Joan Baez - BBC Sessions, Volume 2: In Concert, Hammersmith Odeon, London, Britain, 12-20-1977

Since I've posted one Joan Baez BBC concert already, she's on my list of artists to finish off before I get to posting BBC stuff of other artists. Here's a nice unreleased BBC concert from 1977.

Baez was one of the most popular folk singers of the 1960s, and kept her high popularity going well into the 1970s. She had her second biggest hit of her career in 1975 with the song "Diamonds and Rust." I must say I'm rather surprised that isn't included here. But she did play her biggest hit, a cover of the Band's classic "The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down." Generally, she kept a good acoustic vibe going, and even sang acappella some.

It's so common for lead vocals to be low in the mix, I've noticed, even on BBC recordings sometimes. That was the case again here. So I fixed that in the usual way, using the UVR5 audio editing program.

By the way, I only have one more BBC concert from Baez after this that I've found, from 1999. But I'm pretty sure there are some other BBC concerts by her that I can't find. For instance, I've found mentions of them from 1973 and 1993. If you have any that I don't and want to share, please let me know.

This album is an hour and ten minutes long.

01 Help Me Make It through the Night (Joan Baez)
02 Farewell, Angelina (Joan Baez)
03 talk (Joan Baez)
04 Honey Love (Joan Baez)
05 talk (Joan Baez)
06 Scarlet Ribbons (Joan Baez)
07 talk (Joan Baez)
08 Virgin Mary (Joan Baez)
09 talk (Joan Baez)
10 Michael (Joan Baez)
11 talk (Joan Baez)
12 Honest Lullaby (Joan Baez)
13 talk (Joan Baez)
14 Gracias a la Vida (Joan Baez)
15 talk (Joan Baez)
16 Natalia (Joan Baez)
17 talk (Joan Baez)
18 Swing Low, Sweet Chariot (Joan Baez)
19 Blowin' in the Wind (Joan Baez)
20 Love Is Just a Four-Letter Word (Joan Baez)
21 talk (Joan Baez)
22 The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down (Joan Baez)
23 Sweet Sir Galahad (Joan Baez)
24 Kumbaya (Joan Baez)
25 Imagine (Joan Baez)
26 Let It Be (Joan Baez)
27 Joe Hill (Joan Baez)
28 talk (Joan Baez)
29 Amazing Grace (Joan Baez)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/BDkdP4fx

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/MCGup30nw9lsKSv/file

The cover photo shows Baez at a concert in Santa Barbara in 1977.

Ronnie Lane - BBC Sessions, Volume 4: In Concert, Paris Theatre, London, Britain, 2-16-1976

Here is the fourth and last album of Ronnie Lane performing for the BBC. It's another BBC concert.

This is another episode of the "In Concert" radio series, with a BBC DJ doing most of the talking between songs. That portion of this album is rather short, 25 minutes, making up tracks two through eleven. I don't know if it's the whole show. Probably not, since there were no introductions of Lane and his band at the beginning. All of those tracks come from the official album "You Never Can Tell." It's possible they didn't include some songs since they were similar to other versions on that album, since it has another BBC concert on it.

Because the concert I had available is rather short, I decided to add a couple of songs to it. The first song, "The Poacher," is an unreleased version from the TV show "Supersonic" in 1976. The last song, "One for the Road," is also unreleased, and comes from the BBC TV show "Old Grey Whistle Test" in 1976. Both of these songs didn't have applause at the end, but I added some so they would fit in with the rest.

Unfortunately, this is the last BBC concert for Lane because his career more or less petered out not long after this. He'd been having health problems since the early 1970s, though he mostly was able to cover them up. But by 1977, he was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis as his condition got worse. His last studio album was released in 1979. He continued to occasionally play and record, but he wasn't nearly as active as he was before. He passed away in 1997 at the age of 51.

This album is 34 minutes long.

01 The Poacher (Ronnie Lane)
02 talk (Ronnie Lane)
03 Don't Try and Change My Mind (Ronnie Lane)
04 talk (Ronnie Lane)
05 Walk On By (Ronnie Lane)
06 talk (Ronnie Lane)
07 You Never Can Tell (Ronnie Lane)
08 talk (Ronnie Lane)
09 Steppin' and Reelin' (Ronnie Lane)
10 talk (Ronnie Lane)
11 Ooh La La (Ronnie Lane)
12 One for the Road (Ronnie Lane)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/CS1WsNbN

edit:

https://bestfile.io/en/vK1LtYMkeQ21xdz/file

The cover photo shows Lane at the Great British Music Festival in London in January, 1976.

Help Wanted

As many of you know, I've had some trouble with copyright issues, which has forced me to take some album links down. After a while, I found a workaround with the help of a person who wants to remain anonymous. That person created a website and posted download links there. Then I was able to post links to that. That one step removed process seemed to work, and I didn't have any trouble as a result.

Unfortunately, this person told me recently that he's in very bad health and can't continue helping in this way. Also, the website he currently has with those links will go poof at the end of 2025. So I would love it if anyone else could take on his role. Please let me know if you're interested. Otherwise, I may not be able to share several dozen albums. Thanks.

Difford & Tilbrook (Squeeze) - BBC In Concert, Friars Club, Aylesbury, Britain, 9-22-1984

First off, understand this is a BBC concert by the British band Squeeze in all but name. The songwriting duo Chris Difford and Glenn Tilbrook write all the songs in their band Squeeze. Also, Tilbrook is the main lead vocalist and lead guitarist, and Difford occasionally sings lead vocals and plays guitar. Here is the only BBC concert they during a time when Squeeze had officially broken up.

Squeeze put out their first album in 1977, and were increasingly popular until they broke up in late 1982. Difford and Tilbrook stayed together as a duo, and released an album, cleverly titled "Difford and Tilbrook," in 1984. In 1985, Squeeze reformed. But by 1993, Difford and Tilbrook were the only original members remaining. After that, it was basically just those two with other band members coming and going. At times, they've simply played as a duo with the Squeeze name. So, by later standards, this is definitely Squeeze.

The sole Difford and Tibrook solo album was a good one, but it didn't do very well commercially, probably because it didn't have a killer single on it, and it wasn't released under the Squeeze name. This concert was meant to support that album, and most of the songs are from it, plus one cover version, Band of Gold," and three Squeeze songs to end the concert. I understand there were two more Squeeze songs on some versions of the BBC recording, "Tempted" and "Is This Love." But I haven't been able to find them. Let me know if you have them.

I only found this concert in recent weeks (writing this in January 2025). I wasn't going to post it at first, because the sound quality was poor. Since it was broadcast by the BBC, I'm sure it sounded great at one point, but then it was probably taped off the radio and then copies were made of copies. In tough situations like this, I like to turn to my musical friend MZ. He mixed it nicely, cutting a lot of the bass and boosting the treble. Thanks, MZ. It sounds a lot better now, but it's still a bit rough by usual BBC standards. Everything here is officially unreleased.

This album is 48 minutes long.

