Wednesday, May 29, 2024

Knebworth Festival, Knebworth House, Knebworth, Britain, 6-30-1990, Part 8: Pink Floyd

Pink Floyd was the eighth and final musical act to perform at the 1980 Knebworth Festival.

At this point, Pink Floyd was essentially David Gilmour plus backing musicians. The band's former leader Roger Waters left the band in 1983. But I think it says quite a lot that the Gilmour-led version of Pink Floyd was still so popular in 1990 that it was the closing act of this festival, over such big names as Phil Collins and Paul McCartney, and even the trio of Eric Clapton, Dire Straits, and Elton John playing together.

As I mentioned back in my write-up for Part 1 of this festival, most all of the music from this festival remains officially unreleased, aside from a highlights album and video. But the exception to this is this Pink Floyd set. It was first released in full as part of "The Later Years" box set. Then it later got a stand alone release. Even so, I'm including it here so the entire festival can appear in one place.

Pink Floyd toured all over the world from 1987 to 1989, in the wake of their "Momentary Lapse of Reason" album. However, they wouldn't do another big tour until 1994, after the release of their "Division Bell" album that year. In between, the only full concert they played was this one. 

On the band's classic 1973 album "Dark Side of the Moon," the wordless vocals for the song "The Great Gig in the Sky" were sung by Clare Torry. So it was a special treat when she assisted the band by singing that part in this concert. Beautiful and talented Candy Dulfer also played saxophone.

This album is an hour and one minute long.

01 talk by Tommy Vance (Pink Floyd)
02 Shine On You Crazy Diamond [Parts 1-5] (Pink Floyd)
03 The Great Gig in the Sky (Pink Floyd with Clare Torry)
04 talk (Pink Floyd)
05 Wish You Were Here (Pink Floyd)
06 Sorrow (Pink Floyd)
07 Money (Pink Floyd)
08 Comfortably Numb (Pink Floyd)
09 talk (Pink Floyd)
10 Run like Hell (Pink Floyd)
11 talk (Pink Floyd)

alternate:

https://pixeldrain.com/u/zDzX4AZ7

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/NWoJW1HfISeoTcK/file

The cover photo of lead singer David Gilmour is from this exact concert.

Knebworth Festival, Knebworth House, Knebworth, Britain, 6-30-1990, Part 7: Paul McCartney

The seventh performance at the 1990 Knebworth Festival was by Paul McCartney.

McCartney didn't do any tours for all of the 1980s until the last few months. Then he went on a big world tour that lasted until the end of July 1990. So this was much like another stop on that tour, though playing to an even bigger crowd, of 120,000 people. 

The set list was composed of songs typical from his tour that year, though cut down to fit within the allotted time slot. That included two songs written by fellow ex-Beatle John Lennon, "Strawberry Fields Forever" and "Give Peace a Chance." Technically, he was promoting his 1989 album "Flowers in the Dirt," but he only played one song from it, "We Got Married." This concert was also the first time he played the Beatles song "Birthday" in concert.

This album is 50 minutes long.

01 talk by Cathy McGowan & Timothy Dalton (Paul McCartney)
02 Coming Up (Paul McCartney)
03 Back in the U.S.S.R. (Paul McCartney)
04 I Saw Her Standing There (Paul McCartney)
05 talk (Paul McCartney)
06 We Got Married (Paul McCartney)
07 talk (Paul McCartney)
08 Birthday (Paul McCartney)
09 talk (Paul McCartney)
10 Let It Be (Paul McCartney)
11 talk (Paul McCartney)
12 Live and Let Die (Paul McCartney)
13 talk (Paul McCartney)
14 Someone Else I'd Like to Be (Paul McCartney)
15 talk (Paul McCartney)
16 Hey Jude (Paul McCartney)
17 talk (Paul McCartney)
18 Strawberry Fields Forever (Paul McCartney)
19 Give Peace a Chance (Paul McCartney)
20 talk (Paul McCartney)
21 Yesterday (Paul McCartney)
22 talk (Paul McCartney)
23 Can't Buy Me Love (Paul McCartney)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/GS2fFQHm

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/dIowcvXP5mBOUcI/file

The cover photo is from this exact concert.

Knebworth Festival, Knebworth House, Knebworth, Britain, 6-30-1990, Part 6: Eric Clapton, Dire Straits & Elton John

The sixth performance at the 1990 Knebworth Festival was a rather unusual collaboration between Eric Clapton, Dire Straits, and Elton John.

Collaboration between these three famous musical forces was rare, but not unprecedented. In particular, Mark Knopfler, leader of Dire Straits, and Eric Clapton became good friends in the late 1980s and toured together a lot in 1987 to 1989. Elton John joined them for at least one full concert, in Tokyo, Japan, in 1988. 

Meanwhile, Dire Straits broke up in 1986, at the conclusion of the tour to promote their 1985 album "Brothers in Arms." They got back together for about five shows in 1988 and 1989, mostly benefit concerts, and usually with Clapton included. Then they did this festival, their only performance of 1990. A full reunion followed, leading to the band's final album, "On Every Street," in 1991. This concert didn't actually include all of Dire Straits. Mark Knopfler, John Illsey, and Alan Clark took part, but Guy Fletcher was missing. Instead, the band was rounded out by Clapton, Ray Cooper, and Phil Palmer. But still, it was considered a Dire Straits reunion.

The first four songs were sung by Clapton. Then Dire Straits joined in. One song played, "Think I Love You Too Much," was an original that never made it onto a Dire Straits (or Mark Knopfler) album, despite being a good song that got played a lot on the Dire Straits world tour in 1991 and 1992. This was the first time it was performed in concert. Elton John joined in for the last four songs, three of which were sung by him.

I don't recall any wind noise trouble with this performance. Also note that it's the longest set of the festival, because it was basically three big acts put together.

This album is an hour and 16 minutes long.

01 talk by Dave Dee (Eric Clapton)
02 Pretending (Eric Clapton)
03 Before You Accuse Me (Eric Clapton)
04 Old Love (Eric Clapton)
05 Tearing Us Apart (Eric Clapton)
06 Solid Rock (Eric Clapton & Dire Straits)
07 talk (Eric Clapton & Dire Straits)
08 I Think I Love You Too Much (Eric Clapton & Dire Straits)
09 Money for Nothing (Eric Clapton & Dire Straits)
10 talk (Eric Clapton, Mark Knopfler & Elton John)
11 Sacrifice (Eric Clapton, Mark Knopfler & Elton John)
12 Sad Songs [Say So Much] (Eric Clapton, Mark Knopfler & Elton John)
13 Saturday Night's Alright for Fighting (Eric Clapton, Mark Knopfler & Elton John)
14 Sunshine of Your Love (Eric Clapton, Mark Knopfler & Elton John)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/HoBf13LZ

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/4oHFJrfaG2Kgn1R/file

For the cover, I wanted a photo of Clapton, Knopfler, and John together at this concert. I couldn't find any, since they were spread out on stage. However, I did find one of Clapton and John.

Knebworth Festival, Knebworth House, Knebworth, Britain, 6-30-1990, Part 5: Phil Collins & Genesis

The fifth performance at the 1990 Knebworth Festival was both Phil Collins and Genesis. Phil Collins did the first half as a solo artist and then the second half as part of Genesis.

By 1990, Phil Collins was massively popular. His album "...But Seriously," released late in 1989, was the best selling album in Britain in 1990, staying Number One in the charts for a stunning 15 weeks. It hit the top of the charts in the U.S. and most elsewhere too. Yet at the same time, he was continuing to be very successful as part of Genesis. At the time of this concert, their last album was "Invisible Touch," released in 1986 and another massive seller. The next Genesis album would come out in 1991. In between tours to support those albums, Genesis did almost no live performances. But they made an exception for their festival, since it was such a high profile gig.

By this point in the festival, it seems the wind died down. I don't remember any rustling noises in this set.

This album is an hour and one minute long.

01 talk by Rob Lowe (Phil Collins)
02 In the Air Tonight (Phil Collins)
03 Colours - Drum Duet (Phil Collins)
04 talk (Phil Collins)
05 Another Day in Paradise (Phil Collins)
06 Sussudio (Phil Collins)
07 Mama (Genesis)
08 That's All (Genesis)
09 Throwing It All Away (Genesis)
10 talk (Genesis)
11 Turn It On Again - Somebody to Love - [I Can't Get No] Satisfaction - Twist and Shout (Genesis)
12 Reach Out, I'll Be There - Lovin' Feelin' - Pinball Wizard - Midnight Hour - Turn It On Again [Reprise] (Genesis) 

https://pixeldrain.com/u/XAEy2mka

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/OnuN85P8jJcMiRb/file

The cover photo comes from this exact concert.

Knebworth Festival, Knebworth House, Knebworth, Britain, 6-30-1990, Part 4: Robert Plant with Jimmy Page

The fourth performance at the 1990 Knebworth Festival was given by Robert Plant. He was joined by his former Led Zeppelin Jimmy Page on the last three songs.

Robert Plant's solo career was going very well in 1990. In fact, he was the winner of the British music industry's Silver Clef award that year, which was one of the purposes of the concert. His fifth studio album, "Manic Nirvana," had been released three months prior to this concert.

