Frank Zappa - 1971-1988 Strictly Commercial Live (A Mike Solof Guest Post)

Guest poster Mike Solof has been busily slaving away in the salt mines, coming up with more albums to post at this blog. In particular, he's got a big Beatles project coming that hopefully will knock your socks off. Unfortunately, I've fallen behind getting some things ready to post, but hopefully I'll catch up soon. For this album, he came up with the idea of collecting live versions of all the songs on the Frank Zappa best of collection "Strictly Commercial."

I'll leave most of the explaining to Mike, in his PDF notes included in the download zip. But Zappa was well known for his lead guitar playing, and he's able to stretch some songs out here. For instance, the official album is about an hour and 17 minutes long, whereas this is almost two hours long. A lot of the difference there is with "Don't Eat the Yellow Snow." The official album has the three minute long single version, but this is a 20-minute-long live version of the entire suite. 

As is Mike's style, he's included a gapless single file of the album in the download zip, for those who prefer to hear it that way.

By the way, all the songs here feature Frank Zappa, except for one. His only Top Forty hit in the U.S. was "Valley Girl," in 1982. But that featured his daughter Moon Unit Zappa on lead vocals instead of him, and she was only 14 years old at the time. So it turns out he never performed the song before dying in 1993. But, much later, in 2010, his children Dweezil and Moon Unit performed the song in concert just once. So that's the version included here. But note the sound quality is a bit rough on that compared to everything else. It's one of only two unreleased versions (along with "Sexual Harassment in the Workplace)." All the others were chosen from the many dozens of official live albums.

This album is an hour and 56 minutes long. 

01 Peaches en Regalia (Frank Zappa)
02 Don't Eat the Yellow Snow (Frank Zappa)
03 Dancin' Fool (Frank Zappa)
04 San Ber'dino (Frank Zappa)
05 Let's Make the Water Turn Black (Frank Zappa)
06 Dirty Love (Frank Zappa)
07 My Guitar Wants to Kill Your Mama (Frank Zappa)
08 Cosmik Debris (Frank Zappa)
09 Trouble Every Day (Frank Zappa)
10 Disco Boy (Frank Zappa)
11 Bobby Brown Goes Down (Frank Zappa)
12 I'm the Slime (Frank Zappa)
13 Joe's Garage (Frank Zappa)
14 Fine Girl (Frank Zappa)
15 Planet of the Baritone Women (Frank Zappa)
16 Sexual Harassment in the Workplace [Instrumental] (Frank Zappa)
17 Tell Me You Love Me (Frank Zappa)
18 Montana (Frank Zappa)
19 Be in My Video (Frank Zappa)
20 Valley Girl (Dweezil Zappa & Moon Unit Zappa)
21 Who Are the Brain Police (Frank Zappa)
22 Muffin Man [Extra Guitar Mix] (Frank Zappa) 

https://pixeldrain.com/u/424ohU9v 

alternate: 

https://bestfile.io/WWM2Cx8sAJ0funq/file

The cover art is by Greg Joens. The original version was in black and white. I colorized it (because I hate black and white covers) with the use of the Kolorize program.

Alan Price - BBC Sessions, Volume 6: Alan Price, Royal Exchange Theatre, Manchester, Britain, 12-8-1980

As I mentioned in the write-up to the previous album in this series, I found a short series of four televised concerts Alan Price did for the BBC in 1980. Here's the second out of those four. 

Each of the concerts had an overall theme to the song selections. For this one, the theme was "social commentary." Most of the songs fit that theme, but a few are a stretch. How does "Bridge Over Trouble Water" belong, especially? In any case, this meant that most of the songs were covers. Only one from the show, "Jarrow Song," was an original.

However, there's a bonus song of sorts here, "The Trimdon Grange Explosion," that is also an original. But it's from a different BBC T.V. show, "Fundamental Frolics," aired in 1981. I figured that fits well here, since it also could be considered a social commentary song.

The music is unreleased. The sound quality is excellent. 

This album is 32 minutes long. 

01 Power to the People (Alan Price)
02 talk (Alan Price)
03 Blowin' in the Wind (Alan Price)
04 talk (Alan Price)
05 Political Science (Alan Price)
06 talk (Alan Price)
07 Big Yellow Taxi (Alan Price & Linda Taylor)
08 talk (Alan Price)
09 Bridge Over Troubled Water (Alan Price)
10 talk (Alan Price)
11 Sunny Afternoon (Alan Price)
12 Imagine (Alan Price)
13 talk (Alan Price)
14 Jarrow Song (Alan Price)
15 The Trimdon Grange Explosion (Alan Price)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/3tdqTEUs 

alternate: 

https://bestfile.io/en/zxpvn7o4FOizYmr/file

The cover image is a screenshot I took of a video of this exact concert. 

