Freedy Johnston - Tower Theatre, Upper Darby, PA, 3-19-1995

A couple of days ago, I was looking at a bootleg sharing site, and saw a concert being shared by Freedy Johnston. I decided against getting that one, because it was only an audience boot. But it made me think that I've never posted anything by him. I think he's a very underappreciated singer-songwriter. So I went looking for a concert bootleg with soundboard quality, and found this one. 

Johnston grew up on a farm in a small town in Kansas. After going to college in Kansas, he moved to New York City. He was an office worker while trying to make it in the music business. Most of the music in the concert comes from his 1992 and 1994 studio albums. So I'm pasting in a portion of his Wikipedia entry dealing with that time period: 

"Johnston sold some of his family's farmland to finance the recording of his second album, 'Can You Fly' (an event he wrote about in the opening track on that album, 'Trying to Tell You I Don't Know'). The album, released in 1992, was selected by the New York Times as one of the best albums of the year. Johnston followed up with his 1994 major label debut, 'This Perfect World,' released on Elektra Records and produced by Butch Vig of Garbage. The album received positive reviews and led to Rolling Stone naming Johnston 'songwriter of the year.' Other publications, including the New York Times, Spin, and Musician Magazine, gave the album high marks as well. It featured the single 'Bad Reputation,' which reached 54 on the Billboard Hot 100 and is one of his best-known songs."

Here's the link to the rest of his Wikipedia entry:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedy_Johnston

Unfortunately for him, those two albums were the peaks of his commercial and critical success. But he has settled down into a steady musical career with less attention, releasing new studio albums every few years.

This is a relatively short album, because he was the opening act for Sheryl Crow. He wrote all the songs, except for the Jimmy Webb classic "Wichita Lineman." Personally, my two favorite songs of his are "Bad Reputation" and "The Lucky One," and they're both here. 

The sound quality is excellent. There was just one problem with this recording: the start of the first song "I Can Hear the Laughs" was missing. I couldn't find any other live versions from this time period, since there are very few Freedy Johnston live recordings, period. So I decided to use the studio album version to patch in the missing first verse. It's far from ideal, but I figure it's better than nothing. That's why that one song has "[Edit]" in its title. 

This album is 47 minutes long. 

01 I Can Hear the Laughs [Edit] (Freedy Johnston)
02 Evie's Tears (Freedy Johnston)
03 Delores (Freedy Johnston)
04 Solid Gold Heart (Freedy Johnston)
05 Across the Avenue (Freedy Johnston)
06 talk (Freedy Johnston)
07 This Perfect World (Freedy Johnston)
08 Bad Reputation (Freedy Johnston)
09 Trying to Tell You I Don't Know (Freedy Johnston)
10 Wichita Lineman (Freedy Johnston)
11 talk (Freedy Johnston)
12 Can't Sink This Town (Freedy Johnston)
13 Two Lovers Stop (Freedy Johnston)
14 talk (Freedy Johnston)
15 The Lucky One (Freedy Johnston)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/qfZyxF7A

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/8CH8sEsw0Xb6RXV/file

Remarkably, this photo is from this exact concert. It's remarkable because I only found a few photos of him in concert from this year at all.