Thank You and Farewell - The Closing of the Fillmore East, Fillmore East, New York City, 6-27-1971, Part 6: Country Joe McDonald

This sixth album of the closing of the Fillmore East in New York City in 1971 is a very short one. But I figure since all the other sets are their own albums, this one should be its own album too. This features singer-songwriter Country Joe McDonald.

McDonald had been the leader of the rock band Country Joe and the Fish from 1965 until the band's break-up in 1970. He then pursued a solo career in more of a singer-songwriter mode.

He performed this concert solo, just vocals and guitar. He'd just released his most recent album, "Hold On It's Coming" a couple of months prior to this concert. But the only song he played from it was the title song.

This album is 16 minutes long. This just might be the shortest album I've posted at this blog so far.

As short as this album is, it was even shorter before I started editing it. I cut out a couple of minutes of guitar tuning. It seems he took a extra long time because he broke a string.

56 talk by Bill Graham (Country Joe McDonald)
57 Kiss My Ass (Country Joe McDonald)
58 Entertainment Is My Business (Country Joe McDonald)
59 I-Feel-Like-I'm-Fixin'-to-Die Rag (Country Joe McDonald)
60 talk (Country Joe McDonald)
61 Rockin' All Around the World (Country Joe McDonald)
62 Hold On It's Coming (Country Joe McDonald)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16376038/VA-ThnkYounFrwll197106CntryJoMcDnld.zip.html

The cover photo comes from this exact concert. However, the photo was black and white. I colorized with the help of the Palette program.

Thank You and Farewell - The Closing of the Fillmore East, Fillmore East, New York City, 6-27-1971, Part 5: The Beach Boys

This, the fifth album from the closing of the Fillmore East in New York City in 1971, is an extra special one. That's because although this has existed as a bootleg ever since the live broadcast on the radio, the recording has had serious flaws. But I believe I have mostly fixed them through the magic of audio editing. So one can hear how they really sounded for the very first time.

Before I describe the sound edits I made, I want to tell a story about some backstage intrigue relating to this concert.

First off, note that Chip Rachlin and Michael Klenfner were employees of Graham helping to run the Fillmore East. They also happened to be huge Beach Boys fans. Jack Rieley was the Beach Boys' manager. Also, note that the Beach Boys were considered very uncool at the time, since their earlier hits about cars and surfing were out of sync with rock music culture by 1971. Rachlin and Klenfner managed to convince Graham to let the Beach Boys play at Carnegie Hall in February 1971. That went very well, and helped restore the band's reputation a bit. They also had a guest spot during a Grateful Dead concert at the Fillmore East in April 1971. That helped their reputation some more. Bob Dylan watched that show from backstage, and was heard to exclaim, "They're fuckin' good, man!"

So, with all that in mind, when it came to this concert, according to Rachlin, "Jack Rieley nearly got [the Beach Boys] thrown off by insisting that they close the show, even though you had J. Geils there and you had the Allman Brothers there. The Beach Boys were lucky to be on the show and we had to work very hard to convince Bill (Graham) to put them on the show and then for Jack to take the idiotic position that they had to close the show. Klenfner showed his disgust with Jack in the lobby of the Fillmore, with the glittering lights and all the beautifully lit Fillmore posters. Klenfner threw Jack into a glass case and said he would kill him if he didn't change his mind… He told him 'If we go to Bill with this request he'll throw you out of the theater, so don't hurt the band by being such a jerk!' We won that one."

Butch Trucks of the Allman Brothers Band, who closed the show, has a somewhat different account, where their demand did reach Graham. "Everyone wanted in on that gig. The Beach Boys showed up and unloaded all their stuff and said they'd have to play last, and Bill Graham said, 'Well, just pack up your shit. I have my closing band.' So the Beach Boys had to swallow their pride."

I'm guessing Rieley's demand did make it to Graham, but then Klenfner confronted Rieley and got him to back off. That makes sense and reconciles the two accounts.

Anyway, I think it's possible that someone sabotaged the recording of the Beach Boys for this conflict due to that behind the scenes dispute. This is just a guess, based on the fact that all the other acts sounded great on the live broadcast of the show, but the levels were seriously off for the vocals in the Beach Boys set. It seemed one microphone was fine, but other microphones were turned way, way down, to the point that the other vocals from the other microphones were almost inaudible at times. And of course multiple part harmonies were essential to the Beach Boys sound. This problem wasn't fixed for the entire duration of their set. So the bootleg of their set has been almost unlistenable, in my opinion. What was on there sounded perfectly fine, like a pristine soundboard, but large portions of the vocals were completely missing, including the lead vocals on some songs. At times, it almost sounded like a karaoke version of the band.

Luckily, nowadays, audio editing technology has progressed to the point that much of this problem could be fixed. I spent a lot of time and effort repairing this recording. The first thing I did was split all the songs into vocals and instruments. Then I boosted the vocals where that could help. In many cases, the vocals were there, just buried way down in the mix. Sometimes, I had to carefully fix the volume levels line by line, because they were highly variable. 

But in other cases, the vocals were so low that they were essentially gone. So I had to take more drastic measures. I isolated vocals from other Beach Boys concerts around this time, and I patched those in to replace the missing vocals. It was tricky because I had to match the pitch and speed, but I believe it worked nearly all the time. You be the judge. The songs where I did a lot of this are marked with "[Edit]" in their titles. For the others, just boosting up the existing vocals managed to fix things.

I could have done even more, there are still some missing vocals here and there, but I think that overall, the recording has been drastically changed for the better.

In my opinion, the band was still in a very creative mode. and they sounded very good here. Their next album, "Surf's Up," released in August 1971, would be one of their very best, in my opinion. However, they mostly stuck to their older hits, with only one song, "It's about Time," from their most recent album, and another one, "Student Demonstration Time," from their upcoming album "Surf's Up." (By the way, note that "Student Demonstration Time" is really just the 1950s classic "Riot in Cell Block No. 9" with different lyrics. The band messed up in this performance, singing the chorus to the original version, for almost every chorus.) One nice surprise was that the band also did an excellent cover of "Your Song" by Elton John, which had only been released a year earlier. The Beach Boys have never officially released any version of this song.

This album is 41 minutes long.

38 talk by Bill Graham (Beach Boys)
39 Heroes and Villains (Beach Boys)
40 Do It Again (Beach Boys)
41 Cotton Fields (Beach Boys)
42 Help Me, Rhonda (Beach Boys)
43 talk (Beach Boys)
44 Wouldn't It Be Nice [Edit] (Beach Boys)
45 talk (Beach Boys)
46 Your Song (Beach Boys)
47 talk (Beach Boys)
48 Student Demonstration Time [Riot in Cell Block No. 9] (Beach Boys)
49 talk (Beach Boys)
50 Good Vibrations [Edit] (Beach Boys)
51 talk (Beach Boys)
52 California Girls [Edit] (Beach Boys)
53 talk (Beach Boys)
54 I Get Around [Edit] (Beach Boys)
55 It's about Time [Edit] (Beach Boys)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16376040/VA-ThnkYounFrwll197105BchBys.zip.html

The cover photo comes from this exact concert. However, the original was in black and white. I used the Palette program to convert it to color, then I used Photoshop to fix it up some more. Also, I added the blobs in the background, taken from a different photo of a light show. That roughly matches with images of the light show I saw in other photos from this concert. 

Finally, I'm pretty sure that, from right to left, that's Al Jardine, Carl Wilson, and Mike Love. The other band members weren't included in the photo. Also, drummer Dennis Wilson wasn't at the concert since he had badly injured his hand in an accident a couple of weeks earlier. He was temporarily replaced by a drummer named Mike Kowalski.

Thank You and Farewell - The Closing of the Fillmore East, Fillmore East, New York City, 6-27-1971, Part 4: Mountain

The final night of the Fillmore East in New York City in 1971 continues with the fourth act, Mountain.

Mountain was a hard rock group that lasted from 1969 to 1972. (There would be later reunions.) Its main star was singer and lead guitarist Leslie West. But the band was heavily inspired by Eric Clapton's band Cream. The two bands were linked by Felix Papparaldi, who produced most of Cream's albums and co-wrote some of their songs, including "Strange Brew." He played bass in Mountain, as well as producing and doing some songwriting and singing. The band had their biggest hit in 1969 with "Mississippi Queen."

You can read more about the band at their Wikipedia page, here:

Mountain (band) - Wikipedia

Mountain would release a live album in 1972, "The Road Goes Ever On," which drew from concerts between 1969 and 1972. But surprisingly, there were only four songs on that album, and none of them are the same as any of the songs here. This is arguably a better live document of the band in their prime, especially due to the presence of "Mississippi Queen."

As with most of the other sets from this concert, everything here is unreleased. But the sound quality is great due to the fact that it was professionally recorded and broadcast live. The lead vocals were low in the mix, but I fixed that with the UVR5 audio editing program.

This album is 51 minutes long.