Later in the 1990s, Plant and Page would collaborate quite a lot. They would get together for a live album ("Unledded") and a studio album ("Walking to Clarksdale"), and tour together from 1994 to 1998. However, in 1990, having Plant and Page appear on stage together was very rare, and was considered a big deal. They have taken part in limited Led Zeppelin reunions in 1985 (as part of Live Aid) and 1988 (at an Atlantic Records anniversary concert), and there had been some studio collaborations between them. I could be wrong, but I think this is the first time Page appeared on stage at a Plant solo concert. At least it was the first high profile one. They played three Led Zeppelin songs together to end the set.

This album is 51 minutes long.

01 talk by Gary Davis (Robert Plant)
02 Hurting Kind [I've Got My Eyes on You] (Robert Plant)
03 Immigrant Song (Robert Plant)
04 Tie Dye on the Highway (Robert Plant)
05 talk (Robert Plant)
06 Liar's Dance (Robert Plant)
07 Going to California (Robert Plant)
08 talk (Robert Plant)
09 Nirvana (Robert Plant)
10 Tall Cool One (Robert Plant)
11 talk (Robert Plant)
12 Misty Mountain Hop (Robert Plant with Jimmy Page)
13 Wearing and Tearing (Robert Plant with Jimmy Page)
14 talk (Robert Plant with Jimmy Page)
15 Rock and Roll (Robert Plant with Jimmy Page)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/sQg12KoA

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/pDI0g7HuYVcS4c4/file

alternate:

https://www.imagenetz.de/exoqZ

The cover photo is from this exact concert.

Knebworth Festival, Knebworth House, Knebworth, Britain, 6-30-1990, Part 3: Cliff Richard & the Shadows

The third act at the 1990 Knebworth Festival was Cliff Richard and the Shadows. I doubt Richard would have been invited to such a major festival in the U.S., where he was only a minor star, but he was one of the biggest stars in Britain.

Richard has an an on again and off again relationship with the Shadows. They were his backing band when he first found fame in the late 1950s. The Shadows were no ordinary backing band, because they went on to have many hits of their own, all instrumentals, including five Number One songs in Britain. The Shadows first broke up in the late 1960s. But they reunited with Richard in 1978, 1984, and again in 1989 and 1990, which included this concert. They would reunite with him a few times after this as well, with the final reunion in 2010.

There's some wind rustling noise in this set, especially during the applause and banter. But it's pretty minor stuff and hardly affects the actual songs.
 
This album is 44 minutes long.

01 talk by Mike Read (Cliff Richard & the Shadows)
02 Move It (Cliff Richard & the Shadows)
03 talk (Cliff Richard & the Shadows)
04 Summer Holiday (Cliff Richard & the Shadows)
05 The Young Ones (Cliff Richard & the Shadows)
06 On the Beach (Cliff Richard & the Shadows)
07 talk (Cliff Richard & the Shadows)
08 Living Doll (Cliff Richard & the Shadows)
09 Good Golly, Miss Molly (Cliff Richard & the Shadows)
10 talk (Cliff Richard & the Shadows)
11 Bachelor Boy (Cliff Richard & the Shadows)
12 Fall in Love with You (Cliff Richard & the Shadows)
13 Do You Wanna Dance (Cliff Richard & the Shadows)
14 talk (Cliff Richard & the Shadows)
15 In the Country (Cliff Richard & the Shadows)
16 talk (Cliff Richard & the Shadows)
17 It'll Be Me (Cliff Richard & the Shadows)
18 talk (Cliff Richard & the Shadows)
19 Shake, Rattle and Roll (Cliff Richard & the Shadows)
20 We Don't Talk Anymore (Cliff Richard & the Shadows)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/WTyFwriM

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/d6LJSOAf27y2IHV/file

The cover image is from this exact concert. For most of the other covers from this festival I was able to use clear photos. But in this case, I took a screenshot from a video of this concert, so it's a bit low-res.

Knebworth Festival, Knebworth House, Knebworth, Britain, 6-30-1990, Part 2: Status Quo

Status Quo isn't a well known band in the United States, but they were consistently big hit makers in Britain from the 1960s to the 2000s. They were the second act at the 1990 Knebworth Festival.

There's not much else for me to say here, I think. If you like the band's style of boogie rock, you should enjoy this. 

The wind was a little stronger here than later in the concert, and you can really hear the wind rustling during some quiet parts, but the vast majority of this sounds perfectly fine.

This album is an hour and one minute long.

01 talk by Mark Goodyear (Status Quo)
02 Caroline (Status Quo)
03 talk (Status Quo)
04 Mystery Song - Railroad -  Most of the Time - Wild Side of Life (Status Quo)
05 Rollin' Home -  Again and Again - Slow Train (Status Quo)
06 Hold You Back (Status Quo)
07 talk (Status Quo)
08 Dirty Water (Status Quo)
09 Whatever You Want (Status Quo)
10 In the Army Now (Status Quo)
11 Rockin' All Over the World (Status Quo)
12 Don't Waste My Time (Status Quo)
13 Roadhouse Blues (Status Quo)
14 The Wanderer - Marguerita Time - Living on an Island (Status Quo)
15 Break the Rules - Something 'bout You Baby I Like - The Price of Love - Roadhouse Blues [Reprise] (Status Quo)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16684678/VA-1990KnbwrthFstivlKnbwrthHuseKnbwrthBrtin__6-30-1990_02SttsQuo.zip.html

The cover photo is from this exact concert.

Knebworth Festival, Knebworth House, Knebworth, Britain, 6-30-1990, Part 1: Tears for Fears

The Knebworth Festival has been happening most every year in Knebworth, England, since 1974. The 1990 festival was the first one since 1986, and was a special one, because it was the location for the Silver Clef Award winners concert, the only time that happened at Knebworth. This is a British music industry annual award. In 1990, the Silver Clef winner was Robert Plant.

The musical acts that played in the 1990 festival were bigger names than all festivals there before or since: Tears for Fears, Status Quo, Cliff Richard, Robert Plant with Jimmy Page, Phil Collins and Genesis, Eric Clapton, Dire Straits, Elton John, Paul McCartney, and Pink Floyd! Unlike other festivals such as Live Aid, there were a lot fewer musical acts, but each one got to play an average of a little less than an hour, for a total of eight hours of music.

The organizers behind this festival realized it was a big deal, because they later released audio and video versions of the festival. However, these were only about two CDs worth of highlights. The vast majority of the music has remained unreleased. The only exception is the Pink Floyd set, which was later released in full. Luckily for us, though, the entire concert was broadcast by the BBC at the time. So I'm posting the full concert, thanks to people who recorded the broadcast.

One snag about the festival is that the weather was not good. The outdoors crowd got rained on from time to time. Worse, from a listener's point of view is that it was very windy. In these recordings, there are occasional comments by the performers about how windy it was. That meant that sometimes the wind blew against the microphones, causing rustling noises. I tried fixing this, but I barely made a dent. So I've decided to post it, windy noises and all. Luckily, the wind was only noticeable during the banter between songs and especially quiet parts of songs. It also was pretty infrequent. Don't consider it a big problem, more like a minor annoyance here and there.

In 1990, Tears for Fears were arguably at the peak of their popularity. In 1989, they released the album "The Seeds of Love," which went to Number One in Britain. Tears for Fears was a duo made up of Curt Smith and Roland Orzabal. After the 1990 tour supporting the album, Smith would leave, and not rejoin for another ten years.

This album is 53 minutes long.

01 talk by Dave Dee (Tears for Fears)
02 Head Over Heels - Broken (Tears for Fears)
03 Change (Tears for Fears)
04 Pale Shelter (Tears for Fears)
05 talk (Tears for Fears)
06 Sowing the Seeds of Love (Tears for Fears)
07 All You Need Is Love (Tears for Fears)
08 talk (Tears for Fears)
09 Advice for the Young at Heart (Tears for Fears)
10 I've Got to Sing My Song (Tears for Fears with Oleta Adams)
11 talk (Tears for Fears)
12 Badman's Song (Tears for Fears)
13 talk (Tears for Fears)
14 Everybody Wants to Rule the World (Tears for Fears)

NOTE: The download link has been removed due to a copyright issue, sorry. But look for my comment in the comments section.

The cover photo of Tears for Fears is from this exact concert.

Judy Collins - BBC Sessions, Volume 2: In Concert, London, Britain, 7-3-1974

A couple of weeks ago, I posted a "BBC Sessions, Volume 1" album by Judy Collins here. But after a few days, it got taken down due to copyright issues. That surprised me, because I'm pretty sure it was all unreleased material. So we'll see if we get in trouble with this one. If so, Judy Collins music must be banned in general, because this is all unreleased too.

This comes from a BBC TV show called "In Concert." (This is confusing, because the BBC has tended to call all sorts of radio and TV programs "In Concert.) This particular show by that name ran from 1971 to 1974. I've posted a bunch of other concerts from the series, but I only recently found this one.

As I often do, I found this on YouTube. I converted the video to audio, then broke it into mp3s. So I believe this is the first time this has been shared as music files.

It's a short concert, as all the ones from that TV show are. But Collins filled it with most of her best known songs at that point in her career. Collins bootlegs are extremely few and far between, so let's hope this stays posted.

