Linda Ronstadt with Country Gazette - McCabe's Guitar Shop, Los Angeles, CA, 6-2-1973

The other day, I stumbled across a pretty rare Linda Ronstadt concert bootleg. I really like it, as almost all of the songs are country songs that she didn't put on any of her albums or normally play in concert, and the sound quality is excellent. So I'm posting it here to help give it more attention.

Apparently, in the mid-1970s, Ronstadt occasionally played with this band, the Country Gazette, doing all country covers. Sometimes, she did the same with John Starling. But for whatever reason, these generally haven't been bootlegged, with this one exception. Most of it sounds excellent, as is probably a soundboard. But note that the sound quality for the first two songs isn't as good, with a bit more murk and hiss. Even those two sound pretty decent though.

As an aside, while I was searching the Internet to learn more about this, I came across a similar recording, of both Ronstadt and Emmylou Harris playing with the Seldom Scene in 1975. But, weirdly, they're part of an archive at the University of North Carolina at Raleigh, and you can only download the mp3s if you are physically on that campus! So if anyone reading this is a student there, please do us a favor and free these up for everyone else to hear:

https://dc.lib.unc.edu/cdm/search/searchterm/Linda%20Ronstadt%20and%20Emmylou%20Harris%20with%20The%20Seldom%20Scene/order/nosort

Anyway, getting back to this concert, although Ronstadt put a fair number of country songs on her early 1970s albums, only one of the songs here, "Crazy Arms," had appeared on any of her albums at the time of this concert. Another one, "I Can't Help It (If I'm Still in Love with You)," would appear on her 1974 album, and would be a minor country hit. So this is pretty much a "lost" Ronstadt album, except performed live.

The location of the concert is not in question. But I had a hard time figuring out just when this concert took place. Some bootlegs have it in 1974, with no specific date, but others have it in 1972, also without a specific date. I also found a comment on the Internet from someone who claimed to have been to the exact show, and taped it, and was certain it took place on June 2, 1973. I wasn't sure which way to go, until I listened to the banter between the songs. At one point, Ronstadt talked about how she'd recently been the opening act for a Neil Young tour. I Googled that, and found out that tour with Young and Ronstadt took place in early 1973 (the "Time Fades Away" tour), and ended in April 1973. Thus, the June 2, 1973 fits her comments perfectly, and must be correct.

I should note that I'm not that into country music, and I'm not that big of a Linda Ronstadt fan either. But I like this album! It's a good bunch of songs, sung and performed very well, with some nice banter between the songs.

This concert is fairly short, at only 35 minutes long.

01 Rocky Top (Linda Ronstadt with Country Gazette)
02 talk (Linda Ronstadt with Country Gazette)
03 Crazy Arms (Linda Ronstadt with Country Gazette)
04 talk (Linda Ronstadt with Country Gazette)
05 Once More (Linda Ronstadt with Country Gazette)
06 talk (Linda Ronstadt with Country Gazette)
07 Wicked Path of Sin (Linda Ronstadt with Country Gazette)
08 talk (Linda Ronstadt with Country Gazette)
09 I Can't Help It [If I'm Still in Love with You] (Linda Ronstadt with Country Gazette)
10 talk (Linda Ronstadt with Country Gazette)
11 Rollin' in My Sweet Baby's Arms (Linda Ronstadt with Country Gazette)
12 talk (Linda Ronstadt with Country Gazette)
13 The Poor Old Slave (Linda Ronstadt with Country Gazette)
14 talk (Linda Ronstadt with Country Gazette)
15 Angel Band (Linda Ronstadt with Country Gazette)
16 talk (Linda Ronstadt with Country Gazette)
17 Orange Blossom Special [Instrumental Version] (Linda Ronstadt with Country Gazette)

https://www.imagenetz.de/bYpMP

The cover art photo is from a New Year's Eve TV special hosted by Dick Clark at the end of 1973.