29 talk by Bill Graham (Mountain)
30 Never in My Life (Mountain)
31 talk (Mountain)
32 Theme from an Imaginary Western (Mountain)
33 Roll Over Beethoven (Mountain)
34 Dreams of Milk and Honey - Swan Theme (Mountain)
35 Silver Paper (Mountain)
36 talk (Mountain)
37 Mississippi Queen (Mountain)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16376042/VA-ThnkYounFrwll197104Mntin.zip.html

The cover photo is from this exact concert. That is Felix Pappalardi on bass on the left and Leslie West on guitar on the right. This photo was originally in black and white, but I used the Palette program to colorize it.

Thank You and Farewell - The Closing of the Fillmore East, Fillmore East, New York City, 6-27-1971, Part 3: Edgar Winter's White Trash

The final concert at the Fillmore East in New York City in 1971 continues. The third act to appear was Edgar Winter's White Trash.

Edgar Winter is the younger brother of Johnny Winter. Both were born with albinism. Johnny Winter became famous in the late 1960s for his blues guitar playing. Edgar, who sings and plays keyboards and saxophone, started out in his brother's band, and the two of them often appeared on the others' albums. In 1970, Edgar released his first solo album, "Entrance." Then he formed the group "Edgar Winter's White Trash." They released a studio album in 1971, also called "Edgar Winter's White Trash," then a live album in 1972, "Roadwork." 

Then the band name changed again, to the Edgar Winter Group. Under this name, the band found huge success with the singles "Frankenstein" (which hit Number One in the U.S.) and "Free Ride." Also, the lead guitarist for all these projects was Rick Derringer. He put out a solo album in 1973 while staying in Winter's band, and had a big hit with the song "Rock and Roll Hoochie Koo."

Most of that success was still to come, however. At the time of this concert, Winter had yet to have a single or album reach the Top 100 in the U.S. charts. But his band was increasingly well regarded for their live performances.

This concert has a lot in common with the live "Roadwork" album from a year later. In particular, both feature long versions of "Tobacco Road" and "Turn On Your Love Light." But "Roadwork" is a double album, so it's almost twice as long as this. However, the other two songs here are not on that album.

Like most of the other sets from this concert, the lead vocals were rather low in the mix. So I used the UVR5 audio editing program to boost them relative to the instruments. By the way, the lead vocals are shared between Edgar Winter and a member of his band, Jerry LaCroix.

This album is 38 minutes long.

24 talk by Bill Graham (Edgar Winter's White Trash)
25 Where Would I Be (Edgar Winter's White Trash)
26 Let’s Get It On (Edgar Winter's White Trash)
27 Tobacco Road (Edgar Winter's White Trash)
28 Turn On Your Love Light (Edgar Winter's White Trash)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16376039/VA-ThnkYounFrwll197103EdgrWntrWhtTrsh.zip.html

 The cover photo is from this exact concert. That's Edgar Winter on the left and Rick Derringer on the right with the guitar.

Thank You and Farewell - The Closing of the Fillmore East, Fillmore East, New York City, 6-27-1971, Part 2: The J. Geils Band

I just posted Part 1 of this album series of sets from the final concert at the Fillmore East in 1971. Please read my write-up there for an explanation about what this concert was all about. There were seven music acts in this concert, and I'm presenting them in their order of appearance. The second act is the J. Geils Band.

Nowadays, the J. Geils Band are best known for their huge 1982 pop rock hits "Centerfold" and "Freeze-Frame." But at the time of this concert, their music was more heavily influenced by blues and R&B. They had a reputation for being hard-working, lively concert performers, generally better on stage than on their albums.

The band did release one live album from around this time period. "Full House" is a live album that was both recorded and released in 1972. So there's a lot of similarity between the song selections on that album and in this concert. But there are some differences, and this concert is longer. 

Like most of this overall concert, this performance is unreleased. But the sound quality is excellent because it was professionally recorded and broadcast live on the radio.

This album is 42 minutes long.

Note that the track numbering starts at 8 instead of 1 because the numbering continues where it left off with the previous act. That way you can easily play all the songs from the whole concert if you so desire.

08 talk by Bill Graham (J. Geils Band)
09 Sno-Cone [Instrumental] (J. Geils Band)
10 Wait (J. Geils Band)
11 talk (J. Geils Band)
12 First I Look at the Purse (J. Geils Band)
13 talk (J. Geils Band)
14 Whammer Jammer [Instrumental] (J. Geils Band)
15 talk (J. Geils Band)
16 Homework (J. Geils Band)
17 talk (J. Geils Band)
18 Pack Fair and Square (J. Geils Band)
19 talk (J. Geils Band)
20 Cruisin' for a Love (J. Geils Band)
21 talk (J. Geils Band)
22 Serves You Right to Suffer (J. Geils Band)
23 Hard Drivin' Man (J. Geils Band)

https://www.upload.ee/files/17205340/VA-THNKYOUNFRWLL197102JGilsBnd.zip.html

alternate:

https://pixeldrain.com/u/QAhPshgr

The cover photo is from this exact concert. However, the only photo I could find was a rather blurry  and black and white one. I used the Palette program to convert it to color. I then added the colorful blobs in the background from another picture, because the photos I found of this concert had a light show with that kind of imagery. (You can see it on the Part 1 Albert King set, for instance.) I couldn't do anything about the blur, but at least you hopefully get the general idea. 

UPDATE: On October 5, 2024, I upgraded the photo with the use of the Krea AI program. The image is still blurry in places, but not as much as before.

Thank You and Farewell - The Closing of the Fillmore East, Fillmore East, New York City, 6-27-1971, Part 1: Albert King

I've made it a point to try to post entire rock festivals, as these often seem to be overlooked and neglected. Here's another one. This is the concert from the final night of the legendary Fillmore East venue in New York City. I'll explain more in a bit about what it was and why it closed when it did. But suffice to say the venue went out with a bang. This final concert featured seven big name acts performing for a total of about five hours. So I've made seven albums, one for each act. This first one is blues guitarist Albert King.

All but one of the sets currently remain officially unreleased. However, the entire last night was broadcast live on the radio, so bootlegs exist with excellent sound.

The Fillmore East is closely tied to its owner, promoter Bill Graham, who was arguably the most important promoter in rock history. He was particularly instrumental in the development of the San Francisco psychedelic sound in the late 1960s. Bands like the Grateful Dead and Jefferson Airplane didn't have many good places to play at first. But Graham opened the Fillmore Auditorium in late 1965, and that became a haven for many new and upcoming bands. At first, this venue was just known as the Fillmore (named after the street it was on), but its name changed to the Fillmore West in 1968 when Graham moved it to a larger building about a mile away, around the same time he opened a similar venue in New York City, which he called the Fillmore East.

Both the Fillmore West and Fillmore East were among the most important and prestigious concert venues in the late 1960s and early 1970s. They held between 2,500 and 3,000 people, which was big enough for most of the famous rock acts of the time, but not so big to become a stadium type show, with inevitably poorer sound quality and less of a connection between the musicians and the fans. The Fillmore East in particular was well known for good acoustics, so dozens of live albums were recorded there. You can see a list at the Wikipedia article on the venue, here:

Fillmore East - Wikipedia

Unfortunately, these two venues didn't last that long. In 1971, Graham decided to close both of them. Part of it seems to be that Graham seemed to be personally burned out after hosting concerts on both the East and West coasts nearly every night for three years. But also, the economics were changing. As rock music got increasingly popular and mainstream, the acts that had found success playing at both Fillmores were increasing graduating to playing in arenas and stadiums that could hold 10,000 or more spectators. Graham couldn't pay the acts nearly the same amount when his venues were much smaller. He could have continued with lesser known acts, but he decided to quit the business instead.

Dickey Betts of the Allman Brothers Band later had this to say about the closing of the venue. "The Fillmore East was everybody’s favorite gig to play. It was the Carnegie Hall of rock and roll. Bill Graham made a very great presentation of rock and roll, with the light shows and the curtains and the presentation of the bands and the set changes. But the Fillmore East wasn't big enough to pay any of the bands what they made other places. I think the general feeling among anyone who played there was even though we could be playing somewhere else for three times the money, we'd rather come to the Fillmore East and play because it’s such a great place to play."

As it so happens, Graham didn't stay retired for long. Within a year, he was back to promoting rock concerts, although he wasn't as closely tied to particular venues as he'd been with the Fillmores. He arguably remained the most important concert promoter until he died in a helicopter crash in 1991. The original Fillmore in San Francisco reopened in 1994, and remains a popular venue until today.

Anyway, the closing of the Fillmore West on July 4, 1971, is well documented. There were five nights of closing concerts. This resulted in a documentary film called "Fillmore" and a triple album called "Fillmore: The Last Days," released in 1972. But there was no such similar film or album for the closing of the Fillmore East, which took place just a week earlier. 

Luckily though, we have the bootleg recordings. I'm calling this album series "Thank You and Farewell," because the marquee sign in front of the Fillmore East had "thank you and farewell" written on it after the venue closed. You can see that included in the artwork at the top of the cover art for each album.