By the way, regarding her "BBC Sessions, Volume 1," if you look at that again and check the comments, you might see something you want:

https://albumsthatshouldexist.blogspot.com/2024/05/judy-collins-bbc-sessions-volume-1.html

01 Chelsea Morning (Judy Collins)
02 talk (Judy Collins)
03 Both Sides Now (Judy Collins)
04 talk (Judy Collins)
05 My Father (Judy Collins)
06 The Hostage (Judy Collins)
07 talk (Judy Collins)
08 Suzanne (Judy Collins)
09 Who Knows Where the Time Goes (Judy Collins)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16684715/JUDYCLLNS1974BBSssonsVlum2InCncrtLndnBrtin__7-3-1974_atse.zip.html

The cover is a screenshot from this exact concert. For the text, I also used the same font and colors as the opening credits. However, I added the bottom line of text, and came up with my own color for that.

Monday, May 27, 2024

Joan Baez - BBC Sessions, Volume 1: In Concert, BBC Television Theatre Shepherd's Bush, London, Britain, 6-5-1965

The BBC didn't typically air full concerts until about 1970, so we're lucky to have this decently long concert by Joan Baez all the way back in 1965. This is officially unreleased, but the sound quality is excellent.

I'm not sure what this is from exactly. The BBC did air a folk music TV show around this time called "Tonight In Person," but I believe the Baez show for that took place in Scotland and has a different set list. (If anyone has the audio, please pass it along.) It sounds like a complete concert to me, including banter between songs, but perhaps some songs were cut out, I don't know. 

Baez put out live albums in 1962 and 1963, but then not another until 1969. So this fills a gap. It also is a good time for a concert, since she was hitting a peak of popularity, aided by her well known romance with Bob Dylan at the time.

I found this on YouTube. I converted it into audio and broke it into mp3s. So this has probably never been shared in audio format before.

This album is an hour and two minutes long.

01 Rambler Gambler (Joan Baez)
02 There but for Fortune (Joan Baez)
03 talk (Joan Baez)
04 Copper Kettle (Joan Baez)
05 talk (Joan Baez)
06 Mary Hamilton (Joan Baez)
07 Don't Think Twice, It's All Right (Joan Baez)
08 talk (Joan Baez)
09 Troubled and I Don't Know Why (Joan Baez)
10 talk (Joan Baez)
11 We Shall Overcome (Joan Baez)
12 talk (Joan Baez)
13 With God on Our Side (Joan Baez)
14 Silver Dagger (Joan Baez)
15 Oh Freedom (Joan Baez)
16 talk (Joan Baez)
17 She's a Trouble Maker (Joan Baez)
18 talk (Joan Baez)
19 The Unquiet Grave (Joan Baez)
20 talk (Joan Baez)
21 It Ain't Me, Babe (Joan Baez)
22 talk (Joan Baez)
23 Isn't It Grand Boys (Joan Baez)
24 talk (Joan Baez)
25 500 miles (Joan Baez)
26 talk (Joan Baez)
27 Te Ador (Joan Baez)
28 Ate Amanha (Joan Baez)
29 talk (Joan Baez)
30 Plaisir d'Amour (Joan Baez)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16651234/JOANBZ1965BBSessonsVolum1InCncrtBBTvThetrShphrdsBshLndnBrtin__6-5-1965_atse.zip.html

The cover photo is from a BBC TV show "circa 1965," so maybe it's this very one. It might be from something else though.

Friday, May 24, 2024

Flamin' Groovies - A Bucket of Brains - Non-Album Tracks (1971-1973)

I've been meaning to post more from Flamin' Groovies, but I have so much music to post that I never seem to get around to it. (Apparently they don't use the "the" in their name, though that's how I think of them.) I've only posted one concert so far. I have a series of stray tracks albums to post, but I haven't readied the cover art and such. Here's one I do have all ready to go though, so I'm going to post it a little out of order. 
 
Flamin' Groovies had a few fairly successful years, from about 1968 to 1971. But they had two leaders, Roy Loney and Cyril Jordan. Loney left in 1971, disenchanted by the music business and the failure of the band to break big. He was replaced by Chris Wilson, who became the new main lead singer. This bad would find more moderate success in the later 1970s, especially with the song "Shake Some Action," which would become an all-time power pop classic. But in the early 1970s, they had some lean years. This album roughly corresponds to that time.

Around the time the band lost Loney, they also lost their record contract. They signed to a new record company in 1972, and released two singles, "Slow Death" and "Married Woman." "Slow Death" in particular should have been a big hit. I love that song. It really should be considered a classic too, but not enough people know about it. It didn't even make the charts because it contained the word "morphine," so the BBC and other radio stations banned it. The band was planning to put out an album called "A Bucket of Brains," but after the two singles failed to gain any traction, their contract was cancelled.

It turns out the band did record a fair amount of songs in the 1971 to 1973 time frame, with many of them produced by British rocker Dave Edmunds. That included a 1973 version of "Shake Some Action," though in my opinion the longer version released in 1976 that would eventually be considered a classic is significantly better. Different versions of these songs would be released decades later, under the album names "A Bucket of Brains," "The Rockfield Session," and "Slow Death." I've compiled them all together here, and it's a good length for an album.

Here's a Wikipedia link that tells the story about this album that failed to exist at the time, here:

 
I've added two bonus tracks. These are unreleased. They come from a French TV show where the band was filmed playing live in the studio, with no audience. The sound quality is excellent. However, they're different versions of songs already on the album, so that's why they're only bonus tracks.
 
This album is 48 minutes long, not including the two bonus tracks.

01 Slow Death (Flamin' Groovies)
02 Tallahassee Lassie (Flamin' Groovies)
03 Married Woman (Flamin' Groovies)
04 A Shot of Rhythm and Blues (Flamin' Groovies)
05 Little Queenie (Flamin' Groovies)
06 Sweet Little Rock and Roller (Flamin' Groovies)
07 Let Me Rock (Flamin' Groovies)
08 Dog Meat (Flamin' Groovies)
09 Blues from Phyllis (Flamin' Groovies)
10 Jumpin' Jack Flash (Flamin' Groovies)
11 Shake Some Action [1973 Version] (Flamin' Groovies)
12 When I Heard Your Name (Flamin' Groovies)
13 Roll Over Beethoven (Flamin' Groovies)

Little Queenie [French TV Version] (Flamin' Groovies)
Slow Death [French TV Version] (Flamin' Groovies)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16670410/FLAMNGROVIS1971-1973ABucktoBrans_atse.zip.html

The album cover is based on the 1972 single of the song "Slow Death." I removed the name of the B-side near the bottom, and changed the words "Slow Death" to "A Bucket of Brains" in the exact same location as the original.

Thursday, May 23, 2024

Katrina & the Waves - Shepperton Film Studios, Shepperton, Britain, 12-29-1983

I have long felt that Katrina and the Waves are a very underrated 1980s new wave band. They had many more good songs besides their huge hit "Walking on Sunshine." I've already posted a concert by them, from 1985. This is a concert from 1983.

Frankly, I think that 1985 one is better than this one. It's longer, and has more key songs on it, helped by the fact that they'd released more music in the two years between that concert and this one. I'm mostly posting this because it's so very rare and needs to get into wider public circulation. This is from a professionally recorded concert done in a film studio, but in front of an audience. It was released as a bonus DVD on some versions of the 2003 archival album "The Original Recordings: 1983-1984."

 I had it on my SoulseekQT wish list for many months, and I finally was able to download it the other day. I converted it from video format to mp3s. The sound quality is excellent. There are very few live recordings of this band, period, and nothing from this early in their career. This is from a time where the band had released some music, including a single of "Walking on Sunshine," but they failed to make the charts anywhere. It wouldn't be until 1985 when "Walking on Sunshine" was re-released when they would find big success.

This album is 35 minutes long.

01 talk (Katrina & the Waves)
02 Que Te Quiero (Katrina & the Waves)
03 Game of Love (Katrina & the Waves)
04 Do You Want Crying (Katrina & the Waves)
05 Walking on Sunshine (Katrina & the Waves)
06 Don't Take Her Out of My World (Katrina & the Waves)
07 Mexico (Katrina & the Waves)
08 Brown Eyed Son (Katrina & the Waves)
09 Maniac House (Katrina & the Waves)
10 talk (Katrina & the Waves)
11 I Really Taught Me to Watusi (Katrina & the Waves)
12 talk (Katrina & the Waves)
13 Monkey Town (Katrina & the Waves)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16666484/KATRNANTWVES1983ShppertnFlmStdosShppertnBitin__12-29-1983_atse.zip.html

I didn't find any good photos of the band in concert from 1983 or even 1984. So this one shows lead singer Katrina Leskanich on the US TV show "American Bandstand" in July 1985.

Various Artists - Songs in the Key of Life - A Grammy Awards Tribute to Stevie Wonder, Nokia Theatre, Los Angeles, CA, 2-10-2015

Here's something a little different than my usual stuff. It's a tribute concert for Stevie Wonder. But because it's from relatively recently, 2015, it has a whole different bunch of musical acts performing songs for him than those that typically show up in these kinds of tribute concerts that I post. There are very big stars that I usually don't have on my blog, such as Beyonce, Ed Sheeran, Lady Gaga, and Ariana Grande. Whether you like those kinds of stars or not, they all performed classic Stevie Wonder songs, so it was very hard to go wrong. Plus, the concert ended with a short set by Stevie Wonder himself.

