Here's a remarkable bootleg recording. I never knew it existed until I luckily stumbled upon it yesterday. I've immediately fixed it up so I can share it. In short, in 1994, the Eagles got back together after 14 years and recorded a concert for MTV Unplugged. They later released it as the album "Hell Freezes Over" with four additional studio tracks. It went on to sell millions and millions of copies. This is not that. But the very next night they did a second MTV Unplugged show, and this is that. This is actually better than the "Hell Freezes Over" in several ways I will explain. If you're an Eagles fan, you definitely will want to hear this.
First off, I have to point out the incredible sound quality. Even though it's a bootleg, the sound is so good that sometimes you can hear the squeaking of fingers sliding on the guitar strings. Clearly, this was professionally recorded as part of a plan to make the "Hell Freezes Over" album, but the other night was chosen instead.
What's even better though is that this is a full concert, lasting three minutes shy of two hours, whereas "Hell Freezes Over" only includes about 60 minutes of live music. There are 22 songs here, compared to 11 live songs on that album. As mentioned above, that album had the four studio tracks as well. This concert has those same four new songs ("Get Over It," "Love Will Keep Us Alive," "The Girl from Yesterday," and "Learn to Be Still"), but in live versions. Even the live tracks on "Hell Freezes Over" apparently had a lot of tweaking and overdubbing done to them. There's none of that here. Nor is any necessary. The performance is pretty much flawless. (But the band is known for being perfectionist, so I suppose the tinkering isn't that surprising.)
Ironically, given what I just said about tinkering, I did some editing myself - but not of the music. One thing I did was cut out a lot of dead air between songs. Because this was being recorded to potentially be shown on TV, the band wanted to get everything just right, so there were longer delays than usual between songs. There also were false starts to two of the songs. I got rid of those as well. Additionally, I separated all the talking between songs onto their own tracks and usually upped the volume on those some.
In my opinion, if you want just one live Eagles recording, this is the one to get. It was recorded right at the tail end of their main hit making era, with the five most important band members (from the "Long Run" era) still in the band and relatively young and vital. And it's not just a carbon copy of their studio recordings. The first portion of it is in acoustic format, mostly. They go back to rocking with electric instruments for the second half, but even that is different due to the inclusion of a full orchestra.
01 Peaceful Easy Feeling (Eagles)
02 talk (Eagles)
03 Best of My Love (Eagles)
04 talk (Eagles)
05 Tequila Sunrise (Eagles)
06 Help Me through the Night (Eagles)
07 talk (Eagles)
08 The Heart of the Matter (Eagles)
09 talk (Eagles)
10 Love Will Keep Us Alive (Eagles)
11 talk (Eagles)
12 Learn to Be Still (Eagles)
13 talk (Eagles)
14 Hotel California (Eagles)
15 Wasted Time (Eagles)
16 Lover's Moon (Eagles)
17 talk (Eagles)
18 Pretty Maids All in a Row (Eagles)
19 I Can't Tell You Why (Eagles)
20 talk (Eagles)
21 The Girl from Yesterday (Eagles)
22 talk (Eagles)
23 New York Minute (Eagles)
24 talk (Eagles)
25 The Last Resort (Eagles)
26 talk (Eagles)
27 Take It Easy (Eagles)
28 One of These Nights (Eagles)
29 In the City (Eagles)
30 Heartache Tonight (Eagles)
31 talk (Eagles)
32 Life in the Fast Lane (Eagles)
33 talk (Eagles)
34 Get Over It (Eagles)
35 talk (Eagles)
36 Desperado (Eagles)
The cover art photo comes from the two nights the band played their MTV Unplugged concerts. Chances are it's from the first night, and is a screenshot from the video of that show.
This combined with your other album posting from Shoreline is going to be a great listen. I've been trying to find an audio version of Joe Walsh's 'Farewell Concert', I can't even find the video (pro-shot) anymore. It's when he's decided to join the Eagles. He plays, solo (Barnstorm Band if I recall). Then members of the Eagles come out and 'back' him. It's quite a unique performance. The dynamic is really different. If you can find it I'd be really happy to hear it. Many thanks....
ReplyDeleteI've never heard of a Joe Walsh farewell concert. But I just did some Googling. Could it be this? The Eagles do show up for one song.
Deletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w1-AVh-ZylI
Yes. I think that's it! Maybe the bootleg was called that. Definitely that tour. Great find! I will try find the full concert (maybe that's it, seems a bit short?) A Joe Walsh (acoustic) album would be a great project.
DeletePerhaps a reconstruction of the full concert of the link you sent me would be of interest? It is part of an official release
ReplyDeletehttps://www.udiscovermusic.com/stories/joe-walsh-you-cant-argue-with-a-sick-mind-album/
Thank you, I appreciate the fact that you put the "talks" as separate tracks. Do you know of, or maybe you can find, any decent live recordings of Pink Floyd playing material from Obscured By Clouds? Thanks, Andy
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately, they only ever played a few songs from that album. I have those on an album I've put together of their live rarities from the early 1970s. I could post that there, if there's interest.
DeleteI would certainly be interested in that, I'm sure lots of others would too.
DeleteNick Mason's Saucerfull of Secrets band has recently delved into early Floyd material. I know it's not in periodical context but it's really great and there's some O.B.C material.
ReplyDeleteI have downloaded this a few times over the years but this is the best version I have heard by a country mile. Well Done.
ReplyDeleteThanks. Yeah, the sound is fantastic.
DeleteI second the interest!
ReplyDeleteIn what, exactly?
Deletegreat stuff thankx for sharing
ReplyDeleteHaving just gotten back again in the Eagles, if you want to go a bit deeper than only the hits, you should check out the Eagles' Appearance at Don Kirshner's rock concert. It has a lot of their good stuff from their first three albums, including versions of Tewnty-One, Midnight Flyer and Doolin-Dalton that arguably best their studio counterparts. Obviously, it's much more country rock-ish than their later stuff. It also includes Jackson Browne singing the possibly best version of "Your Bright Baby Blues".
ReplyDeleteThis is purely personal, but I also have to take some slight issue with the description of this line up as being the "five most important band members". Randy Meiner was a major part of the Eagles sound. Now, me, I prefer thaeir first four albums (the "country rock era") to their later work and feel that "The Long Run" is a pretty terrible album, but to each their own.
Still, check out that early concert if you have the time, it's really good.
I'll put that on my list of things to check out. Thanks.
DeleteBro this is a video?
ReplyDeleteNo, not that I know of.
DeleteDo you have a video on these concert the unplugged 1994 second night of eagles?
Deletethe "longer delays between songs" you wrote is for commercials. since it was for tv (cable, specifically) when its a concert such as this its common to have time build in for commercials. that's also why there's minimal talking in those breaks (on mic anyway)
ReplyDeleteAh, thanks for the info.
Deleteexcuse me, is this the same album? https://takemetal.org/the-eagles-unplugged-live-2019/
ReplyDeleteit has the same track list, it is just a doubt
I'm guessing it is. That looks like a bootleg too. There's a whole bunch of these "grey market" albums that are bootlegs but are packaged and marketed as if they're legit.
Deletethanks for the answer
DeleteThanks for continuing to send thanks. :) I do appreciate it.
ReplyDeleteEveryone thinks "Love Will Keep Us Alive" is an Eagles song. It was written and first performed by one of my favorite artists; Jim Capaldi of Traffic fame. Traffic put out about 8 or 9 albums. Jim Capaldi put out 14 solo albums.
ReplyDelete