After all that, there's not a lot to say about the actual music here. In my opinion, Albert King was at his peak in the late 1960s and early 1970s. There's one classic live album from this time, "Live Wire/ Blues Power," released in 1968. But other than that, there isn't much live music from this time period, although he did release many live albums later in his career. So this is a very welcome addition, in my opinion, although it is a rather short set.

Oh, by the way, apparently, King was the very first artist to play the venue when it opened up. So that could be why he was involved in the last show.

This album is 29 minutes long.

01 talk by Bill Graham (Albert King)
02 Knock on Wood [Instrumental] (Albert King)
03 Got to Be Some Changes (Albert King)
04 Nothing but the Blues (Albert King)
05 Crosscut Saw (Albert King)
06 Personal Manager (Albert King)
07 Bye Bye Blues (Albert King)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16376043/VA-ThnkYounFrwll197101AlbrtKng.zip.html

The cover art consists of two parts. The top part is taken from a photo of the marquee sign for the venue. The "thank you and farewell" message was written on three different lines, but I used Photoshop to combine them to one line in order to save space. I also colorized the black and white photo I found, basing the colors off a color photo I found of the same sign. 

The photo of Albert King is from this exact concert, I'm happy to say.

Dead Links Gone

It used to be that I had more download links with Imagenetz than with Upload.ee. Imagenetz links are supposed to last forever, but in fact they keep dying in mass batches, probably due to not getting enough downloads. So I'm gradually replacing the Imagenetz links with Upload.ee ones. A few days ago, another big bunch of Imagenetz links died, probably about 150 in all. I've just finished replacing them with Upload.ee links, so all the download links should be working again.

There are about 2,600 albums to download in total as I write this in March 2024. After this latest round of link fixes, 1,900 of the links are with Upload.ee, and 700 are still with Imagenetz. I guess the Imagenetz ones are going to keep dying from time to time, but hopefully that'll slow down to very little as just really popular downloads tend to remain there. But I want to keep at least some links there in any case, because Upload.ee only allows download files up to 200 MB. That equals about an hour and a half of music, so the really long albums all use Imagenetz links.

Anyway, thanks for your patience, and please keep letting me know when links die so I can fix them. Upload.ee has annoying spam issues, but at least their links almost never die. (It takes 120 days - four mouths - of no downloads at all for a link to die, which almost never happens.)

And by the way, I could still use some help from someone who would be willing to host a few download links at one's blog or website, due to copyright issues.

Ron Sexsmith - Reasons to Believe, Volume 4: 2006-2009

Here's another album of Ron Sexsmith's non-album tracks, with the vast majority of them covers. I hope you're enjoying this series, because there are a bunch more volumes to come.

All but one song here has been officially released. That one song is the last one, "Ring Them Bells," which comes from a concert bootleg.

Four songs are extras for his 2008 album "Exit Strategy of the Soul." Tracks 6 and 7 are bonus tracks available only on the Japanese release (and boy were they hard to get!), while tracks 8 and 9 are more conventional bonus tracks. The other songs are a typical mix of appearances on other artists' albums, various artists collections, and movie soundtracks.

I think the song "Fall at Your Feet" deserves special mention. This was done for a live album by a flamenco guitar virtuoso named Jesse Cook. With Sexsmith on vocals and Cook on guitar, I dare say they actually outdid the excellent Crowded House original. 

Note that I'd be stretching things to call this a covers album, because six of the songs were written by Sexsmith, more than on any of the previous volumes in this series.

Once again, thanks to Pete the Greek for his help putting these albums together.

This album is 48 minutes long. 

Here's a list of the original artists for each song:

01 Love Henry - traditional
02 Dumptruck - Ron Sexsmith
03 Philadelphia - Neil Young
04 Moonlight Becomes You - Bing Crosby
05 Fall at Your Feet - Crowded House
06 Here Comes My Baby - Cat Stevens
07 Rain on the Roof - Ron Sexsmith
08 Seems to Me - Ron Sexsmith
09 Too Good to Be True - Ron Sexsmith
10 Devoted to You - Everly Brothers
11 Something to Hold On To [At Christmas] - Ron Sexsmith
12 Simple Grace - Chris Warren
13 Whatever It Takes - Ron Sexsmith
14 Ring Them Bells - Bob Dylan

Here's the usual song list:

01 Love Henry (Ron Sexsmith with Don Kerr)
02 Dumptruck (Ron Sexsmith)
03 Philadelphia (Ron Sexsmith)
04 Moonlight Becomes You (Ron Sexsmith)
05 Fall at Your Feet (Jesse Cook & Ron Sexsmith)
06 Here Comes My Baby (Ron Sexsmith)
07 Rain on the Roof (Ron Sexsmith)
08 Seems to Me (Ron Sexsmith)
09 Too Good to Be True (Ron Sexsmith)
10 Devoted to You (Melanie Doane with Ron Sexsmith)
11 Something to Hold On To [At Christmas] (Ron Sexsmith)
12 Simple Grace (Chris Warren & Ron Sexsmith)
13 Whatever It Takes (Michael Buble with Ron Sexsmith)
14 Ring Them Bells (Ron Sexsmith) 

https://www.upload.ee/files/16375332/RONSXSMTH2006-2009ResnstoBliveVlum4_atse.zip.html

The cover photo comes from the Sundance Film Festival in 2007.

Squeeze - BBC Sessions, Volume 4: In Concert, Regal Theatre, Hitchins, Britain, 10-30-1982

The British band Squeeze performed for the BBC a lot in the early 1980s. I've already posted BBC concerts they did from 1980 and 1981, and here's one from 1982. In my opinion, each concert got better than the last, due to the band having even more classic songs to play.

This unreleased concert already sounded pretty good, but I tweaked it a little to make it sound even better. The main change I did was boost the lead vocals relative to the instruments, since they were rather low.

One song needed a big edit, the last one, "Tempted." The song faded out halfway through. I'm guessing that the BBC had allotted a certain amount of time for the band to perform, and when that time went over, they ended the broadcast. So I found a different version of the song performed in the same year and patched it in to finish it off. That's why that song has "[Edit]" in the title.

It seems to me that the band was trying their best to make use of a limited time slot, because they wasted very little time between songs. There are only a few comments here and there. And they often went right into the next song before giving the audience a decent amount of time to clap. It makes for a fast-paced show, though a short one.

The band broke up by the end of 1982, but they reunited in 1985. That's when the next album in this series will take place.

This album is 47 minutes long.

01 Cool for Cats (Squeeze)
02 talk by Dave Hepworth (Squeeze)
03 I've Returned (Squeeze)
04 Another Nail in My Heart (Squeeze)
05 talk (Squeeze)
06 Annie Get Your Gun (Squeeze)
07 Someone Else’s Heart (Squeeze)
08 Points of View (Squeeze)
09 Piccadilly (Squeeze)
10 talk (Squeeze)
11 Pulling Mussels [From the Shell] (Squeeze)
12 Labelled with Love (Squeeze)
13 Up the Junction (Squeeze)
14 I Can’t Hold On (Squeeze)
15 In Quintessence (Squeeze)
16 Is That Love (Squeeze)
17 Tempted [Edit] (Squeeze)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16373244/SQUZE1982BBSssonsVlum4InCncrtRgalThtreHtchnsBrtin__10-30-1982_atse.zip.html

The cover photo shows the band performing on the U.S. TV show "American Bandstand" in August 1982.

Natalie Merchant - Cover Songs, Volume 2: 1998-2007

Here's another volume of Natalie Merchant performing cover albums that didn't appear on her studio albums.

By this point in her solo career, pretty much all of the songs on her studio albums were entirely written by her. But she still performed lots of cover songs in concert and elsewhere. And she continued to have some very unusual choices.

This time, all but two of the songs are officially released. The two unreleased ones are "Last Goodbye" and "Nowhere Man." Both are from concert bootlegs.

The released songs are the usual mix of songs from other artists' albums, various artists compilations, and the like. Two songs, "Birds and Ships" and "I Was Born" are from the "Mermaid Avenue" albums, where newer artists added music to go with lyrics written way back when by Woody Guthrie. Three songs, "Space Oddity," "After the Gold Rush," and "The Gulf of Araby," are from Merchant's only official live album, simply titled "Live in Concert." For live tracks like these, I used the MVSEP audio editing program to get rid of the crowd noise.

Also, I think Merchant had a hand in writing the song "Because I Could Not Stop for Death." The lyrics were originally written by the famous 1800s poet Emily Dickinson. But I believe the music was composed by Merchant and Susan McKeown, and then put on an album by McKeown.

Merchant has done many, many interesting covers in concert that I couldn't find any good recordings of, because she didn't perform them many times. Examples include "All Right Now" by Free, "Everyday People" by Sly and the Family Stone, and "Dust in the Wind" by Kansas. I found one such surprise choice, "Wonderwall" by Oasis, but the recording was so poor that I could only include it as a bonus track.

This album is 50 minutes long, not including the bonus track.