01 Man for All Seasons (Difford & Tilbrook)
02 Picking Up the Pieces (Difford & Tilbrook)
03 talk (Difford & Tilbrook)
04 Love's Crashing Waves (Difford & Tilbrook)
05 Woman's World (Difford & Tilbrook)
06 talk (Difford & Tilbrook)
07 Hope Fell Down (Difford & Tilbrook)
08 Band of Gold (Difford & Tilbrook)
09 Tears for Attention (Difford & Tilbrook)
10 Action Speaks Faster (Difford & Tilbrook)
11 Annie Get Your Gun (Difford & Tilbrook)
12 Black Coffee in Bed (Difford & Tilbrook)
13 talk (Difford & Tilbrook)
14 Labelled with Love (Difford & Tilbrook)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/KZcUMSi2

alternate:

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

I couldn't find many good photos of Difford and Tilbrook while they were a duo in 1984. However, I got lucky and found a concert poster for this exact concert. Even better, it nicely fit into a square shape if I cut out some unimportant text at the bottom, so that's what I did. I cleaned it up a bit in Photoshop.

Roxy Music - BBC Sessions, Volume 6: In Concert, Scottish Exhibition and Conference Centre, Glasgow, Britain, 6-11-2001

A few days ago, I posted the fifth volume of Roxy Music performing for the BBC. I found that at the last minute, having the one all ready to go. So here is it already. This is another BBC concert.

Roxy Music's prime period came to an end after the band's last studio album, "Avalon," in 1982, and then a tour that lasted into 1983. By then, there were only three members remaining, Bryan Ferry, Andy McKay, and Phil Manzanera. Nearly twenty years passed until the band reformed in 2001. The occasion was a tour to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the founding of the band. Since then, the band had occasionally regrouped to tour, with the most recent (and probably last) one taking place in 2022. The band did attempt a new album in the 2000s, but they decided not to finish it as they didn't feel it was strong enough to stand with the band's earlier albums.

For this 2001 tour, the three remaining members, Ferry, McKay, and Manzanera, were joined by another founding member, Paul Thompson. The only founding member not to take part was Brian Eno, who quit the band for good back in 1973.

This concert is essentially the band's best songs. Lead singer Bryan Ferry has had a successful solo career, but none of the songs are from his solo albums.

Everything here is unreleased. The sound quality is excellent, as you'd expect from the BBC. I'm bummed that, once again, the band didn't play my favorite song by them, "More than This." It seems that was only played on about one out of five dates during their 2001 tour.

This album is an hour and 22 minutes long.

01 talk (Roxy Music)
02 Street Life (Roxy Music)
03 Ladytron (Roxy Music)
04 While My Heart Is Still Beating (Roxy Music)
05 Out of the Blue (Roxy Music)
06 A Song for Europe (Roxy Music)
07 Oh Yeah (Roxy Music)
08 Both Ends Burning (Roxy Music)
09 talk (Roxy Music)
10 Avalon (Roxy Music)
11 My Only Love (Roxy Music)
12 Is There Something (Roxy Music)
13 Mother of Pearl (Roxy Music)
14 Jealous Guy (Roxy Music)
15 Editions of You (Roxy Music)
16 Virginia Plain (Roxy Music)
17 Love Is the Drug (Roxy Music)
18 Do the Strand (Roxy Music)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/GWeh8Zuv

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/LBc4AcId6s5RWq8/file

The cover photo shows lead singer Bryan Ferry at a concert in London in June 2001.

Various Artists - A Musical Tribute to Woody Guthrie, Carnegie Hall, New York City, 1-20-1968

In October 1967, one of the all-time musical greats, Woody Guthrie, died at the age of 55. His health started declining in the late 1940s, and in 1952 he was diagnosed with Huntington's Disease, which causes a gradual decline in motor skills and mental abilities. He was hospitalized continuously from 1956 until his death. From the early 1960s onward, Bob Dylan regularly visited him in the hospital and sang songs for him, but so did Pete Seeger and many other folk singers.

Back in the 1960s, musical tribute concerts weren't really a thing yet, but Guthie was such a towering figure that there actually were three such concerts. I plan on posting all three eventually. This is the natural way to start, since it came first chronologically.

This concert was officially released in full as the album "A Tribute to Woody Guthrie, Part 1," in 1972. In 1970, another tribute concert for him happened, and that was eventually released as "A Tribute to Woody Guthrie, Part 2." Then, decades later, highlights from the two were combined onto one CD simply called "A Tribute to Woody Guthrie." 

Normally, I wouldn't post something that has been officially released in full. But I think in this case I can made a more listenable album by subtraction. What I mean is, the 1968 concert was a combination of songs that were sung and spoken word/poetry that was read, going back and forth between the two. I think the songs have a lot of relistening value, but I don't want to hear the spoken word parts that often. So I deleted almost twenty tracks of that, keeping just the music. If you want the full version, the official album is for you.

In removing those tracks, I was careful to manage the applause at the end of each song, since the spoken word part often started while the cheering was still going on. In some cases, I was able to fade the cheering down to bring it to a natural end. But when it was too short for that, I pasted in some cheering from the ends to other songs.

Now, let's get to the music, which consists entirely of songs written by Woody Guthrie, or cover songs he was closely associated with. This concert is most famous due to the appearance of Bob Dylan and the Band. It was important for several reasons. This was Dylan's first public performance since his motorcycle accident a year and a half earlier. It seems he wasn't actually that seriously injured in that accident, and it certainly didn't take him years to recover. But he'd been living a fast and crazy life of stardom and wanted to step away from all that for a while, and the accident gave him an excuse to go into seclusion. After this concert, Dylan basically went back into seclusion for another year or so. But he considered Woody Guthrie so important to his life that he made this rare public appearance during that time anyway.

Also important was the fact that Dylan was backed by the Band. Most members of the Band had backed him on a 1966 tour, and then during his "Basement Tapes" studio sessions in 1967. But at the time of this concert, they still hadn't made a name for themselves... both figuratively and literally! Since they literally didn't have a name to call themselves yet, for this concert, they were billed as "The Crackers," weirdly enough. Later in 1968, the Band would release their first studio album, "Music from Big Pink," to great critical acclaim. They would continue to back Dylan on other projects, including the 1969 Isle of Wight Festival concert and a 1974 tour. This concert was critical to their early career as well as their evolving musical connection with Dylan.

By the way, in addition to playing three songs with the Band, Dylan sang on two others: "This Train Is Bound for Glory" and the finale, "This Land Is Your Land." His voice is just one of many on the finale. As for "This Train Is Bound for Glory," he sang a verse on his own. Unfortunately, the album only included about a 30-second long snippet of that song, and his part wasn't included. I didn't include that snippet since I found it frustrating to only have a bit of the song. I'm guessing there was a flaw with the recording for much of the song.

The other stars of the concert were some of the biggest names in folk music at the time: Arlo Guthrie (Woody Guthrie's son, who had just hit it big with "Alice's Restaurant" in 1967), Judy Collins, Pete Seeger, Odetta, Richie Havens, and Tom Paxton. (I was asked the other day if I could post something by Pete Seeger. I couldn't think of anything worth posting. But then I remembered this concert.)