This concert was professionally recorded and broadcast on TV in 2015. I hasn't been officially released in any format as far as I know, not even on video. But I found the video of it on YouTube. The sound quality is excellent, so I did my usual thing of converting it to audio and cutting it into individual mp3s. 

I edited out some sections where there was talking while video montages of Wonder's life were shown on a big screen. That didn't translate well to just a listening experience. I also edited out some speeches that didn't have much do to with the songs performed. There also is some banter by famous people who weren't always introduced, or at least not introduced each time, like LL Cool J, Jamie Foxx, and Tyler Perry. So keep an eye on the song list for those details.

This album is an hour and 20 minutes long.

01 Fingertips, Part 2 (Beyonce)
02 Master Blaster [Jammin'] (Beyonce & Ed Sheeran)
03 Higher Ground (Beyonce, Ed Sheeran & Gary Clark Jr.)
04 talk (LL Cool J)
05 I Believe [When I Fall in Love It Will Be Forever] (John Legend)
06 talk (Maya Rudolph)
07 talk (Lady Gaga)
08 I Wish (Lady Gaga)
09 talk (Jason Derulo)
10 Signed, Sealed, Delivered [I'm Yours] (Ariana Grande & Babyface)
11 talk (LL Cool J)
12 My Cheri Amour (Annie Lennox)
13 talk (Pharrell Williams)
14 Don't You Worry 'bout a Thing (Pharrell Williams & Ryan Tedder)
15 talk (Tony Bennett)
16 For Once in My Life (Tony Bennett)
17 I Was Made to Love Her (Ed Sheeran)
18 talk (Tyler Perry)
19 You Haven't Done Nuthin' (Band Perry)
20 talk (Mary Wilson)
21 talk (Janelle Monae, India.Arie & Jill Scott)
22 As (Janelle Monae, India.Arie & Jill Scott)
23 talk (Andrea Bocelli)
24 I Just Called to Say I Love You (Andrea Bocelli)
25 talk (Jennifer Hudson)
26 All in Love Is Fair (Jennifer Hudson)
27 talk (LL Cool J)
28 Isn't She Lovely (Ne-Yo with Aisha Wonder)
29 talk (Jamie Foxx)
30 Contusion [Instrumental] (Stevie Wonder)
31 Sir Duke (Stevie Wonder)
32 You Are the Sunshine of My Life (Stevie Wonder)
33 Overjoyed - Ribbon in the Sky (Stevie Wonder)
34 Superstition (Stevie Wonder)
35 talk (LL Cool J with the voice of Martin Luther King, Jr)
36 talk (Stevie Wonder)
37 Happy Birthday (Stevie Wonder & Everyone)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16667103/VA-2015SngsinthKyofLfeAGrmmyAwrdTrbteNkaThetrLsAnglsCA__2-10-2015_atse.zip.html

 The cover is from this exact concert. From left to right, that's Stevie Wonder on piano, Tony Bennett, Lady Gaga, and Jennifer Hudson.

Wednesday, May 22, 2024

Elton John - BBC Sessions, Volume 9: Wembley Pool, London, Britain, 11-3-1977

I thought I was all done posting BBC albums by Elton John. But the other day, I came across a BBC concert from 1977 I'd missed that was posted at a bootleg sharing site. It was too interesting to not post, especially with guest appearances by Kiki Dee and Stevie Wonder. So here it is. 

But note that by posting this, I've had to renumber all the Elton John BBC albums that come after this. So the former Volume 9 becomes Volume 10, the former Volume 10 becomes Volume 11, and so on. I just did all that renumbering, so feel free to redownload those if you don't want two Volume 9's.

This entire concert was professionally filmed by the BBC. Apparently, when this concert first happened, only about an hour of it was shown on BBC TV at the time. But over the years, more of it has come out here and there until this is probably the whole thing. A person named Emmanuel Hercules posted the entire video file, which is where I got this. He stitched it together from multiple sources. I converted it to audio format and then broke it into mp3s. The only critique I'd have of his nice work on this is that the audio from the different sources were sometimes at different volumes. But I think I've evened that out. The sound quality is generally excellent, roughly the same as the other 1970s BBC concerts.

This was kind of the end of Elton John's prime 1970s era. He was feeling burned out (and even attempted suicide roughly around this time). In this concert, which was a special one done for charity, he announced he would stop touring for a while. He was pretty low profile for the rest of the 1970s before coming back with more hits in the early 1980s (and beyond).

Regarding the two guest appearances, Kiki Dee did her usual thing, dueting with him on their Number One hit song "Don't Go Breaking My Heart." 

The Stevie Wonder appearance was rather disappointing, in my opinion. He joined Elton John on stage for the final number, "Bite Your Lip (Get Up and Dance)," which I think went on too long (13 minutes). He didn't do much except play some tambourine (as one can see on the video of this concert) and sing some backing vocals. It was almost certainly a spontaneous thing where he showed up on stage without even knowing the song. But the fact that he showed up on stage at all was a big deal. Wonder was probably at the peak of his popularity, but he was kind of in seclusion for most of the late 1970s, kind of like John Lennon doing the same thing around that time. He didn't play any full concerts in 1976, 1977, and 1978, and only made a few brief appearances like this one.

This concert is two hours and 19 minutes long.

01 talk (Elton John)
02 Better Off Dead (Elton John)
03 Daniel (Elton John)
04 talk (Elton John)
05 Roy Rogers (Elton John)
06 talk (Elton John)
07 The Goaldiggers Song (Elton John)
08 Where to Now St. Peter (Elton John)
09 talk (Elton John)
10 Shine On Through (Elton John)
11 Tonight (Elton John)
12 I Heard It through the Grapevine (Elton John)
13 talk (Elton John)
14 Island Girl (Elton John)
15 talk (Elton John)
16 Candle in the Wind (Elton John)
17 talk (Elton John)
18 One Horse Town (Elton John)
19 Bennie and the Jets (Elton John)
20 Rocket Man [I Think It's Going to Be a Long, Long Time] (Elton John)
21 talk (Elton John)
22 Cage the Songbird (Elton John)
23 talk (Elton John)
24 Levon (Elton John)
25 Don't Let the Sun Go Down on Me (Elton John)
26 talk (Elton John)
27 [Gotta Get A] Meal Ticket (Elton John)
28 talk (Elton John)
29 Sorry Seems to Be the Hardest Word (Elton John)
30 Philadelphia Freedom (Elton John)
31 Funeral for a Friend - Love Lies Bleeding (Elton John)
32 talk (Elton John)
33 Your Song (Elton John)
34 talk (Elton John)
35 Don't Go Breaking My Heart (Elton John & Kiki Dee)
36 talk (Elton John)
37 Bite Your Lip [Get Up and Dance] (Elton John with Stevie Wonder)

https://www.imagenetz.de/eVDcZ

alternate:

https://pixeldrain.com/u/ELABVJPf

The cover photo is from this exact concert.

Tuesday, May 21, 2024

The Aerovons - Resurrection - Alternate Version (1969)

Here's an interesting rarity. If you've heard of the Aerovons, I'd be impressed. They're an obscure 1960s band that worshipped at the altar of the Beatles, on the Hollies pop side of things. I'm not saying this is a lost classic, but if you're interested in music that evokes that era, this one has it in spades.

The Aerovons hailed from St. Louis, Missouri of all places. They have a very interesting history, so I've included the liner notes from the official album in the download files. Long story short is they got an incredible opportunity to record a debut album at Abbey Road Studios in London, England. By chance, this happened right at the time the Beatles were recording their "Abbey Road" album in mid-1969. Not only were they able to meet and hang out with their idols, but they got to watch parts of the classic "Abbey Road" album get recorded.

Unfortunately, their fairy tale story didn't completely come true. A couple of their singles got released, but didn't bother the charts. As a result, the record company decided not to release their debut album, "Resurrection." The band broke up a short time later. Their album only came out decades later, in the early 2000s. 

This consists of my alternate version of that album. I've removed some songs, but also added some bonus tracks, including the A- and B-sides from the band's lead singer and songwriter Tom Hartman. It came out in 1971 in total obscurity. I believe it was the only thing he released outside of the Aerovons. 

In this case, I strongly believe less is more. The biggest problem with the Aerovons was that they were too influenced by their musical heroes, especially the Beatles. Oftentimes, you can play "spot the influence" on their songs. I removed some songs that were too derivative, in my opinion. The worst offender was a song that sounds so much like "Oh! Darling" by the Beatles that it annoys me to hear it.

Hartman quit the music business after that failed single mentioned above, and went to college instead. But he never stopped writing songs. In 2021, a new album billed to the Aerovons called "A Little More" was released. It's surprisingly good, probably stronger song for song than the 1969, and less derivative, though only 21 minutes long. If you like this, you should definitely check that out.

By the way, I stumbled across this article about the band that was published only last month (as I write this in May 2024), due to the "Resurrection" finally being released on vinyl. It's an interesting read, with photos:

After 55 Years, the Aerovons Are Finally the Next Big Thing (riverfronttimes.com)

This album is 47 minutes long.