Here's a list of the original artists for each song:

01 Birds and Ships - Woody Guthrie / Billy Bragg & Wilco
02 But Not for Me - Ira Gershwin & George Gershwin
03 In the Ghetto - Elvis Presley
04 The Lowlands of Holland - traditional
05 Space Oddity - David Bowie
06 After the Gold Rush - Neil Young
07 The Gulf of Araby - Katell Keineg
08 Last Goodbye - Jeff Buckley
09 I Was Born - Woody Guthrie / Billy Bragg & Wilco
10 Nowhere Man - Beatles
11 Because I Could Not Stop for Death - Emily Dickinson, Susan McKeown & Natalie Merchant
12 Loch Lomond  - traditional
13 Misguided Angel  - Cowboy Junkies
Wonderwall - Oasis

And here's the usual song list:

01 Birds and Ships (Natalie Merchant)
02 But Not for Me (Natalie Merchant)
03 In the Ghetto (Natalie Merchant with Tracy Chapman)
04 The Lowlands of Holland (Chieftains with Natalie Merchant)
05 Space Oddity (Natalie Merchant)
06 After the Gold Rush (Natalie Merchant)
07 The Gulf of Araby (Natalie Merchant)
08 Last Goodbye (Natalie Merchant)
09 I Was Born (Billy Bragg & Natalie Merchant)
10 Nowhere Man (Natalie Merchant)
11 Because I Could Not Stop for Death (Susan McKeown & Natalie Merchant)
12 Loch Lomond (Dan Zanes with Natalie Merchant)
13 Misguided Angel (Cowboy Junkies with Natalie Merchant)

Wonderwall (Natalie Merchant)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16391902/NATLIMERCHNT1998-2007CvrSngsVlum2_atse.zip.html

The cover photo is from a concert at the Cynthia Mitchell Woodlands Pavilion in Woodlands, Texas, on July 5, 2002.

Eric Clapton - Acoustic Versions: 1989-1999

This is kind of a supplement to the Eric Clapton stray tracks albums from the 1990s that I've been posting. These are all stray tracks too, in the sense that none of them appeared on his studio albums in this era, at least not in these arrangements. And, as you can guess from the album title, they're all acoustic versions.

Note that "at least not in these arrangements" comment I just made. A few of these songs do appear on other stray tracks albums I've made, such as "Tears in Heaven" and "Change the World." But not many, and generally they are done quite differently here. For instance, "Tears in Heaven" is stripped way back from the studio version, with just Clapton's voice and acoustic guitar.

All but three of the performances here are unreleased. The three released ones are "Mississippi Blues" (which comes from an album by another musician), "(I) Get Lost" (from a movie soundtrack) and "Danny Boy" (from a B-side).

There are 12 unreleased songs. Seven of them come from concert bootlegs. For all of those, I used the MVSEP audio editing program to get rid of the crowd noise, so they'd fit in with all the studio tracks. The remaining five didn't come with crowd noise in the first place. They're generally from concert rehearsals, although one, "'The Van' Title Theme," is from a movie or TV show that never had a soundtrack.

I think this makes for a nice listen. Clapton's acoustic performances are underrated, in my opinion.

01 Standing Around Crying (Eric Clapton with Pete Townshend)
02 Tears in Heaven (Eric Clapton)
03 Circus (Eric Clapton)
04 Ain't Nobody's Bizness If I Do (Eric Clapton)
05 Come On in My Kitchen (Eric Clapton)
06 Malted Milk (Eric Clapton)
07 Motherless Child (Eric Clapton)
08 Mississippi Blues [Instrumental] (Eric Clapton & Timothy Duffy)
09 How Long (Eric Clapton with Dr. John)
10 'The Van' Title Theme [Instrumental] (Eric Clapton)
11 Broken Hearted (Eric Clapton)
12 Change the World (Eric Clapton)
13 Driftin' Blues (Eric Clapton)
14 [I] Get Lost (Eric Clapton)
15 Danny Boy [Instrumental] (Eric Clapton) 

https://www.upload.ee/files/16368818/ERCCLPTN1989-1999AcustcVrsons_atse.zip.html

The cover photo was taken at the Royal Albert Hall in London some time in 1998.

https://www.upload.ee/files/16368818/ERCCLPTN1989-1999AcustcVrsons_atse.zip.html

Fiona Apple - Cover Songs, Volume 4: 2016-2022

Here's the last of four volumes of Fiona Apple performing cover versions. I particularly enjoyed this series, and I wish it could keep going, but this is all I could find with worthy sound quality. This last volume gets us caught up to the present day, more or less (as I write this in early 2024).

All but four of the songs here have been officially released. They're from the usual mix of movie soundtracks, appearances on other artist's albums, and various artists compilations. 

As for the unreleased ones, those are tracks 1, 2, 3, and 9. The first one, "Ain't That a Shame," was done for an Internet show. The next two are from another Internet show, this one hosted by musician Andrew Bird (and they're duets with Bird). I included three other songs from that same show on the previous album in this series. Finally, the ninth song, "The Whole of the Moon," was done for the TV show "The Affair," but it only appeared in the show, not on a soundtrack for it or anything like that.

There are two bonus tracks, "All Night Thing" and "You Don't Own Me." They're both from audience concert bootlegs. Their quality was good enough for bonus tracks (some others didn't even make that cut), but not good enough for the album proper.

Here's a list of the original artists for each song:

01 Ain't That a Shame - Fats Domino
02 Why - Andrew Bird
03 Oh, Sister - Bob Dylan
04 I Can't Wait to Meet You - Solangie Jimenez & Thomas Cabaniss
05 Your Molecular Structure - Mose Allison
06 It Won't Be Wrong - Byrds
07 In My Room - Beach Bosy
08 Don't Worry 'Bout Me - Katherine Perry
09 The Whole of the Moon - Waterboys
10 7 O'Clock News - Silent Night - Simon & Garfunkel medley, including "Silent Night" by Franz Xaver Gruber & Joseph Mohr
11 Love More - Sharon Van Etten
12 [Remember Me] I'm the One Who Loves You - Stuart Hamblen
13 Where the Shadows Lie - Bear McCreary

All Night Thing - Temple of the Dog
You Don't Own Me - Leslie Gore

And here's the usual song list:

01 Ain't That a Shame (Fiona Apple)
02 Why (Fiona Apple & Andrew Bird)
03 Oh, Sister (Fiona Apple & Andrew Bird)
04 I Can't Wait to Meet You (Fiona Apple)
05 Your Molecular Structure (Tippo All Stars & Fiona Apple)
06 It Won't Be Wrong (Fiona Apple & Jakob Dylan)
07 In My Room (Fiona Apple & Jakob Dylan)
08 Don't Worry 'Bout Me (Jeff Goldblum & the Mildred Snitzer Orchestra with Fiona Apple)
09 The Whole of the Moon (Fiona Apple)
10 7 O'Clock News - Silent Night (Phoebe Bridgers, Fiona Apple & Matt Berninger)
11 Love More (Fiona Apple)
12 [Remember Me] I'm the One Who Loves You (Watkins Family Hour with Fiona Apple)
13 Where the Shadows Lie (Fiona Apple & Bear McCreary)

All Night Thing (Fiona Apple)
You Don't Own Me (Shirley Manson & Fiona Apple)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16345640/FONAAPPL2016-2022CvrSngsVlum4_atse.zip.html

The cover photo was taken at the Ohana Fest in Dana Point, California, on September 9, 2017.

Natalie Merchant - Cover Songs, Volume 1: 1993-1997

I have previously posted two albums of cover versions by the band 10,000 Maniacs. That band's lead vocalist and main songwriter Natalie Merchant left in 1993 to pursue a solo career. Here's a series that picks up right where the 10,000 Maniacs one left off. I have three albums of cover songs by Merchant. Here's the first one.

This album roughly deals with the time period of her first solo album, "Tigerlily." Released in 1995, it sold five million copies in the U.S. alone. There are no songs here from that album proper, but "Take a Look" and "The Work Song" are bonus tracks from it. Furthermore, "Baby I Love You," "All I Want," and "Sympathy for the Devil" are B-sides from songs taken from the album.

Four other songs have been officially released: "I Know How to Do It," "One Fine Day," "Come Take a Trip in My Air Ship," and "Children Go Where I Send Thee." They're from movie soundtracks and various artists compilations. Note that a version of "Children Go Where I Send Thee" also appeared on one of the 10,000 Maniacs covers albums I made, but that was done in a different style.

The remaining seven songs are from concert bootlegs. I stuck with soundboard recordings, so they all sound excellent. I also used the MVSEP program to remove the crowd noise on all the live recordings, which included a couple of the released songs too.

Some of the songs are classics from well known artists such as Joni Mitchell and the Rolling Stones. But other songs are often obscure and go waaaay back. For instance, "Come Take a Trip in My Air Ship" was first recorded in 1904, a couple of years after airplanes first flew. "Will the Circle Be Unbroken" is actually not a traditional, as often assumed, and was composed in 1907. "When They Ring the Golden Bells" was first recorded in 1915.

This album is an hour and two minutes long.