If you want to know more about this concert, here's an article in Rolling Stone Magazine about it that came out just a month after it took place:

https://www.rollingstone.com/music/music-news/bob-dylan-turns-up-for-woody-guthrie-memorial-197917/

This album is 56 minutes long.

01 Oklahoma Hills (Arlo Guthrie)
02 So Long, It's Been Good to Know Yuh [Dusty Old Dust] (Judy Collins)
03 Curly Headed Baby (Pete Seeger)
04 Ramblin' Round (Odetta)
05 Goin' Down the Road Feelin' Bad (Pete Seeger, Arlo Guthrie & Judy Collins)
06 Pretty Boy Floyd (Tom Paxton)
07 I'd Rather Drink Muddy Water (Richie Havens)
08 Plane Wreck at Los Gatos [Deportee] (Judy Collins)
09 Vigilante Man (Richie Havens)
10 Pastures of Plenty (Tom Paxton)
11 Grand Coulee Dam (Bob Dylan & the Band)
12 Dear Mrs. Roosevelt (Bob Dylan & the Band)
13 I Ain't Got No Home (Bob Dylan & the Band)
14 Roll On Columbia [Edit] (Judy Collins)
15 Jackhammer John (Pete Seeger & Richie Havens)
16 Biggest Thing That Man Has Ever Done [The Great Historical Bum] (Tom Paxton)
17 Union Maid (Judy Collins & Pete Seeger)
18 This Land Is Your Land (Will Geer, Arlo Guthrie, Odetta & Everyone)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/NrqpTP2Z

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/eas3q5bnIYHEX6d/file

What a historic photo for the cover! From left to right, that's Pete Seeger, Bob Dylan, Judy Collins, and Arlo Guthrie. I found a bunch of photos from this concert, but all of them were in black and white. I picked this one, and then colorized it with the Kolorize.cc program. It did a really good job, including picking the colors. I only had to make a few fixes in Photoshop.

U2 - BBC Sessions, Volume 8: Acoustic Session, BBC Radio 2, London, Britain, 10-15-2014

I think it's undeniable U2's music has declined in quality since the early 2000s. One can see it in critical ratings and well as sales. And that's typical for most musical artists. Very few can stay on top creativity after decades. That said, they still have done some interesting stuff in their later years. This is an interesting BBC studio session because the band played their songs in an acoustic style. Actually, it's more accurate to call this semi-acoustic, since they played most of these songs with bass and drums. But still, these are definitely different arrangements of these songs.

This session took place after the release of the band's studio album "Songs of Innocence." That was the album that was controversially included for free for about 500 million Apple iTunes users. It caused a backlash since many people felt it was forced on them.

The first six songs all come from the "Songs of Innocence" album. The seventh song, "Ordinary Love," wouldn't be released until the 2017 album "Songs of Experience." Those first six songs were later included on a deluxe edition of "Songs of Innocence," but the seventh is still unreleased. 

This album is rather short. So I an extra song at the end, "Mysterious Ways." It's also done in a similar style, so I think it fits right in. It's unreleased, coming from a tour rehearsal in 2015.

This album is 30 minutes long.

01 Every Breaking Wave (U2)
02 California [There Is No End to Love] (U2)
03 Raised by Wolves (U2)
04 Cedarwood Road (U2)
05 Song for Someone (U2)
06 The Miracle [Of Joey Ramone] (U2)
07 Ordinary Love (U2)
08 Mysterious Ways (U2)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/7zN3URrC

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/aP2NnywRrlVOtwN/file

For this session, U2 performed in Abbey Road Studios in London, where the Beatles recorded most of their albums, including "Abbey Road." For fun, the band did a photo shoot that was a nighttime version of the Beatles' iconic "Abbey Road" album cover.

John Lennon - Some Time in New York City - Alternate Version (1972)

For some reason, I've posted very little music from John Lennon's solo career so far. I have lots of albums planned, with many of them basically ready to go (minus tidying up and making the cover art). But then again, there's tons of music I plan on posting and I can't get to it all at once. But this particular album has come to the front of my posting priorities due to a song edit a friend of mine made. I'll explain more about that below.

"Some Time in New York City," released in 1972, was John Lennon's third proper solo album. His first two solo albums, "John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band" and "Imagine," were critical successes, and did reasonably well commercially. Both have made it on Rolling Stone Magazine's list of the top 500 albums of all time. So expectations were high for this, his third album. But it was considered a compete bust. One reviewer at the time called it "artistic suicide." Even decades later, a reviewer for Uncut Magazine said it was "a contender for the worst LP by a major musical figure" in all of music history. That's pretty bad! Sales were so bad that Lennon was stunned and he suffered songwriter's block for about a year.

So this is an album that's ripe for an alternate version, which I'm making here. In my opinion, there are three reasons this album did so poorly, both critically and commercially. First, it was a very political album, with every original song expressing radical leftist political opinions. The general public wasn't ready for that. 

Second, it wasn't really a John Lennon album, but instead a John Lennon and Yoko Ono album. Three of the songs on the first album were written and sung by Ono, and she sang some lead vocals on some of the other songs as well. People really didn't like that, especially since many at the time blamed Ono for the break-up of the Beatles. (In retrospect, she probably played some role in that Lennon was having more fun making music with her than with the Beatles, but there were many other factors that came to a head, especially financial ones, and basically everyone in the band being sick of everyone else.)

Third, it was a double album, and while the first album was made up of conventional songs, the second album consisted of live musical jams, and it was pretty terrible. It was a lot like the third album of George Harrison's "All Things Must Pass," consisting of jams that most people played just once. Except it was even worse since while Ono sang conventionally on the first album, she did her unusual screaming style over most of the jams. For many people, it was painful and unlistenable.

So here are all the things I did to improve the album:

1) I got rid of nearly all of the second album of jams. I'm one of those people who find it painful and unlistenable. The only song I kept from it was "Well (Baby Please Don't Go)." Unlike pretty much everything else on the second album, this is an actual song. It's a cover of an obscure song by the Olympics, from 1958.

2) Speaking of that song, "Well (Baby Please Don't Go)," I'm using a version created a couple of days ago by my musical friend Lil Panda. He, like me, has been tinkering with the audio editing programs that have advanced greatly in recent years, thanks to AI technology. Both he and I had previously tried to get rid of Ono's screaming from some songs, but found it impossible. But Lil Panda figured it out: it turns out that Ono's screams are so unusual that they're interpreted by the AI program he uses as a saxophone! Unfortunately, Ono's wailing was all over this song. But the saxophone filter got rid of at least 90 percent of it. Thanks, Lil Panda! Note also, that Lil Panda used the version of this song that appeared on the Frank Zappa album "Playground Psychotics." It's the exact same performance as the one on "Some Time in New York City," recorded at a concert in the Fillmore East in New York City in June 1971, but it's about a minute longer.

3) For the first album of conventional songs, I got rid of two out of three songs that were mostly Ono's, "Sisters, O Sisters," and "We're All Water." For this album, Ono actually sings conventionally most of the time, except for about half of "We're All Water." By and large, she did decently when she stuck to conventional singing. It's a far cry from her screaming on the second album of live jams (and some of "We're All Water"). So these two songs aren't terrible. I just don't think they're that strong. Plus, let's face it, nearly everybody puts on an album like this to hear Lennon songs, not Ono songs. 