01 World of You (Aerovons)
02 Resurrection (Aerovons)
03 With Her (Aerovons)
04 Quotes and Photos (Aerovons)
05 Words from a Song (Aerovons)
06 Bessy Goodheart (Aerovons)
07 Something of Yours (Aerovons)
08 She's Not Dead (Aerovons)
09 The Years (Aerovons)
10 Everything's Alright (Aerovons)
11 The Children (Aerovons)
12 The Train (Aerovons)
13 Song for Jane (Aerovons)
14 Here (Aerovons)
15 World of You [Demo] (Aerovons)
16 Sunshine Woman (Tom Hartman)
17 A Little More (Tom Hartman)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16651228/AEROVNS1969Rsrrcton_atse.zip.html

The cover is just the photo of the original cover, without any changes.

Monday, May 20, 2024

Various Artists - Come Together: A Night for John Lennon's Words and Music, Radio City Music Hall, New York City, 10-2-2001

I don't know much about why this particular John Lennon tribute concert happened when and where it did, with these musical artists taking part. I did find one mention that it was part of a series of tribute concerts shown on TV by the TNT channel. I do know that there are a lot of excellent performances here by talented and famous musicians. This was broadcast on TV at the time. I suspect it was edited down for television from a longer concert, because there's basically no moment wasted here, with tight edits from song to song.

Given this was a tribute to John Lennon, some key musicians were missing. Most importantly, the three other ex-Beatles Paul McCartney, George Harrison, and Ringo Starr, as well as Lennon's musically successful son Julian Lennon. But his other (much less commercially successful) son Sean Lennon did take part. In turns out the timing was pretty terrible, because George Harrison was dying of cancer and only lived one more month. 

Also, the timing was strange because this took place only three weeks after the 9/11 terror attack, with the nation still in shock. I'm sure that was hanging over this, though it wasn't directly mentioned.

As far as I know, everything here remains officially unreleased. I don't believe it's been shared as music files anywhere on the Internet either. I happened to randomly come across a video of it on YouTube. The sound quality was excellent, so I converted it to audio and chopped it up into individual mp3 files.

Normally, these kinds of concerts with lots of different acts are a mixed bag, with winners and losers. But in this case, nearly every performance here is a winner, in my opinion. The only rendition I don't like is "Imagine," a great song but way oversung by Yolanda Adams. Maybe it's because the songs are so great that artists rise to the occasion. For instance, I'm not a fan of Dave Matthews at all, but I was impressed with his version of "In My Life" here. 

The transitions between songs was done in a rather unusual way for this type of concert. Usually, one would expect an emcee introducing the artists performing each song. But there was virtually none of that here. In fact, basically the only between song "banter" here at all are recordings of John Lennon's voice from when he was alive in the 1960s and 1970s. (He was assassinated in 1980.) It worked surprisingly well for me. Weirdly, just about the only exception was Cyndi Lauper, who introduced her performance with some comments.

The sound quality was great overall. There was just one bummer: the last song faded out before it was over. I suspect the time limit for the TV came to an end, so the music went on as long as possible before the cut off moment. The fade out happened in the middle of a chorus. I extended that a bit by patching in an earlier chorus so now at least the fade out happens just after that chorus finishes.

By the way, right after I posted this, I found out a little more information about it. The TNT channel did some other tribute concerts in the years before this (Burt Bacharach's "One Amazing Night" in 1998, which has been officially released, 1998 for Johnny Cash, 1999 for Bob Marley, 2000 for Joni Mitchell, and 2001 for Brian Wilson. The 2001 I've posted here, and I'll try to get to the other unreleased ones. The series seems to have ended after that, though, as the TNT network changed its programming focus in mid-2001, according to Wikipedia. Beck and Marc Anthony were supposed to headline this concert, but didn't do so for some reason.

This album is an hour and four minutes long.

01 Imagine (Yolanda Adams & Billy Preston)
02 talk (John Lennon)
03 In My Life (Dave Matthews)
04 talk (John Lennon)
05 Revolution (Stone Temple Pilots)
06 talk (John Lennon)
07 Dear Prudence (Alanis Morissette)
08 Across the Universe (Moby, Sean Lennon & Rufus Wainwright)
09 talk (Cyndi Lauper)
10 Strawberry Fields Forever (Cyndi Lauper)
11 talk (John Lennon)
12 Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds (Marc Anthony)
13 Mother (Shelby Lynne)
14 Instant Karma (Nelly Furtado & Dave Stewart)
15 Jealous Guy (Lou Reed)
16 Nowhere Man (Natalie Merchant)
17 Come Together (Craig David)
18 talk (John Lennon & Sean Lennon)
19 This Boy (Sean Lennon, Rufus Wainwright & Robert Schwartzman)
20 Julia (Sean Lennon)
21 talk (John Lennon)
22 Give Peace a Chance - Power to the People (Everyone)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16651268/VA-2001CmeTgthrANghtfrJhnLnnnRdioCtyMsicHllNwYrkCty__10-2-2001_atse.zip.html

The cover photo comes from this exact concert. I had a choice of different photos. I went with this one, which shows the Stone Temple Pilots performing in front of a giant screen showing a psychedelic rendition of John Lennon.

Various Artists - Bill McClintock Mash-Ups, Volume 5: 2023-2024

I'm more convinced that ever that Bill McClintock is a twisted genius. Back in February 2023, I posted four albums containing mash-ups created by McClintock and posted on YouTube. Since then, I've been waiting for him to post enough new songs for a fifth volume. Here were finally are.

If you heard and liked any of the first four volumes, you should definitely like this. For those who don't know what I'm talking about, there are a lot of people who have made mash-ups, combining the recordings of two songs to hopefully create something new and interesting. But in my opinion, McClintock is the master of this technique, and his soaring YouTube views are evidence of that.

I've mentioned in the past that McClintock has pretty much single-handedly created a new genre of music, "soul metal," by combining soul songs with heavy metal songs. The resulting mash-ups are fascinating. In my opinion, many of them could be big hits in some bizarro alternate universe. I'm not even much of a heavy metal fan, but I don't think you have to be to enjoy these.

This album is an hour and four minutes long.

Note that, as with the other albums in this series, the track list is rather unusual. The song titles are the titles created by McClintock that often jokingly combined the titles of the source material. Then in brackets are the names of the original songs, with "vs." in between them. Then for the artist names in paranetheses, I've put both artists who created the source songs, with "vs." between those names as well.

01 Wake Me Up Before You Go Go to the Grave [Wake Me Up Before You Go Go vs. Children of the Grave] (Wlam vs. Black Sabbath)
02 More Forgiven Today than Yesterday [The Unforgiven vs. More Today than Yesterday] (Spiral Starecase vs. Metallica)
03 Shake Your Dude Thing [Shake Your Groove Thing vs. Dude Looks like a Lady] (Peaches & Herb vs. Aerosmith)
04 She's Got the Sentinel [She's Got the Look vs. The Sentinel] (Judas Priest vs. Roxette)
05 Could You Be a Freak on a Leash [Could You Be Loved vs. Freak on a Leash] (Bob Marley vs. Korn)
06 I Was Made for Boogie Wonderland [I Was Made for Lovin' You vs. Boogie Wonderland] (Kiss vs. Earth, Wind & Fire)
07 Let's Get Bleeding [The Bleeding vs. Let's Get It On] (Five Finger Death Punch & Marvin Gaye)
08 Freeze Frame City [Freeze Frame vs. Detroit Rock City] (J. Geils Band vs. Kiss)
09 Superfools [Supernaut vs. Chain of Fools] (Aretha Franklin vs. Black Sabbath)
10 Take the Soul Power Back [Take the Power Back vs. Soul Power] (James Brown vs. Against the Machine)
11 Dirty Deeds Around the Christmas Tree [Dirty Deeds Done Dirty Cheap vs. Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree] (AC-DC vs. Brenda Lee)
12 Still Coming Undone [Coming Undone vs. Feel it Still] (Korn vs. Portugal. The Man)
13 Unchained Love Machine [Unchained vs. Love Machine] (Van Halen vs. Miracles)
14 Squareboys from Hell [Square Biz vs. Cowboys from Hell] (Teena Marie vs. Pantera)
15 Celebrate Both Worlds [Good Times vs. Best of Both Worlds] (Van Halen vs. Kool & the Gang)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16651266/BILLMCCLNTCKMSHPS2023-2024Vlum5_atse.zip.html

The cover is basically the exact same as the previous four in this series, with only a bit of the text and the background color changing. That's because I was lucky to find any photos of McClintock at all. Note that when it came time to post this album, I noticed that I used the exact same color, yellow for the backgrounds to both Volumes 3 and 4 in this series. That was mistake. So I just changed the color of Volume 4 to orange. If you put all five covers together in order, it makes a nice rainbow effect.

Neil Finn - Acoustic Radio Sessions, Volume 2: 1999-2001

As I explained when I posted the first album in this series, a few years ago, a kind soul on the Internet contacted me and sent me a bunch of Crowded House and Neil Finn radio show recordings. I'm pretty sure these were recorded when they were broadcast by this person way back when, and they otherwise have disappeared. So these are pretty important. Unfortunately, I waited a few years to post all of this stuff (I just have so much to post that a lot slips through the cracks) and I've forgotten that person's name. But a big thanks just the same.