Here's a list of the original artists for each song:

01 Baby I Love You - Ronettes
02 All I Want - Joni Mitchell
03 Santa Fe Thief - Jimmy Dale Gilmore
04 I Know How to Do It - Dinah Washington
05 Take a Look - Irma Thomas
06 The Work Song - Nat Adderley
07 One Fine Day - Chiffons
08 Sympathy for the Devil - Rolling Stones
09 Come Take a Trip in My Air Ship - Billy Murray
10 Ode to Billy Joe - Bobbie Gentry
11 Fever - Little Willie John / Peggy lee
12 Long Black Veil - Lefty Frizzell
13 Will the Circle Be Unbroken - Ada R. Habershon & Charles H. Gabriel / Carter Family
14 [What's So Funny 'Bout] Peace, Love and Understanding - Brinsley Schwarz
15 When They Ring the Golden Bells - Imperial Quartet
16 Children Go Where I Send Thee - traditional

Here's the usual song list:

01 Baby I Love You (Natalie Merchant)
02 All I Want (Natalie Merchant)
03 Santa Fe Thief (Jimmie Dale Gilmore & Natalie Merchant)
04 I Know How to Do It (Natalie Merchant with Dr. John & Booker T. Jones)
05 Take a Look (Natalie Merchant)
06 The Work Song (Natalie Merchant)
07 One Fine Day (Natalie Merchant)
08 Sympathy for the Devil (Natalie Merchant)
09 Come Take a Trip in My Air Ship (Natalie Merchant)
10 Ode to Billy Joe (Natalie Merchant)
11 Fever (Natalie Merchant)
12 Long Black Veil (Natalie Merchant)
13 Will the Circle Be Unbroken (Natalie Merchant)
14 [What's So Funny 'Bout] Peace, Love and Understanding (Natalie Merchant)
15 When They Ring the Golden Bells (Natalie Merchant with Susan McKeown)
16 Children Go Where I Send Thee (Natalie Merchant)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16344369/NATLIMERCHNT1993-1997CvrSngsVlum1_atse.zip.html

The cover photo was taken in Paris in 1993.

Nick Lowe & Paul Carrack - BBC Sessions, Volume 2: In Concert, Paris Theatre, London, Britain, 9-15-1984

Here's another BBC concert featuring Nick Lowe and Paul Carrack.

It's kind of crazy that I'm posting not just the first but the second BBC concert featuring Lowe and Carrack, because they never released and album together. But Lowe had been in Rockpile from 1977 to 1981, and shared the lead vocals duties with Dave Edmunds. After that band broke up, he kept the same basic formula going, but shared lead vocals duties with Paul Carrack instead, from 1982 to 1985.

At the time of this concert, Lowe was more prolific than Carrack. Lowe released solo albums in 1982, 1983, and 1984, with the most recent one being titled "Nick Lowe and His Cowboy Outfit." Only two songs were from that album: "Half a Boy and Half a Man" and "Maureen." Carrack's most recent solo album at the time had come out in 1982. But Carrack had been involved with more hits. He sang lead vocals on "Tempted" by Squeeze in 1981, which is probably their most popular song. And back in 1974, he wrote and sang "How Long" by the band Ace, which reached Number One in one U.S. singles chart.

This album is unreleased. Most of it sounds excellent. However, three songs are from a different source and don't sound as good: "Soul Cruisin'," "Switchboard Susan," and "How Long." I suspect what happened was the concert was significantly longer, but the BBC edited it down to fit an hour long time slot. But there were different edited versions, for instance this was also broadcast by the Westwood Radio One network in the U.S., so some of the other versions had different songs on it.

I tried my best to improve the three poorer sounding songs with some audio editing tricks, but I could only do so much. I also boosted the lead vocals relative to the instruments on most of the songs, since they seemed a bit low in the mix.

By the way, around 1982, the Lowe and Carrack band was called "Noise to Go." But by the time of this concert, the name was changed to "Nick Lowe and His Cowboy Outfit" (just like the title of his 1984 album), even though the personnel was basically the same. Carrack left in 1985 to become to lead singer for the Genesis side project band Mike + the Mechanics.

This album is one hour long.

01 Soul Cruisin' (Nick Lowe & Paul Carrack)
02 Saint Beneath the Paint (Nick Lowe & Paul Carrack)
03 talk (Nick Lowe & Paul Carrack)
04 Tempted (Nick Lowe & Paul Carrack)
05 Cruel to Be Kind (Nick Lowe & Paul Carrack)
06 talk (Nick Lowe & Paul Carrack)
07 Switchboard Susan (Nick Lowe & Paul Carrack)
08 talk (Nick Lowe & Paul Carrack)
09 Don't Give My Heart a Break (Nick Lowe & Paul Carrack)
10 talk (Nick Lowe & Paul Carrack)
11 Is It You (Nick Lowe & Paul Carrack)
12 talk (Nick Lowe & Paul Carrack)
13 Maureen (Nick Lowe & Paul Carrack)
14 Little by Little (Nick Lowe & Paul Carrack)
15 Raging Eyes (Nick Lowe & Paul Carrack)
16 talk (Nick Lowe & Paul Carrack)
17 Half a Boy and Half a Man (Nick Lowe & Paul Carrack)
18 talk (Nick Lowe & Paul Carrack)
19 Love in Vain (Nick Lowe & Paul Carrack)
20 Marie Provost (Nick Lowe & Paul Carrack)
21 Crackin' Up (Nick Lowe & Paul Carrack)
22 I Need You (Nick Lowe & Paul Carrack)
23 How Long (Nick Lowe & Paul Carrack)
24 Burning (Nick Lowe & Paul Carrack)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16344939/NICKLWPULCRRCK1984BBSssonsVlum2InCncrtPrisThatrLndnBrtin__9-15-1984_atse.zip.html

These Lowe and Carrack concerts seem to have been mostly forgotten on the Internet, because I could barely find any photos of them. I did find a couple of videos of them playing together in the early 1980s though. So I took screenshots of that to make the cover. They always were on different parts of the stage, so I had to put two screenshots together.

U2 - BBC Sessions, Volume 6: In Concert, Point Depot, Dublin, Ireland, 12-31-1989

This is a particularly good installment in the series of U2 BBC albums. It came at the very end of the tour to promote the 1988 album "Rattle and Hum," so it mostly contains songs from that album, plus the album before it, "The Joshua Tree." It's highlighted by a guest appearance from blues legend B.B. King.

The recording of this concert has a strange history. It has been officially released, but just barely. It was broadcast live not just by the BBC in Britain, but in many other countries, so it was widely bootlegged from the beginning. In 2004, it was released as part of the digital box set "The Complete U2." But you could only get it if you got the entire, very large box set. As the Wikipedia entry makes clear, you can't buy the tracks individually on iTunes or anywhere else:

Live from the Point Depot - Wikipedia

As I mentioned above, B.B. King was a special guest. He played and sang on the "Rattle and Hum" track "When Loves Come to Town," so naturally he joined U2 in playing that song in this concert. But he also joined in "Love Rescue Me," including singing some lead vocals. And I don't think he was on stage, but his band helped perform the song "Angel of Harlem," adding a horn section that was key to the song.

Note that this concert is billed as taking place on December 31, 1989. I'm sure that's what appeared on the tickets, so that's the date I'm using here. But if you listen to the recording, it starts with a New Year's countdown and a performance of "Auld Lang Syne." So pretty much everything after the first minute is really from very early on January 1, 1990. 

Note that some of the songs in the song list are more like snippets. For instance, "The Times They Are A-Changin'" is really just one verse sung acappella. "Dirty Old Town" was also brief. There are some other snippets not mentioned in the song titles, such as a bit of "Exodus" by Bob Dylan during the performance of " I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking for," and a bit of "Suspicious Minds" in "Angel of Harlem." And unfortunately, "All I Want Is You" was cut way down, to less than a minute.

This concert marked the end of an era for U2, since it was the last show of a long tour. Lead singer Bono famously mentioned during his banter that the band was going to go away for a while and rethink their sound. That's exactly what they did. They would reemerge two years later with the classic album "Achtung Baby."

Unfortunately, it would be much, much longer before they performed for the BBC again. But they would eventually, so this album series will continue.

This album is an hour and 43 minutes long.

01 talk (U2)
02 Auld Lang Syne (U2)
03 Where the Streets Have No Name (U2)
04 I Will Follow (U2)
05 talk (U2)
06 I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking for (U2)
07 MLK (U2)
08 One Tree Hill (U2)
09 Gloria (U2)
10 God Part II (U2)
11 Desire (U2)
12 All Along the Watchtower (U2)
13 All I Want Is You (U2)
14 Bad (U2)
15 Van Diemen's Land (U2)
16 Bullet the Blue Sky (U2)
17 Running to Stand Still - Dirty Old Town (U2)
18 The Times They Are A-Changin' (U2)
19 New Year's Day (U2)
20 Pride [In the Name of Love] (U2)
21 Trash, Trampoline and the Party Girl (U2)
22 talk (U2)
23 Angel of Harlem (U2)
24 When Love Comes to Town (U2 & B.B. King)
25 talk (U2 & B.B. King)
26 Love Rescue Me (U2 & B.B. King)
27 '40' (U2)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/n1hDjHkv

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/o1OzR78U6g9LyaD/file

alternate:

https://www.imagenetz.de/eFsQX

The cover photo is from this exact concert.

