John Sebastian & David Bromberg - PBS Soundstage, WTTW Studios, Chicago, IL, 12-9-1974

I recently posted a "PBS Soundstage" episode starring Donovan. I noted that another episode recorded that same day at the same location jointly starred John Sebastian and David Bromberg, which allowed Donovan to have them as guests on one of his songs. A commenter noticed that and asked me to post the Sebastian and Bromberg show sooner rather than later. So here it is.

Sebastian and Bromberg are singer-songwriters. (Both are still alive as I write this in 2025.) Sebastian had a lot more success than Bromberg, first with his band the Lovin' Spoonful in the 1960s, and then with his Number One smash "Welcome Back" in 1976. Bromberg did a lot more work as a session musician in the 1970s, while also releasing a series of solo albums.

At first glance, there doesn't appear to have been much connection between these two. For instance, they never put out an album together, or were in a band together. According to their banter between songs in this concert, they were working on a studio album, said to be called "Fish and Fire." I don't know if that was supposed to be a Sebastian album or Bromberg album or what, but no such album ever came to be. However, I did notice that in later years, meaning 1980s and after, they did tour together sometimes.

In any case, they were very collaborative in the concert. The first half was dominated by Bromberg and the second half by Sebastian, but both of them generally played on all the songs.

Generally speaking, the sound quality is pretty good, though not great. The only major problem I had was the last song, "Summer in the City," which was a Number One hit by the Lovin' Spoonful in the 1960s. Unfortunately, it got cut off before the song ended. I couldn't find another version from around this time. But I patched in a part from earlier to at least give it a better sounding ending.

This album is 48 minutes long. 

01 Hard Working John [Instrumental] (John Sebastian & David Bromberg)
02 talk (John Sebastian & David Bromberg)
03 Don't Put That Thing on Me (John Sebastian & David Bromberg)
04 talk (John Sebastian & David Bromberg)
05 Si Bheag, Si Mhor [Instrumental] (John Sebastian & David Bromberg)
06 Nobody's (John Sebastian & David Bromberg)
07 talk (John Sebastian & David Bromberg)
08 I'm a Hog for Ya Baby (John Sebastian & David Bromberg)
09 Stealin' (John Sebastian & David Bromberg)
10 Guitar and Harmonica Duet [Instrumental] (John Sebastian & David Bromberg)
11 talk (John Sebastian & David Bromberg)
12 Friends Again (John Sebastian & David Bromberg)
13 Harmonica Song [Instrumental] (John Sebastian & David Bromberg)
14 Did You Ever Have to Make Up Your Mind (John Sebastian & David Bromberg)
15 You Didn't Have to Be So Nice (John Sebastian & David Bromberg)
16 Do You Believe in Magic (John Sebastian & David Bromberg)
17 talk (John Sebastian & David Bromberg)
18 Summer in the City [Edit] (John Sebastian & David Bromberg)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/xv13TJvj

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/hrzGeMuWIm5iie4/file

I couldn't find any photos or video footage from this exact concert. But I as I mentioned above, Sebastian and Bromberg guested on a song in a Donovan concert recorded that same day. I managed to find a moment in it showing just Sebastian (playing harmonica) and Bromberg (playing guitar). So I took a screenshot of that. It was pretty low-res and blurry video footage though, so I ran the image through the Krea AI program.