All but two of the songs here are unreleased. The two released one are tracks 2 and 3. Even those two are pretty rare. Track 2, a fun cover of Michael Jackson's "Billie Jean," comes from a various artists album collection "Andrew Denton's Musical Challenge." Track 3, "Throw Your Arms Around Me," is from the various artists collection called "KCRW Sounds Eclectic."

This album mostly consists of Crowded House done in acoustic format. It includes some well-known ones, including their biggest hit, "Don't Dream It's Over." There are some interesting other songs as well. For instance, "Message to My Girl" was originally done by Split Enz, the band Finn was in before he was in Crowded House.

This album is 47 minutes long.

01 Message to My Girl (Neil Finn)
02 Billie Jean (Neil Finn)
03 Throw Your Arms Around Me (Neil Finn)
04 Rest of the Day Off (Neil Finn)
05 Distant Sun (Neil Finn)
06 Turn and Run (Neil Finn)
07 Into the Sunset (Neil Finn)
08 Last Day of June (Neil Finn)
09 Wherever You Are (Neil Finn)
10 Last to Know (Neil Finn)
11 Fall at Your Feet (Neil Finn)
12 Anytime (Neil Finn)
13 Driving Me Mad (Neil Finn)
14 Don't Dream It's Over (Neil Finn)

NOTE: The link has been removed due to a copyright issue. However, take a look at the comments.

The cover photo is from a promotional photo shoot in 2001.

Paul Weller - BBC Sessions, Volume 7: In Concert, Victoria Park, London, Britain, 8-8-1998

I've been wanting to post the next album in this series of BBC albums performed by Paul Weller, but I wasn't sure how to proceed. It made sense to make the next album a BBC concert from 1996 or after. Thanks to the official box set "At the BBC," I had lots of choices. There was one concert each from 1996, 1997, and 1998. But all of them were edited down to less than an hour and all the banter between songs was removed. Furthermore, the song selections in all of them were similar. 

What I really wanted was a full concert with all the banter. That box set had a second concert from 1998 that at least was a full concert, at over an hour and 10 minutes long. However, the banter was still missing, and even a lot of the applause after songs was missing, with quick edits from one song to the next. I found that annoying. I think it's a much better listening to concerts where there are breaks between songs, otherwise it ends up kind of sounding like one song. So I was stuck. I had four BBC concerts to choose from, and I wasn't happy with any of them.

Then I found a soundboard bootleg of a concert Weller did in Edinburgh in July 1998. That did have banter between many songs, as well as complete applause, and the set list was largely the same. So what I'm presenting here is the music from the BBC concert in Britain, but with banter and applause added from the Edinburgh bootleg. The sound quality is excellent in both cases, and all the banter fits. (There were a few bits that didn't fit, such as a mention of Edinburgh, so I cut those out.) I hope when you listen to this is just sound like one concert and you'd never know that some bits came from a second source. (I didn't put "[Edit]" in the names of songs like I sometimes do, because basically all of the songs here have been carefully edited with their applause and such.)

So I finally got what I wanted, a full BBC concert from this time period. Weller was probably at the peak of his solo career popularity at this time, and the set list is excellent.

This album is an hour and 14 minutes long.

01 Into Tomorrow (Paul Weller)
02 Peacock Suit (Paul Weller)
03 Friday Street (Paul Weller)
04 Mermaids (Paul Weller)
05 talk (Paul Weller)
06 Sunflower (Paul Weller)
07 Out of the Sinking (Paul Weller)
08 talk (Paul Weller)
09 Science (Paul Weller)
10 Heavy Soul (Paul Weller)
11 talk (Paul Weller)
12 As You Lean into the Light (Paul Weller)
13 talk (Paul Weller)
14 Wild Wood (Paul Weller)
15 talk (Paul Weller)
16 Up In Suzes' Room (Paul Weller)
17 talk (Paul Weller)
18 Can You Heal Us [Holy Man] (Paul Weller)
19 talk (Paul Weller)
20 The Changingman (Paul Weller)
21 Porcelain Gods (Paul Weller)
22 Woodcutter's Son (Paul Weller)
23 talk (Paul Weller)
24 I Walk on Gilded Splinters (Paul Weller)
25 Broken Stones (Paul Weller)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/PDCVYu8x

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/cnJhfXE6rW8iDUw/file

A professional video for this concert was made, and can be found on YouTube. It seems the audio from the box set is taken from that video, because the lack of banter and applause is exactly the same. Anyway, I wasn't able to find any good photos of Weller at this concert, so I took a screenshot from the video. It's a bit low-res, but I like the perspective that shows Weller looking towards the crowd. Later, I used Krea AI to sharpen the image a bit.

Friday, May 17, 2024

Dolly Parton - Dominion Theatre, London, Britain, 5-21-1983

Dolly Parton can be a bit of a caricature, with her theme park, extreme hourglass figure, big hair, and the like. But she's actually a great songwriter as well as singer, writing classics like "Jolene," "I Will Always Love You," and "Coat of Many Colors" on her own. I figured she's worthy of a live album at this blog. I looked around and found this bootleg.

I believe this has never been shared as music files. I found a video of this concert, because it was once shown on cable TV. So I converted it to audio and broke it up into mp3s. I think it's from an ideal era, because she was still in her musical prime in 1983, but most of her big, classic songs had been released by then.

Unfortunately, one song that is missing is "Islands in the Steam," a smash Number One hit duet. It was released in 1983, but a few months after this concert.

The sound quality was excellent. There were no problems to speak of.

This album is one hour and 14 minutes long.

01 Baby I'm Burning (Dolly Parton)
02 Jolene (Dolly Parton)
03 Two Doors Down (Dolly Parton)
04 Coat of Many Colors (Dolly Parton)
05 talk (Dolly Parton)
06 Appalachian Memories (Dolly Parton)
07 Applejack (Dolly Parton)
08 talk (Dolly Parton)
09 Do I Ever Cross Your Mind (Dolly Parton)
10 talk (Dolly Parton)
11 Do I Ever Cross Your Mind [Fast Version] (Dolly Parton)
12 talk (Dolly Parton)
13 Brother Love's Traveling Salvation Show - I'll Fly Away - When the Saints Go Marching In - Old Time Religion (Dolly Parton)
14 talk (Dolly Parton)
15 Dueling Banjos - Orange Blossom Special [Instrumental] (Dolly Parton)
16 Rhumba Man [Rhumba Girl] (Dolly Parton)
17 talk (Dolly Parton)
18 All Shook Up (Dolly Parton)
19 talk (Dolly Parton)
20 Me and Little Andy (Dolly Parton)
21 Down from Dover (Dolly Parton)
22 Here You Come Again (Dolly Parton)
23 9 to 5 (Dolly Parton)
24 Great Balls of Fire (Dolly Parton)
25 I Will Always Love You (Dolly Parton)
26 9 to 5 [Instrumental Version] (Dolly Parton)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16644232/DOLLYPRTN1983DmnonThetrLndnBrtin__5-_21-1983_atse.zip.html

The cover photo is from a concert she did at this very venue from this very month, but it was a few days later. Apparently, she did about a week's worth of concerts there.

Thursday, May 16, 2024

Two More Bite the Dust

A couple of weeks ago, I posted a BBC album by Tears for Fears. That got taken down due to a copyright violation. A couple of days ago, I posted a BBC album by Judy Collins. That also got taken down for the same reason. I'll try to see what I can do to point to those being available elsewhere. Stay tuned for more info.

Sara Bareilles - Non Sequiturs, Volume 1 (2007-2023) (A MIKE SOLOF GUEST POST)

Have you heard of Sara Bareilles? Up until recently, I had not. But frequent guest poster Mike Solof came to me recently with a proposal to post an album of original, unreleased songs by her. I listened to it and thought it was good, so I approved posting it. But I also wondered how many people will download it if they hadn't heard of it before, like me. So I suggested to Mike that he make an album of cover songs she's done, all from stray tracks, so people who just love good music can listen to her and discover she has a great voice. So that's what this is.

As usual with Mike's post, you can find a lot more information in his PDFs he writes and includes in the downloads. So check that out. And the other Sara Bareilles album I mentioned is in the works and should be posted here too.

This album is an hour and four minutes long.

01 I Want You Back (Straight No Chaser & Sara Bareilles)
02 Single Ladies [Put a Ring on It] (Sara Bareilles)
03 Oh Darling (Sara Bareilles)
04 I Can Let Go Now (Sara Bareilles)
05 In Your Eyes (Sara Bareilles)
06 I've Had the Time of My Life (Sara Bareilles)
07 Fuck You (Sara Bareilles)
08 Truly Brave [Mash-Up of Brave and True Colors]] (Sara Bareilles, Cyndi Lauper & Hoda Kotb)
09 I Don't Know How to Love Him (Sara Bareilles)
10 River (Sara Bareilles)
11 What's Going On (Sara Bareilles, Clarence Bekker & Titi Tsira)
12 What the World Needs Now Is Love (Sara Bareilles)
13 When You Wish upon a Star (Sara Bareilles)
14 Chandelier (Sara Bareilles)
15 Stoney End (Sara Bareilles)
16 You've Got a Friend (Sara Bareilles)
17 California (Sara Bareilles, Brandi Carlile & Lucius)
18 Come On Eileen (Sugarland & Sara Bareilles)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16631634/SARBARLLES2007-2023NnSqitrsVlum1_atse.zip.html

I have no idea when or where the cover photo is from, and I doubt Mike does either. But he presented a bunch of options to me for the cover photo, and I liked this one the best, so here we are. I'm guessing there are different colors on her because she was sitting near a stained glass window, which I think is a cool effect.