Joe Jackson - BBC Sessions, Volume 6: In Concert, Symphony Hall, Birmingham, Britain, 1-30-1995

Here's another BBC album performed by Joe Jackson. This time, it's a concert from 1995.

In 1994, Jackson released the studio album "Night Music." He was getting into classical music at the time, and it's a mix of classically inspired songs with more typical pop songs. It was not well received. If one looks at the crowd-sourced rateyourmusic.com ratings as I write this in February 2024, it has the lowest ratings of all of his albums up to that point in his career. (He would do a couple more classically influenced albums that also would not be well received.) 

So this concert is a mixture of songs from "Night Music" plus his usual assortment of popular tracks from his previous albums. However, I must say the "Night Music" songs come across better in this concert than they do on the studio album. Most are just songs that could have easily fit on his earlier albums. "Ever After" in particular is a standout. But also, there are a couple of classically inspired instrumentals, "Nocturne No. 2" and "Nocturne No.4," that are actually totally rearranged from the album versions, done just as solo piano pieces. I like them a lot better this way.

The concert recording has excellent sound quality, even though it's a bootleg. But there was a major problem: apparently the BBC cut out some songs to fit the concert into a certain time slot. Five songs were missing: "Nocturne No. 4," Nocturne No. 2," "The Other Me," "Tango Atlantico," and "Steppin' Out." I was able to find one other concert bootleg from this tour, from New York City in November 1994, to get good versions of "Nocturne No. 4," Nocturne No. 2," and "Steppin' Out." However, "The Other Me" and "Tango Atlantico" were not played at that other concert and I couldn't find any other good versions of them from that tour, so those two haven't been included. 

I suspect also that some of the banter between songs got cut out due to BBC edits. For instance, Jackson never introduced his band members, which was something he's always done. But at least some banter did survive.

By the way, "Is She Really Going Out with Him - It's Different for Girls" is an unusual case. Both those songs were early hits from him. But on this performance, he played the music to "Is She Really Going Out with Him" with the lyrics to "It's Different for Girls." Then, later in the song, he played the music to "It's Different for Girls" with the music to "Is She Really Going Out with Him!" So it's a medley, but not like you would normally expect.

Unfortunately, I haven't found any evidence of Jackson performing for the BBC after this concert. So the BBC series for him ends here, unless something else turns up.

This album is an hour and 24 minutes long.

UPDATE: On February 20, 2025, I updated the mp3 download file. The music is exactly the same, but I renamed the album from "Volume 5" to "Volume 6," after finding a BBC concert that I'd missed. So I redid the cover art and mp3 tags as well.

01 Home Town (Joe Jackson)
02 Real Men (Joe Jackson)
03 talk (Joe Jackson)
04 Nocturne No. 4 [Instrumental] (Joe Jackson)
05 Is She Really Going Out with Him - It's Different for Girls (Joe Jackson)
06 Stranger than Fiction (Joe Jackson)
07 talk (Joe Jackson)
08 Sea of Secrets (Joe Jackson)
09 Nocturne No. 2 [Instrumental] (Joe Jackson)
10 talk (Joe Jackson)
11 The Man Who Wrote Danny Boy (Joe Jackson)
12 talk (Joe Jackson)
13 Ever After (Joe Jackson)
14 talk (Joe Jackson)
15 Only the Future (Joe Jackson)
16 Another World (Joe Jackson)
17 Chinatown (Joe Jackson)
18 Breaking Us in Two (Joe Jackson)
19 You Can't Get What You Want [Til You Know What You Want] (Joe Jackson)
20 Got the Time (Joe Jackson)
21 What's the Use of Getting Sober (Joe Jackson)
22 I'm the Man (Joe Jackson)
23 Steppin' Out (Joe Jackson)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/j8w4g6iV

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/iYUMaqDT59j2DoC/file

I couldn't find any good photos of Jackson in concert from 1995. I ultimately had to resort to using one from 1997, from a concert in Paris.

Eric Clapton - Black Cat Bone - Non-Album Tracks (1994-1996)

On one hand, I'm still annoyed, maybe permanently annoyed, at Eric Clapton's idiotic comments and behavior about the Covid pandemic. But on the other hand, he's done a lot of great music, and I have a ton of albums I've prepared from even before the Covid crisis. So I'm gonna try to move faster on posting them. This is another stray tracks album.

Around this time, Clapton was going through a particularly bluesy phase, culminating with his all blues album "From the Cradle" in 1994. 

One partial exception is the song "Change the World," which was a big hit in the U.S. in 1996, reaching the Top Five of the singles chart, and one of the most played songs on the radio that year. It has a much more poppy sound that the others, including a hint of hip hop. But at the same time, Clapton said the song still has "one foot in the blues, even if it's subtly disguised."

"Change the World," released only as an A-side and on a movie soundtrack, is one of four officially released songs here. The others are "Ain't Gone 'N' Give Up on Love," from a live Stevie Ray Vaughan tribute album, "Every Day I Have the Blues," from a "Live at Hyde Park" DVD, and "Low Tide," an instrumental from another movie soundtrack.

The other songs are all blues songs from concert bootlegs. With Clapton bootlegs being very popular, I had no problem sourcing all of them from soundboard boots. Note that I ran them through the MVSEP audio editing program filter to remove the crowd noise, so they'd fit in with the studio tracks. I also boosted the lead vocals on a few tracks that needed it.

This album is 51 minutes long.

01 I Can't Judge Nobody (Eric Clapton)
02 Forty-Four (Eric Clapton)
03 Ain't Nobody's Bizness If I Do (Eric Clapton)
04 Black Cat Bone (Eric Clapton)
05 I'm Gonna Cut Your Head (Eric Clapton)
06 Blues All Day Long [Blues Leave Me Alone] (Eric Clapton)
07 I Got My Mojo Working (Eric Clapton)
08 Ain't Gone 'N' Give Up on Love (Eric Clapton)
09 Change the World (Eric Clapton)
10 Every Day I Have the Blues (Eric Clapton)
11 Low Tide [Instrumental] (Eric Clapton)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16326559/ERCCLPTN1994-1996BlckCtBne_atse.zip.html

All I know about the photo used for the cover is that it's from 1996. The little picture of the cat in the top right corner I added on a whim, after doing an image search for the phrase "black cat bone."

Various Artists - Mike’s Mixes - Uncovered Classics, Volume 1 (1964-2006) (A MIKE SOLOF GUEST POST)

Here's another collection of unique mixes by guest poster Mike Solof. I'll let him describe what it's about.

---

It’s Mike. You might know me from my series of Uncovered Beatles tracks. I’m back and starting a whole new series of non-Beatles cuts that I’m calling Uncovered Classics. The series will feature some of my remixes of classic tracks that I know and love and grew up listening to on my old FM radio. I own a broad spectrum of music that I have collected over the past 40 years. This new series will focus on some of my favorite songs, mostly well-known classics, but also a few you might not be familiar with.

As with my Beatles series, the thing I enjoy most is using modern tech to rip apart the commercially released tracks you know by heart… and find all the cool stuff that is hiding in the cracks and crevices deep, deep within. The buried gems, the treasures you never usually get a chance to hear because they had been buried deep in the mix under all those other “bothersome” instruments and vocals... until now!

Below is a brief track by track summary of what I've included in my intro into this new series. Please read the PDF file included in the download zip for more information, including song by song details.

This album is an hour and one minute long.

01 Long Train Runnin' [2024 Mike’s Mix] (Doobie Brothers)
02 Exposure [2020 Mike’s Mix] (Robert Fripp)
03 Bedspring Kiss [2024 Mike’s Mix] (Jellyfish)
04 Fly Me to the Moon [2024 Mike’s Mix] (Frank Sinatra)
05 Borderline [2024 Mike’s Mix] (Madonna)
06 Ramble On [2024 Mike’s Mix] (Led Zeppelin)
07 Slip Kid [2024 Mike’s Mix] (Who)
08 Lone Jack [2024 Mike’s Mix] (Pat Metheny Group)
09 Once in a Lifetime [2024 Mike’s Mix] (Talking Heads)
10 Thick as a Brick [2024 Mike’s Mix] (Jethro Tull)
11 Seven Bridges Road [2024 Mike’s Mix] (Eagles)
12 You Know My Name [2024 Mike’s Mix] (Chris Cornell)
13 Relax [2024 Mike’s Mix] (Frankie Goes to Hollywood)
14 Bohemian Rhapsody [2024 Mike’s Mix] (Queen)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16329866/VA-MikesMixsUncverdClsscsVlum1_atse.zip.html

Paul here again. I don't know what's going on with the cover art. A Mike self portrait, maybe?! Perhaps he can explain.

Ron Sexsmith - Reasons to Believe, Volume 3: 2002-2005

This is Volume 3 of my Rox Sexsmith stray tracks collection. It mostly consists of cover versions, but there are a few originals in there.

All but two of the songs are officially release. Those two are "Guess Things Happen That Way" and "Wrecking Ball." They're from concert bootlegs. But they're probably from soundboards, because their sound quality is excellent.