4) I kept one mostly Ono song, "Born in a Prison." I consider it the best of the Ono songs on the album. It's not fantastic, but it's as good as a couple of the Lennon ones. However, I made a slight edit. Lennon sings backing vocals on the choruses. I used the same editing tool Lil Panda used for the "Well" song to separate out Lennon's vocals from Ono's. Then I boosted his vocals some. I couldn't do more because the two voices didn't completely separate. But you can at least hear him better. That's why this is the other song that has "[Edit]" in the title.

5) I used a live version of "Luck of the Irish." To be honest, I made the alternate version of this album years ago, except for the two recent song edits mentioned above, so I have long forgotten why I chose that version. I listened to both this live version and the studio version again today, and I didn't see much difference at all. Both versions have lead vocals by Lennon and Ono in different parts, and even Ono sang very competently in a live setting. In case you're curious, this version was recorded during a concert/rally on behalf of political activist John Sinclair (who was imprisoned at the time), that took place University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan, in December 1971.

6) For "Angela," I used the "Ultimate Mix" that came out on the archival album "John Lennon: Gimme Some Truth" that was released decades later. It brings up organ playing that was completely buried in the original album version, and it has less reverb on it.

7) Finally, I added the song "Happy Xmas (War Is Over)" to the end of the album. This was a hit single that was released in December 1971, about six months prior to the release of this album. It was only a minor hit in the U.S. because it was released very late in the holiday season. But it was held back a year in Britain to maximize Christmas sales, and it made it to Number Four in the singles charts there. Since then, it has become a Christmas standard, being rereleased many times, and going back into the charts many times around Christmas. It has been widely covered as well. Being a classic, hit song, it really elevates the whole album, and ends it on a high note. Note that the 2005 reissue of the album included it at the end as well.

8) All the other songs are the same versions as on the original "Some Time in New York City" double album.

Ultimately, only so much can be done with this alternate version. This album is still a step down from the greatness of "John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band" and "Imagine." Some of the songs are a bit slapdash and generic musically. There was nothing I could do about the radical leftist political content, since that's a key part of every song. (Even "Happy Xmas" has an anti-Vietnam War message woven into it.) But being a political progressive myself, I'm in pretty close agreement with most of the political sentiments expressed here anyway. Lennon was going through a political phase and got a little carried away with his enthusiasm at times, but I think most of his political points have been proven right with the passage of time. 

Consider, for instance, the song "John Sinclair," complaining about how Sinclair got sentenced to ten years in prison for being caught with two joints of marijuana. Not only was Sinclair released early due to political pressure (and largely due to Lennon's high-profile involvement, it seems), but now marijuana is legal in half of the U.S. states as I write this in 2025, and medical marijuana is legal in many more. The ten-year prison sentence seems absurd in retrospect.

This album is 40 minutes long. The original double album version is 90 minutes long.

01 Woman Is the Nigger of the World (John Lennon)
02 Attica State (John Lennon)
03 Born in a Prison [Edit] (John Lennon & Yoko Ono)
04 New York City (John Lennon)
05 Luck of the Irish (John Lennon & Yoko Ono)
06 Sunday Bloody Sunday (John Lennon & Yoko Ono)
07 John Sinclair (John Lennon)
08 Angela [Ultimate Mix] (John Lennon & Yoko Ono)
09 Well [Baby Please Don't Go] [Edit] (John Lennon with Frank Zappa & the Mothers of Invention)
10 Happy Xmas [War Is Over] (John Lennon)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/WAUDdste

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/Dhlj0Bk5HcZ5Ofv/file

For the album cover, I wanted something similar to the official cover, but different. Luckily for me, the cover was done in the style of a newspaper front page, with song lyrics instead of articles. There were two newspaper pages included in the album art to get all the lyrics, so I just kept the title parts and used lyrics from the second page for the rest. 

Roxy Music - BBC Sessions, Volume 5: The High Road, Arenes de Frejus, Frejus, France, 8-27-1982

I'm extra psyched to be posting this, because up until the very last minute, I didn't know this recording existed. What I mean is, I had looked for a BBC recording from the band's 1982 tour, and I couldn't find one. I was all set to post the next (and final) album in this series, a BBC concert from 2001. But as I was writing the write-up for the post, I Googled some information about that, and happened to come across a mention of this show. So the 2001 concert will be renamed to Volume 6 and posted later.

One thing about BBC concerts is that it's sometimes hard to tell if a given show is from the BBC or not. People don't always keep track of the source, other than marking that it's "FM" if it's from a radio show. In this case, I didn't notice it until the last minute because it's closely related to, yet different from, one of the band's official live albums, "Heart Still Beating." It turns out that the BBC videotaped the band's 1982 concert in Frejus, France, and broadcast that on BBC TV. It later came out on VHS as a show apparently called "The High Road," which also was the name of the band's 1982 tour as a whole. Years later, that came out as the album "Heart Still Beating." However, the song order was mixed up, and some of the songs came from a concert in Glasgow, Britain, as well. 

I found the original video, which shows just the Frejus concert in whole, with all the songs in the correct order. I then converted that to audio and broke it into mp3s. There was a slight problem though. I found the lead vocals were low in the mix, and an analysis in the Audacity program confirmed that. So I remixed all the songs using the MVSEP program, specifically boosting the lead vocals relative to the instruments.

There was one other thing that I didn't like about the Frejus concert. Namely, that the song "More than This" wasn't included. That's my favorite Roxy Music song of all time. I thought for sure that would be included, because it was on the band's 1982 album "Avalon," which the tour was promoting, and it was the biggest hit from that album. But it turns out that for the entire tour, the band only played the song one time.

I found a way to include it though, although it's a bit sneaky. It turns out there's an excellent sounding bootleg of the band's tour rehearsal, which took place some time in the summer of 1982. That also included a cover of the Byrds classic "Eight Miles High," which was never performed during the tour. So I added those two at the end. I even patched in some cheering at the end of both songs to make them sound like a continuation of the concert. I think it makes a fitting end. It would have made perfect sense for the band to play "More than This" as the final encore, since it was their most recent big hit.

This album is an hour and 23 minutes long. Without the two extra songs at the end, it's an hour and 13 minutes.

01 The Main Thing (Roxy Music)
02 Out of the Blue (Roxy Music)
03 talk (Roxy Music)
04 Both Ends Burning (Roxy Music)
05 A Song for Europe (Roxy Music)
06 Can't Let Go (Roxy Music)
07 While My Heart Is Still Beating (Roxy Music)
08 Avalon (Roxy Music)
09 My Only Love (Roxy Music)
10 Dance Away (Roxy Music)
11 Love Is the Drug (Roxy Music)
12 Like a Hurricane (Roxy Music)
13 Editions of You (Roxy Music)
14 talk (Roxy Music)
15 Do the Strand (Roxy Music)
16 Jealous Guy (Roxy Music)
17 Eight Miles High (Roxy Music)
18 More than This (Roxy Music)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/QPWuo1Hv

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/ycMF5Z3jdCfluMh/file

The cover image is from this exact concert. It's a screenshot I took from the video.