Les McCann - Ebbets Field, Denver, CO, 2-6-1974

The flood of concerts from the Ebbets Field venue in Denver, Colorado continues. This one stars soul jazz pianist Les McCann.

I'm not really into jazz, although there are some exceptions. For instance, I do like vocal jazz more than the all instrumental kind. I'm posting this because I'm trying to be post most of the Ebbets Field concerts I find, and McCann's fusion of soul and jazz is more palatable to me than straight jazz.

Here's some of what Wikipedia has to say about him: "[McCann] was an American jazz pianist and vocalist. He is known for his innovations in soul jazz and his 1969 recording of the protest song "Compared to What". His music has been widely sampled in hip hop. ... After the success of "Swiss Movement" (the album that contained "Compared to What"), McCann, primarily a piano player, emphasized his vocals. He became an innovator in soul jazz, merging jazz with funk, soul and world rhythms. His music was influential for its use of electric piano, clavinet, and synthesizer."

Here's the link to the entry:

Les McCann - Wikipedia

This concert contains a version of "Compared to What," McCann's surprise hit single. That song only reached Number 35 in the U.S. singles charts, but it sold over a million copies. So it was a slow seller, but ultimately reached numbers expected of a song that got close to the top of the charts. And it became a classic, with over 200 cover versions. The song was actually written by Gene McDaniels, although McCann released the first version of it, back in 1966.

Unfortunately for me, aside from "Compared to What" and two other songs, most of the songs in this concert were instrumentals. And I say that's unfortunate, because I don't know what the titles are for them. The source I found for this bootleg did have titles, but they were just made up by somebody as best guesses, such as "Electric Funk." It turns out they had nothing to do with the actual titles. So if anyone is very familiar with McCann's music, please help us out so I can update this with the correct names.

The music here is unreleased. The sound quality is excellent. 

This album is 58 minutes long. 

01 Talk to the People (Les McCann)
02 Unknown Song 1 [Instrumental] (Les McCann)
03 Unknown Song 2 [Instrumental] (Les McCann)
04 Soaring [At Dawn] (Les McCann)
05 Unknown Song 3 [Instrumental] (Les McCann)
06 Unknown Song 4 [Instrumental] (Les McCann)
07 Compared to What (Les McCann)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/zRTUmdcc

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/XTZTWL9noeEQjVi/file

The cover photo is from the Newport Jazz Festival in 1974. The original was in black and white, but I colorized it with the use of the Kolorize program. 

Covered Covers

I recently announced that I've updated all the links for the 150 or so "Covered" albums. And I mentioned that I made changes to many of the album covers for them while I was at it. 

The changes were mostly pretty minor, to be honest. A lot of it was standardizing the size of the text. And, for instance, for some albums, I wrote "The Best Of" and others I just wrote "Best Of." So I standardized that kind of thing as well. But I did make changes to the pictures too. I even replaced some of the pictures entirely, for instance for two of the Bacharach and David volumes. 

So, if any of that matters to you, redownloading 150 plus albums is a big pain in the ass. I got a request today by a commenter named Private Beach to make just the changed covers available. I decided that was reasonable. Thus, here's a zip file with all of the 150 or so album covers. Not all of them were changed, but the vast majority were (if only in subtle ways).

https://pixeldrain.com/u/ZajSf728

But note that if you download this, you still have to put each one of them in with the albums they belong to. 

John Hartford, Joni Mitchell & Pete Seeger - Gentle on Your Mind, KCOP-TV Studios, Los Angeles, CA, 10-18-1970

Here's a really nice find I luckily stumbled across recently. It's the audio from a 1970 musical T.V. special that featured John Hartford, Joni Mitchell, and Pete Seeger in roughly equal amounts. (Technically, the special was called "John Hartford, Joni Mitchell & Pete Seeger - Gentle on Your Mind," but I cut it down to just "Gentle on Your Mind" because really long album titles can cause problems for PC users.)

I wish I knew more about this T.V. show, but I could find very little about it other than this audio recording, plus one photo. And even that photo, which I used for the cover art, was taken from a newspaper clipping. So apparently none of the film footage survives, at least not in the public domain. 