Regarding the officially released songs, six of them come from the 2004 album "Has-Been and Wives:" tracks 5, 8, 9, 11, 13, and 15. Technically, this album was credited to "the Kelele Brothers," but that's just another name for Sexsmith and his backing band. They did another album in 2001, and I included some songs from that on the last album in this series. As with that volume, I've only included the songs where Sexsmith is the lead vocalist. I've scattered them between some other songs because the sound is ukelele-centric, and I wanted to spread that out.

Regarding the other songs, they're generally from various artists collections and appearances on other artists' albums. For instance, there are songs from tribute albums to Stephen Foster, NRBQ, and Gordon Lightfoot. There's also one song, "All Too Much," that's a bonus track.

Note that the first song, "Wastin' Time," appears on his debut studio album "Ron Sexsmith." But this is a piano-centric version that I figured was different enough to merit inclusion.

As with the rest of this series, thanks to Pete the Greek for help finding the songs and organizing the information about them.

This album is 50 minutes long.

Here's a list of the original artists for each song:

01 Wastin' Time [Piano Version] - Ron Sexsmith
02 Maybe This Christmas - Ron Sexsmith
03 Guess Things Happen That Way - Johnny Cash
04 Drifters - Gordon Lightfoot
05 Chick Habit - Serge Gainsbourg / April March
06 All Too Much - Ron Sexsmith
07 Wrecking Ball - Neil Young
08 Father Christmas - Kinks
09 Boredom and Loneliness - Ron Sexsmith
10 Comrades Fill No Glass for Me - Stephen Foster
11 I Don't Want to Hear It Anymore - Randy Newman / Dusty Springfield
12 My Girlfriend's Pretty - NRBQ
13 Blue, Red and Grey - Who
14 Los Mismo Que Yo [If Only] - Alex Cuba & Ron Sexsmith
15 One Brown Mouse - Jethro Tull
16 Song No. 6 - Ane Brun

Here's the usual song list:

01 Wastin' Time [Piano Version] (Ron Sexsmith)
02 Maybe This Christmas (Ron Sexsmith)
03 Guess Things Happen That Way (Ron Sexsmith)
04 Drifters (Ron Sexsmith)
05 Chick Habit (Kelele Brothers [Ron Sexsmith])
06 All Too Much (Ron Sexsmith)
07 Wrecking Ball (Ron Sexsmith)
08 Father Christmas (Kelele Brothers [Ron Sexsmith])
09 Boredom and Loneliness (Kelele Brothers [Ron Sexsmith])
10 Comrades Fill No Glass for Me (Ron Sexsmith)
11 I Don't Want to Hear It Anymore (Kelele Brothers [Ron Sexsmith])
12 My Girlfriend's Pretty (Ron Sexsmith)
13 Blue, Red and Grey (Kelele Brothers [Ron Sexsmith])
14 Los Mismo Que Yo [If Only] (Alex Cuba Band & Ron Sexsmith)
15 One Brown Mouse (Kelele Brothers [Ron Sexsmith])
16 Song No. 6 (Ane Brun & Ron Sexsmith)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16329833/RONSXSMTH2002-2005ResnstoBliveVlum3_atse.zip.html

The cover photo shows Sexsmith at a concert in Bochum, Germany, in 2004.

U2 - BBC Sessions, Volume 5: Old Grey Whistle Test, Balmoral TV Studios, Belfast, Britain, 3-8-1987

I continue with more of U2 performing for the BBC. This is a short but interesting 1987 concert.

1987 was the year U2 went from being "mere" stars to being superstars, thanks to their blockbuster album "The Joshua Tree." This concert for the BBC TV Show "The Old Grey Whistle Test" took place the day before that album was released. In fact, after the show, at midnight, they went to a local record store and signed autographs for people waiting in line to buy the album as soon as it turned midnight. So this was the first public unveiling of two new songs, "Exit" and "In God's Country." ("Trip through Your Wires" had been performed just once prior to this.) Furthermore, they did two cover songs, "People Get Ready" and "Southern Man." They had done "Southern Man" a bunch of times in 1982, but this was the first time they ever played "People Get Ready" in public. Furthermore, this apparently was the only time they ever played "Pride (In the Name of Love)" in the same key as the album version.

The two last songs are unusual too, but I mention them separately because they're actually from a different show. The main show is rather short, only 22 minutes long. So I wanted to add a bit more. The last two songs (tracks 9 to 11) are from a brief appearance the band made on an Irish TV show just a week later. They did two covers. It was the first time they did "Springhill Mining Disaster," and it was the only time they ever did "Happy Xmas (Was Is Over)."

Everything here is unreleased, as far as I know. But the main show had some serious sound quality issues. There was a constant noise through the whole thing that was annoying. But I used some sound editing tricks to get rid of it. So I would imagine this sounds better than any other bootleg versions out there up to this point.

This album is 28 minutes long.

01 talk (U2)
02 People Get Ready (U2)
03 Southern Man (U2)
04 Trip through Your Wires (U2)
05 Exit (U2)
06 In God's Country (U2)
07 talk (U2)
08 Pride [In the Name of Love] (U2)
09 talk (U2)
10 Springhill Mining Disaster (U2)
11 Happy Xmas [Was Is Over] (U2)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16326160/UTOO1987BBSssonsVlum5OldGryWhstlTstBlmralTVStdosBlfstBrtin__3-8-1987_atse.zip.html

The cover photo is from this exact performance. (Note the "Whistle Test" sign in the background.) Unfortunately, it's probably a screenshot from the video and the picture quality isn't that great.

Chris Isaak - Acoustic, Volume 1: 1989-1996

I'm a big fan of acoustic music, and one thing I like about Chris Isaak is that he's always had an acoustic side to his music. It hasn't fully shown up that much on his studio albums, but I've found enough for three albums of acoustic versions. This is the first one.

Everything here is officially unreleased. The first song is from 1989. The next big chunk, tracks two through ten, are from a 1991 appearance on the Dutch radio show "2 Meter Sessies." Tracks 11 through 13 are from a 1994 appearance on a Los Angeles radio show called "Music Hall." Then tracks 14 through 17 are from another appearance on that show a year later. The last song is from an appearance on an Australian TV show in 1996. So the vast majority of these are from in-person radio station performances. All the songs were essentially done in studio conditions, with no audience noise.

This album is 42 minutes long. 

01 Vaya Con Dios [Edit] (Chris Isaak)
02 Wicked Game (Chris Isaak)
03 Undo the Right (Chris Isaak)
04 Leavin' It All Up to You (Chris Isaak)
05 I'm Not Waiting (Chris Isaak)
06 La Tumba Sera el Final (Chris Isaak)
07 Solitary Man (Chris Isaak)
08 Western Stars (Chris Isaak)
09 Leah (Chris Isaak)
10 Pretty Papers (Chris Isaak)
11 Guess Things Happen that Way (Chris Isaak)
12 Sweet Leilani (Chris Isaak)
13 Nobody Else but Me (Chris Isaak)
14 Cryin' (Chris Isaak)
15 You're the Only Good Thing [That's Happened to Me] (Chris Isaak)
16 Forever Blue (Chris Isaak)
17 Baby Did a Bad, Bad Thing (Chris Isaak)
18 Think of Tomorrow (Chris Isaak)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16323372/CHRSISK1989-1996AcsticVlum1_atse.zip.html

I don't know any details about the cover photo, except it was taken in 1991.

The Rolling Stones - Some Covers, Volume 2: 1979-1981

I posted "Some Covers, Volume 1" by the Rolling Stones back in September 2021. I planned to post Volume 2 soon thereafter. It's now two and a half years later. Oops! The reason for the delay was that I wanted to post my stray tracks albums for the band's "Some Girls" era, and that got delayed for various reasons I've explained elsewhere. So now I'm finally free to post this one.

Just like "Volume 1," this collects cover versions the band did that they didn't put on their studio albums at the time. But after getting themselves together and making the classic "Some Girls" album in 1978, the band started to split. Lead guitarist Keith Richards finally got off various drug addictions and wanted to take more of a leadership role in the band. But lead singer Mick Jagger didn't like that, and the two of them butted heads.

One result of that was the key members began taking part in more solo projects. There aren't any solo songs from Jagger, but there are two solo songs by Richards, one by guitarist Ronnie Wood, and two more by a short-lived side project band that was headed by both Richards and Wood, the New Barbarians.

Furthermore, Richards sings one of the Rolling Stones songs here, "Your Angel Steps Out of Heaven." As a result of all that, Richards sings four songs and Wood sings two. Normally, Jagger sang the vast majority of the songs for the band. But that leaves only seven songs for him, and two of those are duets with blues legend Muddy Waters. So that's a bit unusual, but that's what the source material gave me. I tried to sort the songs so that it usually alternates between one sung by Jagger and then one sung by Richards or Wood.