Georgie Fame - BBC Sessions, Volume 5: BBC Four Sessions, LSO St. Luke's, London, Britain, 4-24-2005

Ever since I put together two albums of Georgie Fame and Alan Price performing as a duo for the BBC in the early 1970s, the two of them have been linked in my mind. So I find it interesting that when I recently found an Alan Price BBC concert that I'd previously missed, I independently found a Georgie Fame BBC concert that I'd previously missed. So it's fitting that I post both of them at the same time.

Fame, like Price, had his commercial heyday in the 1960s. But he was much more successful than Price, including having three Number One singles in Britain. So he remained popular enough in the 2000s for the BBC to broadcast one of his concerts. He boosted his appeal by including some other 1960s stars as guests: Geno Washington, Zoot Money, and Madeline Bell. Each of them got song to sing lead vocals. Then Money and Bell came back to help with the last song.

This concert is unreleased. It's from a BBC TV series called "BBC Four Sessions." I converted the video to audio then broke it into mp3s.

By the way, the date in the title is almost certainly the broadcast date, not the actual date of recording, which I always prefer to use when it's known.

This album is 58 minutes long.

01 Lawdy Miss Clawdy (Georgie Fame)
02 talk (Georgie Fame)
03 Get on the Right Track (Georgie Fame)
04 talk (Georgie Fame)
05 Zulu (Georgie Fame)
06 talk (Georgie Fame)
07 Humpty Dumpty (Georgie Fame & Geno Washington)
08 Yeh Yeh (Georgie Fame)
09 talk (Georgie Fame)
10 Will the Circle Be Unbroken (Georgie Fame & Zoot Money)
11 talk (Georgie Fame)
12 Point of No Return (Georgie Fame)
13 talk (Georgie Fame)
14 The Blues and Me (Georgie Fame & Madeline Bell)
15 talk (Georgie Fame)
16 Get Away (Georgie Fame)
17 talk (Georgie Fame)
18 Flamingo Allnighter (Georgie Fame with Madeline Bell & Zoot Money)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/1NY9xHDi

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/AyHmsETYf8u9OZG/file

The cover photo is from a concert at the Royal Albert Hall in London, on March 15, 2004.

Alan Price - BBC Sessions, Volume 3: In Concert, Royal Exchange Theater, Manchester, Britain, 12-24-1979

I was rather surprised to find this concert the other day. Alan Price was a big name in Britain in the 1960s and early 1970s, but his star had faded by the late 1970s. However, the BBC still gave him a concert. Here it is.

I previously posted two albums of Price's BBC studio sessions, all from the 1960s. Then in the early 1970s, he became part of a duo with Georgie Fame for a couple of years. I found two more albums of BBC studio sessions from that duo. Then, in 1973, he went back to being a solo artist. He had a big success composing the songs for the 1973 movie "O Lucky Man." After that, his album sales slowly dwindled. But he also had some success acting in movies and TV, and composing for more movie soundtracks.

As hinted above, his late 1970s albums didn't set the world on fire, either critically or commercially. However, this concert mostly consists of his songs from the 1960s, plus those from the early 1970s, especially the "O Lucky Man" soundtrack. So it does a decent job of being a "best of" collection.

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

This album is 56 minutes long.

01 O Lucky Man (Alan Price)
02 talk (Alan Price)
03 Don't Stop the Carnival (Alan Price)
04 The House That Jack Built (Alan Price)
05 talk (Alan Price)
06 Simon Smith and His Amazing Dancing Bear (Alan Price)
07 talk (Alan Price)
08 In Times like These (Alan Price)
09 talk (Alan Price)
10 I'm a Poor Boy (Alan Price)
11 Don't Try (Alan Price)
12 I Know When I've Had Enough - That's Alright Mama - Blue Moon of Kentucky (Alan Price)
13 Poor People (Alan Price)
14 Sell, Sell, Sell (Alan Price)
15 Goin' Down Slow (Alan Price)
16 talk (Alan Price)
17 Left Over People (Alan Price)
18 Away, Away (Alan Price)
19 talk (Alan Price)
20 This Is Your Lucky Day (Alan Price)
21 Baby of Mine (Alan Price)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/o5QMu74y

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/zjmnf4z7z5EXvAc/file

The cover image is a screenshot I took from the British TV show "The Basil Brush Show" in November 1979.

David Bowie - BBC Sessions, Volume 13: 2002-2003

Here's yet another album of David Bowie performing for the BBC. Unlike most others from around this time period, this one is a collection of BBC studio sessions. It so happens all of them were broadcast on TV instead of on the radio.

Everything here is officially unreleased, at least as far as I can tell. The first three songs are from the popular "Top of the Pops" TV show. Most appearances on that show are lip-synced, but these versions are included because they were actually done live. The next four songs are from another BBC TV show, "Friday Night with Jonathan Ross."

The eighth song is from the BBC TV show "Parkinson." The next three, tracks 9 to 11, are from yet another BBC TV show, "Later... with Jools Holland."

Everything I've mentioned so far is from 2002. But the last two tracks are from 2003, a second appearance on the TV show "Friday Night with Jonathan Ross."

Generally speaking, the songs sound really good. But there was a lot of cheering on most of them. So I ran all the songs through the MVSEP audio editing program and removed the crowd noise.

This album is 54 minutes long.

01 Slow Burn (David Bowie)
02 Fame (David Bowie)
03 I Took a Trip on a Gemini Spaceship (David Bowie)
04 Everyone Says Hi (David Bowie)
05 Fashion (David Bowie)
06 Slip Away (David Bowie)
07 Ziggy Stardust (David Bowie)
08 Life on Mars (David Bowie)
09 Rebel Rebel (David Bowie)
10 5.15 The Angels Have Gone (David Bowie)
11 Heathen [The Rays] (David Bowie)
12 Modern Love (David Bowie)
13 New Killer Star (David Bowie)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/8fTrzEZY

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/d68cHTrIuHTKqkw/file

The cover photo was taken backstage at a concert for the BBC in September 2002.

Joan Armatrading - BBC Sessions, Volume 3: In Concert, Colston Hall, Bristol, Britain, 4-20-2010

Normally, I'm reluctant to post an album from a musical act that takes place well after their commercial and/or critical prime. For Joan Armatrading, that was mainly the 1970s and 80s. So I wasn't sure if I'd post this one. Then I listened to it. 

I was pleasantly surprised. I had no idea she rocked this much! I tend to think of Armatrading more of a singer-songwriter folkie type. But for this concert, she was in full rocking mode, with power chords and guitar solos and so on, more so than either of the previous BBC concerts I'd posted from her. There were only a couple of songs done in more of an acoustic style. The song selection is very good too. This might be my favorite out of her three BBC concerts.

Everything here is officially unreleased. The sound quality is excellent, so I didn't have to make any fixes.

This album is 57 minutes long.

