)
11 Friends and Lovers (Beach Boys & Gloria Loring)
12 I Can Hear Music (Beach Boys & Gloria Loring)
13 talk (Beach Boys & Glen Campbell)
14 In Cars (Beach Boys & Glen Campbell)
15 talk (Beach Boys & Glen Campbell)
16 Little Deuce Coupe (Beach Boys & Glen Campbell)
17 The Little Old Lady from Pasadena (Beach Boys & Glen Campbell)
18 I Get Around (Beach Boys & Glen Campbell)
19 Barbara Ann (Beach Boys)
20 talk (Beach Boys & the Fabulous Thunderbirds)
21 Rock and Roll Music (Beach Boys & the Fabulous Thunderbirds)
22 Be True to Your School (Beach Boys)
23 Don't Worry Baby - Getcha Back (Beach Boys & the Everly Brothers)
24 Wake Up Little Susie (Beach Boys & the Everly Brothers)
25 Surfer Girl (Beach Boys)
26 Come Go with Me (Beach Boys)
27 talk (Beach Boys)
28 Disney Girls [1957] (Beach Boys)
29 God Only Knows (Beach Boys & Jeffrey Osborne)
30 talk (Beach Boys with Paul Shaffer)
31 Surfer Girl [Reprise] (Beach Boys with Paul Shaffer)
32 Surf City (Beach Boys with Paul Shaffer)
33 Surfin' U.S.A. (Beach Boys with Paul Shaffer)
34 Wouldn't It Be Nice (Beach Boys & Belinda Carlisle)
35 Band of Gold (Beach Boys & Belinda Carlisle)
36 talk (Beach Boys & Three Dog Night)
37 Darlin' (Beach Boys & Three Dog Night)
38 talk (Beach Boys)
39 Heaven (Beach Boys)
40 Good Vibrations [Edit] (Beach Boys & Everyone)
41 talk (Beach Boys)
42 The Spirit of Rock and Roll [Edit] (Beach Boys & Everyone)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/eYAr29uv

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/lny0w2Q0FB2gE8x/file

I had a hard time finding a good cover photo by taking a screenshot from a video. If I used a long distance shot showing many people, it was too low-res and blurry. I chose this one from the "Good Vibrations" finale. From right to left, that's Gloria Loring, unknown, Al Jardine, and Belinda Carlile. I used Krea AI to boost the image quality.

Three Dog Night - PBS Soundstage, WTTW Studios, Chicago, IL, 9-4-1975

Here's an episode of the TV show "PBS Soundstage" starring the band Three Dog Night.

Three Dog Night was formed in 1968. It consisted of three lead vocalists, Danny Hutton, Chuck Negron, and Cory Wells, with each of them taking lead sometimes but also sometimes the three of them singing together. From 1968 to 1974, they went from success to success, having a string of many hit songs. But by 1975, the usual personality clashes and drug programs of successful bands began to show. Their 1975 album "Coming Down Your Way" sold way less than previous albums. It only spawned one Top Forty hit in the U.S., "Til the World Ends," which would be their last hit. Hutton missed many recording sessions due to drug use. He was kicked out of the band at the end of 1975. Negron also was arrested for drug possession. But the band didn't have much longer to go anyway, breaking up in mid-1976 (though inevitably later getting back together for reunion tours).

Given all that, this is a pretty good time for a concert recording. Although they were faltering in some ways, they still put on a good, energetic concert, and they were able to select from all of their hits. Besides, Negron only took part in early 1980s reunions, and most of the backing band drifted away and were replaced. So this is pretty much the end of the line for the full original band.

There was a minor problem with the song "One." There was some overdubbing of fans talking about the band at the start of the song. I got rid of that in the usual way, with the help of the UVR5 audio editing program. That's why that one song has "[Edit]" in its title. But also, if one looks at the YouTube video of this concert, that first song could have been recorded somewhere else. I don't know about that, but I included it anyway.

This album is 49 minutes long.

01 One [Edit] (Three Dog Night)
02 Family of Man (Three Dog Night)
03 talk (Three Dog Night)
04 Shambala (Three Dog Night)
05 Old Fashioned Love Song (Three Dog Night)
06 Til the World Ends (Three Dog Night)
07 Try a Little Tenderness (Three Dog Night)
08 Pieces of April (Three Dog Night)
09 Eli's Coming (Three Dog Night)
10 talk (Three Dog Night)
11 Celebrate (Three Dog Night)
12 The Show Must Go On (Three Dog Night)
13 Joy to the World (Three Dog Night)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/di5FraAx

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/1eODW8GazVRKGnn/file

The cover image is a screenshot taken from this exact concert. It was rather low-res, so I used the Krea AI program to improve it.

Three Dog Night - BBC in Concert, London, Britain, 12-7-1972

Here's yet another BBC TV show concert bootleg from the early 1970s.

Generally speaking, the US band Three Dog Night has had a respect problem. From 1969 to 1974, they had 15 top twenty hits in the US (and two big hits in Britain), and that popularity led some people to criticize them for being too commercial. They also didn't write many songs on their own, and their hits were written by others. But I just listened to this concert for the first time the other day, and it struck me that they were a good, rocking band. Yeah, it would have been nice if they wrote all their own stuff, but all of these are excellent songs that might not have been hits otherwise. 

This concert took place at the end of 1972, at a time when the band still had all seven of its original members. They were in the middle of their run of chart hits, but they already had so many that virtually every song here was a hit, with the exception of "Midnight Runaway," and they had even more big hits they didn't have time to play, like "One," "Easy to Be Hard," "Liar," and "Never Been to Spain." 

I have to admit that up until now I'd only thought of this group for their singles. But they impressed me with their talent playing these songs in this concert.

This album is 43 minutes long.

01 One Man Band (Three Dog Night)
02 Mama Told Me Not to Come (Three Dog Night)
03 It's for You (Three Dog Night)
04 An Old Fashioned Love Song (Three Dog Night)
05 talk (Three Dog Night)
06 Midnight Runaway (Three Dog Night)
07 Try a Little Tenderness (Three Dog Night)
08 talk (Three Dog Night)
09 Black and White (Three Dog Night)
10 Eli's Coming (Three Dog Night)
11 Joy to the World (Three Dog Night)
12 Celebrate (Three Dog Night)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/4J8wSFFF

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/q61dzScbG1MkDek/file

A video of this concert is available on YouTube, at least when I checked. However, the video that I saw didn't have the band's name at the beginning, as that part was probably cut off. So I used the same font as the others from the same TV show, but I had to guess on the colors of the letters.

In April 2025, I improved the image with the use of the Krea AI program.