Only five of the songs here are officially released. "Going to a Go-Go" is from the rather obscure archival live album "Hampton Stadium." "Let’s Go Steady Again" is a duet between Richards and a lesser known female singer, Kristi Kimsey. This song comes from a Kimsey album called "As I Look Back." "Seven Days," a great Bob Dylan cover, is from a Ronnie Wood solo album. The two songs with Muddy Waters, "Hoochie Coochie Man" and "Champagne and Reefer," are from another fairly obscure archival live album called "Checkerboard Lounge Live."

That leaves the unreleased songs. "Linda Lu," "Your Angel Steps Out of Heaven," and "Sweet Home Chicago" are from studio sessions by the band. "Linda Lu" has "[Edit]" in the title because I thought it went on too long without purpose, so I edited out about a minute of it. The next two songs, "Apartment No. 9," and "Worried Life Blues," are from a soundboard bootleg of a New Barbarians concert. "Twenty Flight Rock" is from a concert in Hartford, Connecticut, during the band's big 1981 tour. Richards has a penchant for weepy country songs, surprisingly enough. The last two unreleased songs, "Oh, What a Feeling" and "Don't," were done by him as solo performances in the studio.

I've collected one more album of covers that deals with the rest of the 1980s. I hope it won't take as long before I post that one.

This album is 51 minutes long.

01 Linda Lu [Edit] (Rolling Stones)
02 Your Angel Steps Out of Heaven (Rolling Stones)
03 Sweet Home Chicago (Rolling Stones)
04 Apartment No. 9 (New Barbarians (Keith Richards & Ronnie Wood))
05 Worried Life Blues (New Barbarians (Keith Richards & Ronnie Wood))
06 Going to a Go-Go (Rolling Stones)
07 Let’s Go Steady Again (Rolling Stones with Kristi Kimsey)
08 Twenty Flight Rock (Rolling Stones)
09 Seven Days (Ronnie Wood)
10 Hoochie Coochie Man (Muddy Waters & the Rolling Stones)
11 Oh, What a Feeling (Keith Richards)
12 Down the Road Apiece (Rolling Stones)
13 Champagne and Reefer (Muddy Waters & the Rolling Stones)
14 Don't (Keith Richards)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16322317/TROLLNGSTNS1979-1981SmeCversVolum2_atse.zip.html

I picked a pretty strange Stones concert poster for the cover art to Volume 1. I did the same with this one. I don't have the details about this poster, but I cropped out much of it so I could focus on the flower with the Stones lips logo.

Natalie Merchant - VH-1 Storytellers, Manhattan Center, New York City, 9-14-1998

I just posted a couple of albums of the band 10,000 Maniacs. Natalie Merchant was that band's main singer and songwriter. She left for a solo career in 1993. I have plans to continue with more albums of Merchants doing cover songs in her solo career. But before I get to that, I figured I'd post an album of her original material. 

This is from her appearance on the TV show "VH-1 Storytellers." The main idea behind the show was for the musical act to tell stories behind the songs they played, and she did definitely that here. 

This is unreleased on audio, but I believe it has been released as a video.

I believe the last four tracks weren't actually included in the original TV show, but were included in the video later. There also was a second take of the song "These Are Days," but I didn't include it since it was virtually the same as the version here.

The timing of this concert is excellent if you're just a casual fan. She had two really popular albums in 1995 and 1998 ("Tigerlily" and "Ophelia" respectively), then her sales went way down. So this captured her at the peak of her popularity, and includes most of her best known solo songs, as well as a few from her 10,000 Maniacs era.

This album is 51 minutes long.

01 These Are Days (Natalie Merchant)
02 talk (Natalie Merchant)
03 Carnival (Natalie Merchant)
04 talk (Natalie Merchant)
05 What's the Matter Here (Natalie Merchant)
06 talk (Natalie Merchant)
07 Kind and Generous (Natalie Merchant)
08 talk (Natalie Merchant)
09 Break Your Heart (Natalie Merchant)
10 talk (Natalie Merchant)
11 Wonder (Natalie Merchant)
12 talk (Natalie Merchant)
13 Verdi Cries (Natalie Merchant)
14 talk (Natalie Merchant)
15 Life Is Sweet (Natalie Merchant)

https://www.upload.ee/files/17172252/NATLIMERCHNT1998StrytellrsMnhattnCntrNwYrkC__9-14-1998_atse.zip.html

alternate link:

https://pixeldrain.com/u/rG9qRFC6

The cover photo is a screenshot I took from the video of this exact concert. I used the Krea AI program to upgrade the detail.

Various Artists - Prince's Trust Rock Gala, Wembley Arena, London, Britain, 6-5-1987

I just posted the Prince's Trust concert from 1986. This is the 1987 concert. It's the same basic idea, but many of the songs and performers are different. Both are very worthwhile listens.

Like the 1986 concert, this one started with some newer musical acts. With the benefit of hindsight, some were good choices, and others... not so much (cough cough, Curiosity Killed the Cat and Go West, cough cough). But if you don't like all the artists, that's okay, because none of the first few acts lasted more than a single song.

There were fewer big name artists in this concert than the 1986 one. Plus, the entire concert was about half an hour shorter. (If, in fact, this is the whole thing - I'm not entirely sure.) But on the other hand, the finale was probably even more impressive. I'll get to that in a minute.

First though, I want to point out that, like the 1986 concert, for many of the songs, there was a backing band made up of many stars. I don't know which songs exactly, because I can't find the full video of this concert on YouTube. But, for instance, when Ben E. King sang his song, his backing band included Phil Collins on drums, Midge Ure on rhythm guitar, and Eric Clapton on lead guitar.

But the big deal was the finale. In the 1986, the biggest star was ex-Beatle Paul McCartney. But the 1987 concert outdid that by having two ex-Beatles performing together: George Harrison and Ringo Starr! Harrison's appearance was a particularly big deal because he hadn't performed in concert since his 1974 tour (other than a couple of brief appearances in the finales of other artist's concerts). 

I randomly stumbled across a description of the concert's finale in a 2015 article in Guitar World Magazine. Here it is:

"On June 5, 1987, three of the five original musicians who appeared on the classic Beatles 'White Album' track 'While My Guitar Gently Weeps' reunited to perform the song live at the Prince's Trust Rock Gala in London's Wembley Arena. George Harrison, Ringo Starr, and Eric Clapton were joined in an all-star U.K. band, including Elton John, Phil Collins, Jeff Lynne, Ray Cooper, and... well, if you're wondering who that understandably happy bassist is, it's Mark King from Level 42. Harrison, Starr, and Clapton last performed the song live 16 years earlier at the Concert for Bangladesh in New York City. What most interesting about this performance is the fact that A., the normally Strat-happy Clapton is playing a beautiful Gibson Les Paul, just as he did on the original 1968 recording, and B., the also-Strat-happy Harrison joins Clapton in the extended guitar solo at the end of the song. The two guitarists trade solos and feed off each other's energy, and their intertwining lines are often pretty damn cool."

In addition to that, someone, I'm guessing Clapton, played a guitar solo for "With a Little Help from My Friends," a song that normally lacked any solo. It's a shame that Jeff Lynne apparently didn't sing any of his Electric Light Orchestra hits. But he sang backing vocals on all three of the Beatles songs at the end. Given that Lynne is a huge Beatles fan, this must have been the closest he ever got to a fantasy of being a part of the Beatles, getting to sing with Harrison and Starr, with Clapton on guitar for good measure!

This album is an hour and 45 minutes long.

01 Running in the Family (Level 42 with Eric Clapton)
02 If I Was (Midge Ure)
03 Misfit (Curiosity Killed the Cat)
04 Don't Look Down (Go West)
05 Invisible (Alison Moyet)
06 Through the Barricades (Spandau Ballet)
07 [Something Inside] So Strong (Labi Siffre)
08 Run to You (Bryan Adams)
09 Hearts on Fire (Bryan Adams)
10 Somebody (Bryan Adams)
11 talk (Dave Edmunds & Bryan Adams)
12 The Wanderer (Dave Edmunds & Bryan Adams)
13 talk (Eric Clapton)
14 Wonderful Tonight (Eric Clapton)
15 Behind the Mask (Eric Clapton)
16 Stand by Me (Ben E. King)
17 talk (Phil Collins)
18 Reach Out, I'll Be There - I Can't Help Myself - Same Old Song (Phil Collins & Paul Young)
19 You've Lost That Loving Feeling (Phil Collins & Paul Young)
20 talk (Elton John)
21 Your Song (Elton John)
22 Saturday Night's Alright for Fighting (Elton John)
23 talk (George Harrison & Ringo Starr)
24 While My Guitar Gently Weeps (George Harrison & Eric Clapton with Ringo Starr & Jeff Lynne)
25 Here Comes the Sun (George Harrison with Ringo Starr & Jeff Lynne)
26 With a Little Help from My Friends (Ringo Starr with George Harrison, Eric Clapton & Jeff Lynne)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/W4HtwzDd

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/6mOchiVwGJ0ZR4P/file

I searched the Internet pretty thoroughly for a color version of the group photo from this concert. All I could find was a black and white version. I tinted it blue. If anyone can find the color version, please let me know so I can upgrade this. There are way too many people in the photo for me to try to make a colorized version.