01 Show Some Emotion (Joan Armatrading)
02 talk (Joan Armatrading)
03 All the Way from America (Joan Armatrading)
04 Into the Blues (Joan Armatrading)
05 Love and Affection (Joan Armatrading)
06 My Baby's Gone (Joan Armatrading)
07 talk (Joan Armatrading)
08 This Charming Life (Joan Armatrading)
09 The Weakness in Me (Joan Armatrading)
10 talk (Joan Armatrading)
11 Best Dress On (Joan Armatrading)
12 Call Me Names (Joan Armatrading)
13 Me Myself I (Joan Armatrading)
14 Willow (Joan Armatrading)
15 Drop the Pilot (Joan Armatrading)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/oXoS7kZt

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/orEmMv8BogOYKBV/file

The cover photo is from a concert at Royal Albert Hall, in London, on April 13, 2008.

Paul Weller - BBC Sessions, Volume 9: In Concert, BBC Radio Broadcasting Theatre, London, Britain, 4-23-2001

Here's another BBC album by Paul Weller. This one is rather unusual in that it contains a full solo acoustic concert. I believe 2001 was the first time Weller did a major tour in fully acoustic mode.

This concert bears a strong similarity to the official album "Days of Speed," released in late 2001. That is a compilation of various performances in Europe from this acoustic tour. So many of the songs are the same even though all of the exact performances are different. I prefer this though, as I generally prefer single full concerts with banter between songs over live albums that are compilations from lots of concerts. Admittedly, there isn't a lot of banter here, but there is some.

There's not much else to say. The sound quality is excellent despite everything here being officially unreleased.

On a related note, as I write this in January 2025, Weller recently released a new studio album, "66." I gave it a listen, and I was pleasantly surprised at how good it is. In my opinion, most songwriters his age tend to lose some of their creative fire after putting out dozens of albums (the title refers to his age of 66 years old at the time it came out), but Weller is still going strong.

This album is an hour and 12 minutes long.

01 talk (Paul Weller)
02 The Loved (Paul Weller)
03 Brand New Start (Paul Weller)
04 Out of the Sinking (Paul Weller)
05 talk (Paul Weller)
06 Clues (Paul Weller)
07 talk (Paul Weller)
08 All the Pictures on the Wall (Paul Weller)
09 Amongst Butterflies (Paul Weller)
10 talk (Paul Weller)
11 Science (Paul Weller)
12 Back in the Fire (Paul Weller)
13 talk (Paul Weller)
14 Sweet Pea, My Sweet Pea (Paul Weller)
15 talk (Paul Weller)
16 Here's One that Got Away (Paul Weller)
17 That's Entertainment (Paul Weller)
18 talk (Paul Weller)
19 Frightened (Paul Weller)
20 You Do Something to Me (Paul Weller)
21 There's No Drinking After You're Dead (Paul Weller)
22 Everything Has a Price to Pay (Paul Weller)
23 talk (Paul Weller)
24 Wild Wood (Paul Weller)
25 Headstart for Happiness (Paul Weller)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/D639zJRv

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/dhF9vWZB3k4aFeF/file

The cover photo is from a concert in London on July 1, 2001.

Final Poll Results

Right at the end of 2024, I made a poll asking you which musical acts would you like to see me post BBC albums for sooner rather than later. Note I have literally hundreds of acts with at least one BBC album I could see post. This poll is specifically for the "big acts" where I have at least four BBC albums I've already made, sometimes a lot more.

The votes have died down, so here is the final count:

Incredible String Band           11
Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers    9
Caravan                          8
R.E.M.                           8
Elvis Costello                   8
Crowded House                    8
Emmylou Harris                   8
XTC                              7
Genesis                          7
James Taylor                     6
Eric Clapton                     6
Flaming Lips                     6
Robert Plant                     5
Thin Lizzy                       5
Loudon Wainwright III            5
White Stripes                    5
Amy Winehouse                    4
Johnny Cash                      4
Police                           4
Stone the Crows                  3
Supergrass                       3
Pretenders                       2
Queen                            2
Oasis                            1
Texas                            0

I'm still really surprised the Incredible String Band won. And I'm just as surprised that the likes of Queen and Oasis got so few votes. But I'll abide by these results and soon start posting albums in rough order from this list.

Note though that since I posted that poll, I've been organizing the unposted BBC part of my collection, and I've found a few more acts with at least four BBC albums still to post. It's a shame I didn't think to add them to the poll:

Blur
Peter Gabriel
Robyn Hitchcock
Nils Lofgren
Simple Minds
Bruce Springsteen
Richard Thompson (solo)

D'oh! It's too late to add them to the poll, now, but if you have strong feelings about any of those, please let me know here.

Before I get to posting any of the above BBC albums, I first want to "clean house" and post BBC albums for those artists were I've already posted at least one BBC album and aren't mentioned above. It turns out there's a lot more of those than I'd realized, so this may take me some time. Here's what you're likely to see more of when it comes to BBC albums in the near future:

Joan Armatrading
Joan Baez
Bee Gees
David Bowie
Jackson Browne
Donovan
Richie Havens
Humble Pie
Ronnie Lane
Nick Lowe
Van Morrison
Robert Palmer
Tom Paxton
Roxy Music
Squeeze
Al Stewart
Rod Stewart
Supertramp
T Rex
U2
Paul Weller

If you feel strongly about getting some of those sooner rather than later, please let me know about that too. Thanks. And thanks for your patience. There's so much good music worth posting that it overwhelms me at times. This BBC stuff is just one small part of so much more I want to post here.

John Cale, Nick Cave & Chrissie Hynde - Songwriters' Circle, Subterania Club, London, Britain, 7-9-1999

I recently discovered a bunch of "Songwriters' Circle" albums, and I plan on posting more of them soon. Most of them are pretty hard to find, except this one. It probably gets around more due to the star line-up of John Cale (formerly of the Velvet Underground), Nick Cave, and Chrissie Hynde of the Pretenders.

By the way, I've already posted two Songwriters' Circle albums. They all follow the same format, in which three singer-songwriters are chosen and take turns singing songs in an acoustic format. Sometimes they join in a bit on each other's songs, sometimes not. Then, at the end, they usually sing a song together. 

I've already posted two such shows. Here's one with Jimmy Webb, Chip Taylor, and Nick Lowe:

https://albumsthatshouldexist.blogspot.com/2023/03/jimmy-webb-chip-taylor-nick-lowe.html

And here's one with Richard Thompson, Suzanne Vega, and Loudon Wainwright III:

https://albumsthatshouldexist.blogspot.com/2022/12/richard-thompson-suzanne-vega-loudon.html

I have figured out all of these come from a BBC TV show called "Songwriters' Circle." But the odd thing is, this show has had two brief runs. There were a bunch of shows in 1999, including the one I'm posting here. Then there was a second bunch in 2010 and 2011. There haven't been any since. All the episodes remain unreleased as audio albums, but you can often find the videos of them on YouTube.

For this show, I found out there are two versions. One ends with "The Ship Song," and goes into a BBC DJ announcing the end of the show. Another has one more song, a cover of "I'm Waiting for the Man" by the Velvet Underground. I used the shorter version for most of this concert, since I had that in better quality. But I added in the extra song from the other version.

This album is 49 minutes long.