The official Joni Mitchell website is normally extremely comprehensive about anything relating to her. But even that site has very little about this show. However, if you go to this link, you cansee the one photo I'm talking about (before I colorized it and used Krea AI to fill in some detail):

Joni Mitchell - 1970.10.18 | Gentle On My Mind KCOP-TV | Los Angeles

There are some nice surprises in this special. One is having Mitchell sing two songs with Seeger and one song with Hartford. "The Water Is Wide" was mostly Seeger, with Mitchell generally singing wordless backing vocals. But "Both Sides Now" was a proper duet. Seeger even wrote some nice new lyrics and sang those. And it was also great to hear Mitchell sing "Mr. Tambourine Man" with Hartford, especially since it's a Bob Dylan song that she very rarely sang.

Another nice surprise is that Mitchell performed "A Case of You" from her 1971 classic album "Blue" nearly a year before that album was released. So this was an early version, and it turned out a lot of the lyrics were changed by the time the album version came out. I actually prefer some of these lyrics (though some other changes were clear improvements). I particularly like "I'm frightened by the devil, and I'm scared to death by saints." (It was later changed to "I'm frightened by the devil, and I'm drawn to those ones that ain't afraid.")

Hartford also sang an original song he didn't release at the time, "Sunshine Lady, You Really Know How to Slow a Man Down." It eventually came out on an archival release, "Radio John," in 2002. 

This recording sounds pretty good considering how long it's been since the broadcast, though I couldn't call it "excellent." But there was one big problem with the recording: the applause for many of the songs were cut off. Probably, that's how it was in the original broadcast, due to the usual practice of quickly cutting to commercial breaks. I fixed that by patching in extra cheering that I took from the ends of other songs. 

Also, there's no banter included whatsoever. I'm sure there was some in the original broadcast. In fact, there were a few words said by Seeger before one of the songs, but I cut that out because it was literally just a few words, a mere sentence fragment. It would have been great to hear Hartford, Mitchell, and Seeger all talking to each other. But hey, at least we have the music.

The music is unreleased.  

This album is 48 minutes long. 

01 Frustrated Bird (John Hartford)
02 In Tall Buildings (John Hartford)
03 A Case of You (Joni Mitchell)
04 Bring Me Little Water (Pete Seeger)
05 Orange Blossom Special [Instrumental Version] (John Hartford)
06 Both Sides Now (Joni Mitchell & Pete Seeger)
07 Willy (Joni Mitchell)
08 [He Played Real Good] For Free (Joni Mitchell)
09 A Simple Thing as Love (John Hartford)
10 Sunshine Lady, You Really Know How to Slow a Man Down (John Hartford)
11 The Water Is Wide (Joni Mitchell with Pete Seeger)
12 Mr. Tambourine Man (Joni Mitchell & John Hartford)
13 Letter to Eve [Edit] (Pete Seeger) 

https://pixeldrain.com/u/jjUYyFhP

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/LImWqWn09DQyBVQ/file

As mentioned above, the image is the sole picture I could find that is actually from this exact performance. It's too bad Pete Seeger isn't shown as well. And, also as I mentioned above, I colorized it (using the Kolorize program) as well, and then increased the detail with the Krea AI program. 

Alan Price - BBC Sessions, Volume 5: Alan Price, Royal Exchange Theatre, Manchester, Britain, 12-1-1980

Once upon a time, back in 2022, I started posting BBC albums for Alan Price. I had plans to post two such albums for him, which seemed about right for his level of popularity. Then I found two more, and posted those. And I found two more BBC albums with him and Georgie Fame as a duo, and posted them as well. I thought that was a lot, more than expected. But now, I've found FOUR more BBC volumes for him! Here's the first of those four.

The reason I found four more albums from him all at once is that it turns out he was the star of a four part T.V. series for the BBC in 1980, and good copies have survived until today. Each episode consisted of a half an hour-long concert and nothing else. Furthermore, each of the episodes had specific musical themes. So Price played songs that fit those themes instead of his own songs. I believe that, between the four episodes, he only sang one of his songs. I don't know when the episodes were filmed exactly (I'm using the broadcast dates, since that's all I know), but they were broadcast on consecutive weeks.

This first episode had the theme of "Black music." That's pretty damn broad and vague, but hey, I didn't come up with the themes. In any case, it gave Price an excuse to sing some of his favorite songs from various genres, so that's what he did here. And one feature of these episodes is that each one featured at least one other guest singer. Madeline Bell was the choice this time, singing prominently on two of the songs.

The last song, "The House of the Rising Sun," isn't actually from this concert. But I found a version of Price singing the song on another BBC T.V. show ("Jeremy Taylor"), earlier in 1980. I stuck it on this album, instead of some of the other episodes, because I have other bonus tracks for some of them, and it fits the theme... maybe. I say "maybe" because nobody knows who actually wrote "House of the Rising Sun" or where it came from. The earliest versions go back to the 1920s, but apparently those are based on still earlier versions from the 1800s. So we don't know if it was originally written by a Black person or not. But it fits into the general Black blues tradition, in any case. 