Monday, May 13, 2024

Cliff Richard - BBC Sessions, Volume 8: In Concert, Bournemouth International Centre, Bournemouth, Britain, 11-16-1988

I'm not much of a Cliff Richard fan, but somehow I keep posting BBC albums from him. Here's the eighth one. Like the previous two, this is a concert broadcast by the BBC. Although I'm not much of a fan, I figure he's such a big star in Britain that a fair amount of people will want to hear this.

If you got just one Cliff Richard concert, this is probably the one to get. It's late enough in his career that it includes pretty much all of his big hits. But it's far back in time enough for him to still be in his vocal and physical prime.

This concert is totally unreleased, as far as I know. The sound quality is generally excellent. However, I boosted the vocals a lot for the banter between songs. Also, there was a flaw in the song "We Don't Talk Anymore." Luckily, it was in the middle of a chorus, not a verse. So I was able to patch it when a bit from another chorus. That's why that song has "[Edit]" in the title.

This album is an hour and 37 minutes long.

01 Born to Rock 'n' Roll (Cliff Richard)
02 Move It (Cliff Richard)
03 Daddy's Home (Cliff Richard)
04 Devil Woman (Cliff Richard)
05 We Don't Talk Anymore [Edit] (Cliff Richard)
06 Another Tear Falls (Cliff Richard)
07 Some People (Cliff Richard)
08 Ocean Deep (Cliff Richard)
09 talk (Cliff Richard)
10 Living Doll (Cliff Richard)
11 The Young Ones (Cliff Richard)
12 talk (Cliff Richard)
13 Bachelor Boy (Cliff Richard)
14 talk (Cliff Richard)
15 In the Country (Cliff Richard)
16 Visions (Cliff Richard)
17 The Minute You're Gone (Cliff Richard)
18 Carrie (Cliff Richard)
19 True Love Ways (Cliff Richard)
20 My Pretty One (Cliff Richard)
21 talk (Cliff Richard)
22 Miss You Nights (Cliff Richard)
23 talk (Cliff Richard)
24 Thief in the Night - UFO - Get It Right Next Time (Cliff Richard)
25 talk (Cliff Richard)
26 Rock and Roll Medley (Cliff Richard)
27 It'll Be Me (Cliff Richard)
28 Mistletoe and Wine (Cliff Richard)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/6rRNC86u

The cover photo comes from a concert in Nurnberg, Germany, in 1988.

Sunday, May 12, 2024

Judy Collins - BBC Sessions, Volume 1: Tonight in Person, London, Britain, 5-2-1966

In the mid-1960s, the BBC had an interesting folk music TV show called "Tonight in Person." Each show featured just one music act and lasted half an hour without commercials. In 2023, I posted a the audio from double episode that featured Peter, Paul and Mary. I recently came across another episode featuring Judy Collins, so here it is.

By 1966, Collins was one of the most famous folk singers in the world, generally covering songs written by others. By the time of this concert she'd switched from a purely acoustic sound to a folk-rock sound, so there was a small band backing her.

The sound quality is surprisingly great considering this is unreleased and from back in 1966. I only had to make two edits where there were minor glitches. I patched them using music from elsewhere in the same song. Those are the songs with "[Edit]" in their names.

The BBC show was fairly short, only about 28 minutes. So I looked around to see if there were any other TV or radio appearances from that time I could throw on as quasi-bonus tracks. I found two, from an appearance on the "Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour" in 1967. I stuck those on the end. Those are unreleased too.

You may notice I called this "BBC Sessions, Volume 1." I found another BBC concert she did in the 1970s. I plan on posting that soon.

This album is 35 minutes long, including the two Smothers Brothers extra songs.

01 Early Morning Rain (Judy Collins)
02 talk (Judy Collins)
03 Hey Nelly Nelly (Judy Collins)
04 talk (Judy Collins)
05 In My Life (Judy Collins)
06 talk (Judy Collins)
07 Silver Dagger (Judy Collins)
08 talk (Judy Collins)
09 Turn, Turn, Turn [To Everything There Is a Season] [Edit] (Judy Collins)
10 Ramblin' Boy (Judy Collins)
11 talk (Judy Collins)
12 Oh My Sweetheart (Judy Collins)
13 talk (Judy Collins)
14 Let's Get Together (Judy Collins)
15 I Think It's Going to Rain Today [Edit] (Judy Collins)
16 Hard Lovin' Loser & the Smothers Brothers (Judy Collins)

NOTE: The link has been removed due to a copyright issue. However, check out the comments below.

The full video of this concert can be found on YouTube if you look hard. This cover is a screenshot taken from that. I then colorized it with the help of the Palette program.

The Knitters - The Ritz, New York City, 10-24-1985

Have you even heard of the Knitters? Maybe not. But it's more likely you've heard of the punk band X. The Knitters are a basically an X side project, featuring three out of four members of X, including their two singer-songwriters, Exene Cervenka and John Doe. But there are two other members, including Dave Alvin, a singer-songwriter from the Blasters. The reason for this side project is because the Knitters play a very different style of music. They were alt-country about five years before the alt-country movement even began.

The Knitters were formed around 1982, and they generally perform a handful of concerts each year. They only released two studio albums, "Poor Little Critters in the Road" in 1985 and "The Modern Sounds of the Knitters" in 2005. They've never put out an official live album.

So if you're a fan of this band, as I am, this album is really great. It's double the length of their debut album, so it contains lots of songs that they never put out on either album. They played a couple of X songs redone in a country rock style ("The New World" and "I Must Not Think Bad Thoughts") as well as some Knitters originals. But mostly they did classic and obscure folk or country covers. So not every fan of X is going to love this. But if you're open-minded about country rock, you should really like it. They were way ahead of their time back in 1985.

This is a soundboard bootleg. It's the only Knitters bootleg that I know of, so it's a lucky thing that the sound quality is excellent. 

This album is an hour and 11 minutes long.

01 talk (Knitters)
02 Silver Wings (Knitters)
03 talk (Knitters)
04 Cryin' but My Tears Are Far Away (Knitters)
05 talk (Knitters)
06 Poor Little Critter on the Road (Knitters)
07 talk (Knitters)
08 The New World (Knitters)
09 Someone like You (Knitters)
10 talk (Knitters)
11 Hand Me Down My Walking Cane (Knitters)
12 talk (Knitters)
13 Poor Old Heartsick Me (Knitters)
14 talk (Knitters)
15 Mama Tried (Knitters)
16 talk (Knitters)
17 I'm Here to Get My Baby Out of Jail (Knitters)
18 I Can't Hold Myself in Line (Knitters)
19 Pipeline [Instrumental] (Knitters)
20 Long White Cadillac (Knitters)
21 talk (Knitters)
22 Love Shack (Knitters)
23 talk (Knitters)
24 The Call of the Wreckin' Ball (Knitters)
25 I Must Not Think Bad Thoughts (Knitters)
26 talk (Knitters)
27 Jackson (Knitters)
28 Rock Island Line (Knitters)
29 talk (Knitters)
30 The Trail of Time (Knitters)
31 talk (Knitters)
32 Tennessee Border (Knitters)
33 talk (Knitters)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16625127/TKNITTRS1985TRitzNwYrkCty__10-24-1985_atse.zip.html

 I couldn't find any photos of the Knitters in concert back in 1985 (or any year around then, for that matter). So I used a photo from an X concert taken from a TV appearance in August 1985. The two singers shown here, Exene Cervenka and John Doe, are also the two main singers for the Knitters.

Saturday, May 11, 2024

Kate Bush - Manchester Apollo, Manchester, Britain, 4-10-1979

I'm not a really big fan of Kate Bush's music, though I do like some of her stuff. However, I'm posting this because it seems like something that needs more attention.

Bush really only performed full concerts in 1978, 1979, and 2014. There's an official live album from her 1979 tour, called "Live at Hammersmith Odeon," which was released in 1994. However, it's only 53 minutes long. That's unfortunate, because her concerts that year were about two hours long. I haven't seen any excellent sounding bootlegs from this tour. However, I did find a great sounding video, taken from a concert in Manchester, Britain. I converted it to audio and broke it into mp3s. 

You can find an interesting article from NME Magazine about Bush's 1979 tour, with lots of photos, here:

The Big Picture - Inside Kate Bush's Groundbreaking 1979 Tour (nme.com)

In short, she considered performing typical concerts to be boring, and she wanted to do something artistically challenging and groundbreaking. So her concerts were big productions, with costume changes, dozens of supporting musicians, magicians, mimes, video projections, and dance routines. Bush ran around and danced so much that it was a wonder she was able to sing as well. If you listen closely to this recording, you might hear her a little breathless at times.