01 talk (John Cale)
02 Dying on the Vine (John Cale)
03 talk (Chrissie Hynde)
04 Talk of the Town (Chrissie Hynde)
05 talk (Nick Cave)
06 West Country Girl (Nick Cave)
07 Thoughtless Kind (John Cale)
08 talk (Chrissie Hynde)
09 Kid (Chrissie Hynde)
10 talk (Nick Cave)
11 Henry Lee (Nick Cave)
12 talk (John Cale)
13 Fear Is a Man's Best Friend (John Cale)
14 talk (Chrissie Hynde)
15 I'll Stand by You (Chrissie Hynde)
16 talk (Nick Cave)
17 Into My Arms (Nick Cave)
18 talk (John Cale)
19 Ship of Fools (John Cale)
20 Back on the Chain Gang (Chrissie Hynde)
21 The Ship Song (Nick Cave)
22 talk (Chrissie Hynde)
23 I'm Waiting for the Man (John Cale, Nick Cave & Chrissie Hynde)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/mKtJ7Xwt

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/3mDwN0ngPHtMjEJ/file

The image is from this exact concert. Unfortunately, all I could find was a rather low-res video. So I took a screenshot of that. But I couldn't do much to improve the quality in this case.

David Byrne - BBC Four Sessions, Union Chapel, London, Britain, 12-2002

Here's the only BBC concert by David Byrne that I could find. If you know of any others, please let me know.

This is from a TV program, apparently called "BBC Four Sessions," that ran for a few years and generally was edited down to hour-long episodes (I think). But for some reason, we seem to have gotten a full concert this time, judging by the length.

The sound quality is excellent, despite it all being unreleased. And if you want, you can find the video of the full concert on YouTube. 

I've already posted a Byrne concert from 2001, which is only a year earlier. But this one is pretty different, mainly due to the fact that he was backed by a full orchestra for the concert. So he picked songs that worked well for that, including some from his Talking Heads years.

This album is an hour and 21 minutes long.

01 talk (David Byrne)
02 [Nothing But] Flowers (David Byrne)
03 talk (David Byrne)
04 And She Was (David Byrne)
05 Once in a Lifetime (David Byrne)
06 talk (David Byrne)
07 God's Child (David Byrne)
08 The Great Intoxication (David Byrne)
09 talk (David Byrne)
10 Un Di Felice (David Byrne)
11 The Revolution (David Byrne)
12 talk (David Byrne)
13 Sax and Violins (David Byrne)
14 This Must Be the Place [Naive Melody] (David Byrne)
15 What a Day That Was (David Byrne)
16 Like Humans Do (David Byrne)
17 talk (David Byrne)
18 U.B. Jesus (David Byrne)
19 talk (David Byrne)
20 Life during Wartime (David Byrne)
21 Lazy (David Byrne)
22 I Wanna Dance with Somebody [Who Loves Me] (David Byrne)
23 talk (David Byrne)
24 Ausencia (David Byrne)
25 The Accident (David Byrne)
26 Road to Nowhere (David Byrne)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/ZA2czdLT

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/L7fsWdd0CsAr5Wx/file

The cover photo is from this exact concert.

Phil Ochs - Burg-Waldeck Festival, Dorweiler, Germany, 6-1968

Here's something I'm especially proud to present. I'm a fan of folk singer Phil Ochs. I've been wanting to post something from him for a long time, but I wanted it to be something special. I finally found it with this concert.

This is a completely unreleased bootleg, with excellent sound quality. It seems that a German radio station made the recording, though it appears it was never actually broadcast. However, despite the quality, this bootleg hasn't gotten around much due to many sonic flaws. But thanks to many recent improvements with audio editing technology, I was able to fix nearly all of the flaws, so this should be a really good listen.

Since this is my first (but hopefully not last) Phil Ochs post, I just want to say that I think he's very underrated. He was most popular in the 1960s, then had increasing mental problems in the early 1970s (he suffered from depression and being bipolar), finally committing suicide in 1976. Being a politically progressive person myself, I like the fact that his songs were very political and pulled no punches. He probably isn't so well remembered today precisely because he was so provocative and radical with his songs. For instance, he didn't just sing in "stop the war" generalities about the Vietnam War, he sang about human rights atrocities committed by U.S. soldiers (this before events like the My Lai Massacre were generally known) as well as the overall immorality of certain aspects of U.S. foreign policy. A lot of people may disagree with his views, but it can't be denied that felt strongly about his opinions and thought he was being patriotic in his own way by shining a spotlight on problems he thought needed fixing.

If you want to know more about him, here's his Wikipedia page:

Phil Ochs - Wikipedia

This concert recording is directly tied to his political activism. It took place during a rock festival, but not a typical one. The following is a relatively short summary of what I learned from the German Wikipedia entry about the festival (translated into English). The Burg-Waldeck Festival began in 1964, held in a remote location near the ruins of the Waldeck castle in Germany. It started out both as a festival and kind of a workshop, where creative people of all types could meet and exchange ideas. There were lectures, poetry readings, training sessions, and more, as well as typical musical performances, mostly of acoustic folk music. 

With each passing year, the festival got larger, but also more radical with its leftist politics. The youth of many countries were getting radicalized as the 1960s went on, thanks to the Vietnam War and the counter-culture movement. That was especially true in Germany, where many youths were having a dramatic opposing reaction to the Nazism of their parents' generation. So, for instance, by the 1967 festival, the official theme of the festival was the political song.

Things got even more radical in the 1968 festival. It also was the biggest, with 6,000 people showing up. Phil Ochs and Odetta were the only big names from the U.S. to show up, but there were performers from other countries, especially Germans singing in German. But even as radically leftist the festival had become, it wasn't radical enough for some. Many German socialists and even communists came to the festival and caused trouble, especially when there were performers who they didn't consider radical enough. They often occupied the stage, waved Vietcong flags, read leaflets, and demanded political discussions instead of musical performances. Due to this chaotic situation, many performers were afraid to go on stage. There were numerous delays and cancellations.

Given all that, it was probably a fortunate thing for Ochs that his songs were almost all political, and often expressed some pretty radically leftist views. But even he had trouble with some elements in the crowd. You can hear that on this recording with his comments in the very first track. And later, he made more comments along those lines, and also played some songs that criticized people on the left as well, for instance "Outside of a Small Circle of Friends."

By the way, the next Burg-Waldeck festival in 1969 would also be the last. The political situation got more out of hand as some people radicalized even more, while others did not. Plus, the general folk music tone of the festival was out of touch with the increasing focus on rock music with full bands. There even was some violence, apparently most done by conservative locals who hated the festival. For instance, cables were cut, car tires were punctured, a wooden stage was burned down, and a stage sculpture was blown up!

Anyway, getting back to the music, the festival went from June 12th to June 17th. Ochs performed multiple times. It seems there's no telling what date or dates this music is from, which is why I didn't give a special date in the album title. It almost certainly is from at least two different concerts, and probably three (if not more), since he performed six songs twice and one song three times in the bootleg recording I took this from. I've cut things down so there is just one version of each song. There's also no telling the "correct" order, so I generally stuck with the order of the bootleg I came across, but I moved two songs to the end that sounded like natural closers.

