California Jam, Ontario Motor Speedway, Ontario, CA, 4-6-1974, Part 1: Rare Earth

I mentioned recently that I plan on putting more effort into posting big festival concerts, because those often seem to slip through the cracks and get forgotten. This is a good example. Here's what Wikipedia has to say about the 1974 California Jam:

"The California Jam attracted 250,000 paying music fans. The festival set what were then records for the loudest amplification system ever installed, the highest paid attendance, and highest gross in history. It was one of the last of the original wave of rock festivals, as well as one of the most well-executed and financially successful, and presaged the era of media consolidation and the corporatization of the rock music industry."

There's a Wikipedia page on the concert, if you want to know more:

California Jam - Wikipedia

In short, from what I understand, ABC TV had a show called "In Concert." The makers of that show came up with the idea of putting on a rock festival, then dedicated four episodes of their show broadcasting the highlights from it, with some portions also broadcast on radio. But that was only part of the all-day concert. All of the Deep Purple and part of the Emerson, Lake and Palmer sets have been officially released, but none of the rest has. I was able to find most of the concert in good sound quality, but some bits are still missing.

This first set, by Rare Earth is a case in point. I found four songs in soundboard worthy quality. But it appears a fifth song, "Get Ready," was played as an encore. That probably wasn't included in the TV and/or radio broadcasts, so it seems to have disappeared. The vocals were low in the mix, so I adjusted that using the UVR5 audio editing program.

Rare Earth was best known for their hits in 1970 and 1971, "[I Know] I'm Losing You," "I Just Want to Celebrate," and "Get Ready." Their star was fading by 1974, but they still had this one big last hurrah, which was the biggest concert they ever played.

Eight musical acts performed at the California Jam. I'm posting each of their sets as separate albums, in chronological order, starting with this one. Some of the sets from the biggest acts are easy to find, but other sets are very rare. I haven't seen all of the festival put together in one place before this effort here.

This album is 44 minutes long.

01 Hey Big Brother (Rare Earth)
02 Big John Is My Name (Rare Earth)
03 [I Know] I'm Losing You (Rare Earth)
04 I Just Want to Celebrate (Rare Earth)

https://www.upload.ee/files/15571530/CalifrniaJmOntrioMtorSpeedwyOntarioCA__4-6-1974_01RreEarth.zip.html

The cover photo comes from this exact concert. For the text at the top, I used the same colors and font as text on a concert poster promoting the festival.