There was no banter between songs at all, because she felt that took the concert goer out of the immersive experience. But she did talk a little at the end of the concert.

This album is an hour and 54 minutes long.

01 Moving (Kate Bush)
02 Saxophone Song (Kate Bush)
03 Room for the Life (Kate Bush)
04 Them Heavy People (Kate Bush)
05 Man with the Child in His Eyes (Kate Bush)
06 Egypt (Kate Bush)
07 L'Amour Looks Something like You (Kate Bush)
08 Violin (Kate Bush)
09 Poem by John Carder Bush (Kate Bush)
10 The Kick Inside (Kate Bush)
11 In the Warm Room (Kate Bush)
12 Fullhouse (Kate Bush)
13 Strange Phenomena (Kate Bush)
14 Hammer Horror (Kate Bush)
15 Chant (Kate Bush)
16 Kashka from Baghdad (Kate Bush)
17 Don't Push Your Foot on the Heartbrake (Kate Bush)
18 Wow (Kate Bush)
19 Coffee Homeground (Kate Bush)
20 In Search of Peter Pan (Kate Bush)
21 Symphony in Blue (Kate Bush)
22 Feel It (Kate Bush)
23 Kite (Kate Bush)
24 James and the Cold Gun (Kate Bush)
25 Oh England My Lionheart (Kate Bush)
26 Wuthering Heights (Kate Bush)
27 talk (Kate Bush)

https://www.imagenetz.de/fisMS

alternate:

https://pixeldrain.com/u/drUYjobL

The cover photo was taken of Bush at a concert in Amsterdam, Netherlands, on April 29, 1979. It doesn't look like a concert photo at first, but these concerts were elaborate productions, and this is indeed from a concert.

Squeeze - BBC Sessions, Volume 6: In Concert, Hammersmith Odeon, London, Britain, 10-14-1985

For much of the 1980s, it seemed like the British band Squeeze performed a BBC concert every time they released another studio album, and here's another example of that. 

In 1982, Squeeze broke up, when they arguably were at their peak of commercial and critical success. But they only stayed apart for three years. They reunited for a benefit concert, decided they liked being together, and recorded a studio album that year, "Cosi Fan Tutti Frutti." This concert was from part of a tour to support that album.

The sound quality here was a bit below par for the BBC, even though it's an unreleased bootleg. I boosted the lead vocals on all the songs, and especially on the banter between songs (using the audio editing program UVR5), and I think it sounds very good now. 

There was a more significant problem with the song "Is That Love," where there was a sonic flaw in one part of the songs. But I was able to patch that with another bit from elsewhere in the song. That's why that one has "[Edit]" in the title.

This album is 59 minutes long.

01 talk (Squeeze)
02 Another Nail In My Heart (Squeeze)
03 Is That Love [Edit] (Squeeze)
04 In Quintessence (Squeeze)
05 talk (Squeeze)
06 Hits of the Year (Squeeze)
07 Last Time Forever (Squeeze)
08 By Your Side (Squeeze)
09 talk (Squeeze)
10 King George Street (Squeeze)
11 Up the Junction (Squeeze)
12 No Place like Home (Squeeze)
13 Annie Get Your Gun (Squeeze)
14 Take Me, I'm Yours (Squeeze)
15 Pulling Mussels [From the Shell] (Squeeze)
16 Labelled with Love (Squeeze)
17 Black Coffee in Bed (Squeeze)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16622377/SQUZE1985BBSssonsVlum6InCncrtHmmrsmthOdonLndonBrtin__10-14-1985_atse.zip.html

The cover photo is from a concert at Hoffman Estates, Illinois, on September 6, 1985.

SNACK Benefit, Kezar Stadium, San Francisco, CA, 3-23-1975, Part 8: Neil Young, Bob Dylan & the Band

This is the eighth and last major act to perform for the 1975 SNACK benefit concert in San Francisco. In my opinion, it's the most interesting one, because it was a very rare collaboration between Neil Young and Bob Dylan, with three members of the Band assisting for good measure.

It's not entirely clear how this collaboration came about. Only Neil Young was billed as the final act for the concert. Promoter Bill Graham later said that Young and the Doobie Brothers were the biggest draws. Bob Dylan seemed to a last minute addition because this group probably didn't practice much. I'm guessing the Band members joined due to their connection with Dylan. They'd never played with Young before, as far as I know, but they'd been Dylan's most frequent backing back from 1966 all the way until a big tour in 1974. Only three members of the Band were there though: Levon Helm, Rick Danko, and Garth Hudson. That meant Robbie Robertson and Richard Manuel were missing. But the key thing was that Helm was there, because he was the lead vocalist on most of the songs by the Band. And indeed he sang lead on a couple of the songs here.

According to Rolling Stone Magazine's account of the concert, Dylan wasn't expected by the crowd whatsoever. When he showed up on stage, very few people recognized him until Bill Graham introduced the band members. Then a huge roar went up, naturally, since he was arguably the biggest name of all the acts in the concert.

But what's curious is that one normally would have expected Dylan to dominate the set, but for this concert he seemed content to be just one member of a group. For most of the songs, he just played guitar and/or harmonica, and sang backing vocals some. He only sang lead on two of the nine songs, his "I Want You" and "Knockin' on Heaven's Door," which was inexplicably renamed "Knockin' on the Dragon's Door" for this concert only. He also sang lead on some of the verses for the traditional song "Will the Circle Be Unbroken," but he forgot how a verse went, so the song finished more as an instrumental.

Young sang lead on three songs: "Are You Ready for the Country," "Lookin' for a Love," and "Helpless." "Lookin' for a Love" wouldn't be released until it appeared on the "Zuma" album towards the end of the year. This was its concert debut. The Band dominated the singing on "Ain't That a Lot of Love," "Loving You Is Sweeter than Ever," and "The Weight." "Helpless" flowed directly into "Knockin' on Heaven's Door" (er, "Dragon's Door") in an interesting way.

Unfortunately, there was one very big problem with the audio of this set that I think has prevented it from being much better known: Bob Dylan's microphone was turned off or malfunctioned for the entire set! As a result, he was practically inaudible at times. The only reason he could be heard at all was because he was singing in a particularly shouty style (perhaps because he noticed the microphone problem?) and his voice was picked up somewhat by some of the other nearby microphones.

Luckily, in this day and age there are things that can be done to fix this. Using the UVR5 audio editing program, I did my best to boost Dylan's voice up to normal levels as much as possible. However, in some cases there wasn't enough there to do any boosting. For "Knockin' on Heaven's Door" (sorry, "Dragon's"), and "Will the Circle Be Unbroken," I was able to get by with just boosting. It doesn't always sound great, but it's way better than previous versions. 

However, I had a lot more trouble with "I Want You." His voice was nearly totally gone for the first verse. So I found a soundboard of him singing the song from 1976 and pasted his vocals in for that part. But for the bridge and the second and third verses, I was able to get by with just boosting the existing vocals. The choruses were also a problem. Rick Danko sang backing vocals, and that was picked up very loudly, totally drowning out Dylan. So again I used that 1976 version and pasted in Dylan singing on the choruses, trying to match it with Danko's timing. I think the end result more or less works, but you can tell the difference in style between the 1976 parts, where he was singing the song normally, and the parts from this concert, where he was much more shouty. 

So that's why the three songs with Dylan lead vocals all have "[Edit]" in their titles. With "Will the Circle Be Unbroken," the last verse didn't have a chorus following it due to Dylan forgetting the words, so I pasted in the chorus from earlier in the song.

I'm afraid there are probably other songs where Dylan sang backing harmonies that are now totally lost due to the microphone problem. In such cases, his quiet voice would have been totally drowned out by whomever happened to be singing lead. Oh well.

It's too bad that Dylan and Young in particular didn't collaborate more, but at least we have this. 

This album is 36 minutes long.

73 talk by Bill Graham (Neil Young, Bob Dylan & the Band)
74 Are You Ready for the Country (Neil Young, Bob Dylan & the Band)
75 Ain't That a Lot of Love (Neil Young, Bob Dylan & the Band)
76 talk (Neil Young, Bob Dylan & the Band)
77 Lookin' for a Love (Neil Young, Bob Dylan & the Band)
78 Loving You Is Sweeter than Ever (Neil Young, Bob Dylan & the Band)
79 I Want You [Edit] (Neil Young, Bob Dylan & the Band)
80 The Weight (Neil Young, Bob Dylan & the Band)
81 Helpless (Neil Young, Bob Dylan & the Band)
82 Knockin' on the Dragon's Door [Knockin' on Heaven's Door] [Edit] (Neil Young, Bob Dylan & the Band)
83 Will the Circle Be Unbroken [Edit] (Neil Young, Bob Dylan & the Band)

https://www.upload.ee/files/17209136/VA-SNCKBnefitKzarStdumSnFrncscoCA197508NilYungBbDylnthBnd_atse.zip.html

alternate:

https://pixeldrain.com/u/msdWqABs

For this set, due to the big names involved, I found some more photos from this exact concert, including a couple of color ones. But the one I liked the best was a black and white one. So again I colorized it with the Palette program. Then I used the color ones as a guide to get the colors of the clothes right.

UPDATE: On October 7, 2024, I upgraded the photo with the use of the Krea AI program.