It turns out there was also great variety in the sound quality of the songs. The first few had no problems. But after that, the overall sound quality stayed high, but there were static interruptions and slight cuts of silence here and there. In the notes I found, this apparently was on the original recording, not some later digital artifacts. For the silent bits, I generally just deleted the gaps when they were small enough, usually only a fraction of a second. But bigger ones were problematic, since simply deleting them interrupted the rhythm of the songs. Luckily, there weren't too many of those. But when there were, I often managed to patch in bits from elsewhere in the song, for instance with repeating choruses. For one particularly big gap in the song "Joe Hill," I had to use a few seconds from a bootleg of a different concert.

But just as common, or more common, were the bursts of noise or static. Up until recently, I would have been helpless to fix this. But I found a way, using the iZotope audio editing program. I ran the troubled parts of songs through that program's "de-rustle" feature, and that got rid of the noises nearly every time while keeping the music. Probably some of the musical richness was lost, so I tried to use that only when necessary. Those are the songs with "[Edit]" in the names. I actually made even more edits than for just those songs (and it would be long and boring to explain them all), but those were the really tricky ones. There's probably a few little problems remaining here and there, but hopefully I got rid of the vast majority of them.

Anyway, it was a lot of work, but this should now be one of a handful of the best Ochs recordings out there, bootleg or official. For all the songs, it was just his voice and his acoustic guitar. There's also a fair amount of interesting banter before most of the songs.

This album is an hour and 18 minutes long.

01 talk (Phil Ochs)
02 Flower Lady (Phil Ochs)
03 talk (Phil Ochs)
04 Outside of a Small Circle of Friends (Phil Ochs)
05 talk (Phil Ochs)
06 Changes (Phil Ochs)
07 Rhythms of Revolution (Phil Ochs)
08 talk (Phil Ochs)
09 Joe Hill [Edit] (Phil Ochs)
10 talk (Phil Ochs)
11 Draft Dodger Rag [Edit] (Phil Ochs)
12 White Boots Marching in a Yellow Land [Edit] (Phil Ochs)
13 I'm Gonna Say It Now [Edit] (Phil Ochs)
14 talk (Phil Ochs)
15 Crucifixion [Edit] (Phil Ochs)
16 Floods of Florence [Edit] (Phil Ochs)
17 talk (Phil Ochs)
18 There but for Fortune [Edit] (Phil Ochs)
19 Is There Anybody Here [Edit] (Phil Ochs)
20 talk (Phil Ochs)
21 The Highwayman (Phil Ochs)
22 talk (Phil Ochs)
23 Cops of the World (Phil Ochs)
24 talk (Phil Ochs)
25 I Ain't Marchin' Anymore (Phil Ochs)
26 talk (Phil Ochs)
27 The War Is Over (Phil Ochs)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/MshzUys6

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/jncKXCQM5VejCyU/file

This cover photo is from this exact concert. I found a black and white movie of one of the songs, and took a screenshot from it. Then I used the Palette program to colorize it. After that, I used the Krea AI program to sharpen the image.

Jethro Tull - Tower Theatre, Upper Darby, PA, 11-25-1987

I've been posting a lot of BBC concerts lately as part of my big BBC project. But sometimes, non-BBC sources are even better. Here's a case in point. 

I wanted a Jethro Tull concert from right after the release of their 1987 album "Crest of a Knave." I'm not a huge fan of this band, but I like that album. In particular, I remember as a kid hearing the songs "Steel Monkey" and "Farm on the Freeway" on the radio a lot, and I think those are very strong songs. Unfortunately, the BBC didn't record a concert for this band in the time period I wanted. But luckily, a local radio station did (in conjunction with the nationwide radio show "King Biscuit Flower Hour").

This unreleased concert has great sound quality and a good set list, including the "Crest of a Knave" songs I was looking for.

This album is an hour and 55 minutes long.

01 Instrumental (Jethro Tull)
02 Songs from the Wood (Jethro Tull)
03 talk (Jethro Tull)
04 Thick as a Brick (Jethro Tull)
05 Steel Monkey (Jethro Tull)
06 talk (Jethro Tull)
07 Farm on the Freeway (Jethro Tull)
08 Heavy Horses (Jethro Tull)
09 talk (Jethro Tull)
10 Living in the Past (Jethro Tull)
11 Serenade to a Cuckoo [Instrumental] (Jethro Tull)
12 talk (Jethro Tull)
13 Budapest (Jethro Tull)
14 talk (Jethro Tull)
15 Hunting Girl (Jethro Tull)
16 Bach Violin Concerto in E [Third Movement] [Instrumental] (Jethro Tull)
17 Keyboard and Drum Duet [Instrumental] (Jethro Tull)
18 Wond'ring Aloud (Jethro Tull)
19 Skating Away on the Thin Ice of a New Day (Jethro Tull)
20 Jump Start (Jethro Tull)
21 talk (Jethro Tull)
22 Too Old to Rock 'n' Roll, Too Young to Die (Jethro Tull)
23 Aqualung (Jethro Tull)
24 Locomotive Breath (Jethro Tull)
25 Thick as a Brick [Outro] (Jethro Tull)
26 Wind Up (Jethro Tull)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/DapXhj7P

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/MUOAHdYqj9K7u12/file

The cover photo of lead singer Ian Anderson was taken at a concert in Chicago, Illinois, on December 4, 1987.

Ronnie Lane - BBC Sessions, Volume 3: In Concert, Golders Green Hippodrome, London, Britain, 12-13-1974

Here's another BBC album by ex-Faces member Ronnie Lane. This is the third out of four that I've found.

Like the previous volume in this series, this is a BBC concert. Both of them are close in time, set about six months apart. But in between, Lane released his album "Anymore for Anymore." So naturally there are a good number of songs performed from that album.

The concert has been officially released in full as part of the album "You Never Can Tell." However, for some reason, it was badly mixed, with the lead vocals too quiet. So I fixed that for all songs using the UVR5 audio editing program.

The concert is a bit strange in that all the talking between songs is done by a BBC DJ, as if Lane could only sing, not talk. But that was the occasional style for BBC concerts in the early 1970s.

This album is 49 minutes long.

01 talk (Ronnie Lane)
02 Last Orders (Ronnie Lane)
03 talk (Ronnie Lane)
04 Anniversary (Ronnie Lane)
05 talk (Ronnie Lane)
06 Roll On Babe (Ronnie Lane)
07 talk (Ronnie Lane)
08 From the Late to the Early - How Come (Ronnie Lane)
09 talk (Ronnie Lane)
10 You're So Rude (Ronnie Lane)
11 talk (Ronnie Lane)
12 What Went Down [That Night with You] (Ronnie Lane)
13 talk (Ronnie Lane)
14 Chicken Wired (Ronnie Lane)
15 talk (Ronnie Lane)
16 Sweet Virginia (Ronnie Lane)
17 talk (Ronnie Lane)
18 Ooh La La (Ronnie Lane)
19 talk (Ronnie Lane)
20 You Never Can Tell (Ronnie Lane)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/d7As1s9C

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/AnZiO0wEN8Nw5oZ/file

The cover photo is probably from the year before, when Lane's concerts took on many of the stylings of a traveling circus.