The music here is unreleased. The sound quality is excellent. 

This album is 33 minutes long. 

01 Introduction [Instrumental] (Alan Price)
02 Sir Duke (Alan Price)
03 talk (Alan Price)
04 A Stranger's Lament (Alan Price)
05 talk (Alan Price)
06 Beat Out a Rhythm on a Drum (Alan Price & Madeline Bell)
07 talk (Alan Price)
08 Cherry Red (Alan Price)
09 talk (Alan Price)
10 Go Where I Send Thee (Alan Price & Madeline Bell)
11 talk (Alan Price)
12 What'd I Say (Alan Price)
13 Keep a-Knockin' (Alan Price)
14 The House of the Rising Sun (Alan Price)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/UfKvgz3Y

alternate: 

https://bestfile.io/MzMWzLg9hJuATOT/file

The cover image is a screenshot I took from this exact concert.

Terry Reid - Ebbets Field, Denver, CO, 4-1973

The Ebbets Field radio broadcasts keep coming, nearly one a day. Here's one starring singer-songwriter Terry Reid.

Reid, unfortunately, is best known for one bit of trivia: he passed on offers to be the lead singer for both Led Zeppelin and Deep Purple! In 1968, when he was given the Led Zeppelin offer by Jimmy Page, he had extensive touring commitments he couldn't get out of. So he suggested Robert Plant for the role instead, and the rest is history. And when Richie Blackmore asked him to join Deep Purple in 1969, he said their music was too heavy and not really his style.

The fact that both bands wanted him was a sign that a lot of people thought he was going to be a big star, one way or another. Unfortunately, that never happened. Here's the intro to his Wikipedia entry:

"[Reid] was an English musician, songwriter, and guitarist, best known for his emotive style of singing in appearances with high-profile musicians as vocalist, supporting act, and session musician. As a solo recording and touring artist he released six studio albums and four live albums. Described as an 'artists' artist' by Rolling Stone, Reid was recognized by his contemporaries as an eminent talent in English rock music, both as a guitarist and a vocalist. Robert Plant praised his vocal 'flexibility, power, and control' and Graham Nash was quoted as saying he should have been 'a gigantic star.'"

Terry Reid - Wikipedia 

There are very few live recordings of Reid, and this one was hard to find. So hopefully this will get around and add to his unofficial discography. By the way, he died in 2025 at the age of 75, which is why that paragraph was written in the past tense for him.

This concert took place when Reid was promoting his third solo album, "River," released in 1973. It got a lot of critical praise, but not a lot of sales. It put him more into singer-songwriter mode compared to his earlier, more rocking records. Some people compared the style of "River" to "Astral Weeks" by Van Morrison. That style of the album can be heard here, even for the songs not from the album.

I'm not sure if this concert was actually broadcast on local radio at the time, because there were some big issues with the recording. Overall, it doesn't sound as good as most of the Ebbets Field recordings, even after some changes I made. I had to make a lot of adjustments. The biggest was that I boosted the lead vocals dramatically relative to the instruments. But I made some other changes as well. For instance, a chunk of "Things to Try" was missing. Luckily, he played that song at the 1970 Isle of Wight Festival, so I used that to patch in the missing section.

I couldn't find any song list for this concert, so I had to figure out the song titles myself. This was difficult since I didn't have any of his albums prior to this. I had a hard time of it, since the sound quality meant the vocals sounded somewhat muffled at any volume. I think I got most of them right. However, I was totally stumped for one of them, which I just call "Unknown Title." If anyone knows the real name of that song, please let me know so I can fix it.

This album is an hour and 19 minutes long.

01 Rich Kid Blues (Terry Reid)
02 Without Expression (Terry Reid)
03 Live Life (Terry Reid)
04 To Be Alone with You (Terry Reid)
05 talk (Terry Reid)
06 Avenue (Terry Reid)
07 [Unknown Title] (Terry Reid)
08 Funny (Terry Reid)
09 talk (Terry Reid)
10 Things to Try [Edit] (Terry Reid)
11 Dean (Terry Reid)
12 River (Terry Reid)
13 talk (Terry Reid)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/kqist42S

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/rMFpswvfr9EWDSK/file

The cover image is from a concert at an unknown location on Jun3 24, 1973. The original was in black and white. I colorized it with the use of the Kolorize program.

The Beatles and Various Artists (including Brenda Holloway and King Curtis) - Shea Stadium, New York City, 8-15-1965

Normally, I'm not that interested in recordings of Beatles concerts, because they generally played short sets with the same songs over and over again, and the sound quality is bad, with more screaming girls than music. But this is an exception, for three reasons. 

One: this was an incredibly important and historic concert. That's because it was the very first stadium-sized concert anywhere. The 55,000 person-sized crowd would remain the largest audience for any Beatles concert, and the largest concert in the U.S. by anyone until a concert by Led Zeppelin in 1973. After it proved to be a big success, stadium concerts have become a standard thing ever since. It also was highly symbolic, showing how the Beatles were a cultural phenomenon and the most popular music act in the world, by far. Even the cynical John Lennon later said, "I saw the top of the mountain on that glorious night."

Two: this is the only Beatles concert recording I've seen that includes the opening acts with worthy sound quality. So you get the full concert experience, complete with lots of local radio DJs and other emcees hyping things up. It's true the opening acts weren't the greatest, compared to other opening acts for other Beatles concerts. I'm mainly interested in King Curtis and Brenda Holloway. But still, all of them are interesting as a historical curiosity. Keep in mind that there are an extremely small number of concert recordings from rock concerts as far back as 1965, outside of the Beatles and a few other big stars. So we're very lucky to have the opening acts. 

Three: the sound quality is surprisingly good for all of it, including the Beatles set. That's surprising because most concert recordings of the Beatles are practically unlistenable, in my opinion, due to all the screaming. And we know this concert took the screaming to new levels. The Beatles were forced to use the stadium's P.A. system, which was woefully inadequate for the situation. That meant the Beatles could barely hear each other. For instance, John Lennon later said of the concert, "It was a happening. You couldn't hear any music at all." But somehow, this recording brought the crowd noise down to a normal, reasonable level. I've done a lot of audio editing of crowd noise for this blog in general, but I barely made any changes for the Beatles set. (To have no or very little crowd noise would sound weird as well.) Plus, the actual singing and playing by the Beatles sounds very good, considering the difficult circumstances. 

There's a lot more I could say about this concert. But I don't want to write a mini-tome. So instead, I'll suggest some links if you want to know more. There's no Wikipedia page just for this concert. So here's a page from the Beatles Bible website instead:

https://www.beatlesbible.com/1965/08/15/live-shea-stadium-new-york/

Here's a 17 minute long fan-made YouTube video that explains the story of the concert:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sca-bR1b-qE&t=247s

And here's a Rolling Stone magazine article just about the concert: 

Why The Beatles’ Shea Stadium Show Is The Ultimate Pop Celebration 

Here's a Washington Post article from 2025, also just about the concert, written to mark the 60th anniversary of it. It has a lot of great photos and anecdotes, including extensive quotes for Brenda Holloway about her impressions of all of it:

The Beatles’ historic Shea Stadium concert, remembered 60 years later - The Washington Post 

Finally, and most importantly, here's the transcript of an interview of author Laurie Jacobson, who wrote an ENTIRE BOOK just about this one concert, called "Top of the Mountain." I highly recommend reading this one. It's not too long, and it's filled with interesting stories, for instance how Mick Jagger and Keith Richards were also at the concert, and what happened to them:

https://lovethatsongpodcast.com/the-beatles-play-shea-stadium-1965/

By the way, did you know a lot of then-current and future famous people were in the crowd of 55,000 people for that concert? Future Beatles wives Linda Eastman and Barbara Bach were there. So were Marvin Gaye, Bobby Vinton, John Sebastian, Ronnie Spector, and Mary Wilson of the Supremes. (Gaye actually got a brief mention by an emcee right before Brenda Holloway's set.) So were Joe Walsh, Steve Van Zant, Whoopi Goldberg, and Meryl Streep, all of them teenagers or younger at the time. (Streep held up an "I love Paul" sign.) And Bob Dylan did not attend the concert, but he hung out with the Beatles at their hotel after the concert ended. (He'd met them for the first time a year earlier.) 

Another aside. Some accounts claim that the Rascals, then known as the Young Rascals, performed at the concert. They did not. However, they did attend, and got prime seats in the third base dugout. At the time, they had signed a record contract, but were still unknown. Promoter Sid Bernstein wanted to hype them as the next big thing, and had the scoreboard sign flash the message "The Rascals are coming!" But Beatles manager Brian Epstein saw that and told Bernstein to stop it immediately, so it was stopped.

Now, let me address edits to this recording. I kept most of it, but I removed a song at the start called "Discotech Dancers Medley." It basically was a Muzak-like instrumental that played while a dance troupe called the Discotech Dancers showed off their moves. It was something I guess you needed to see more than hear. Also, there was very little cheering to be heard at the ends of songs for all the opening acts. So I generally upped the volume of the applause for all of those.

There also were extensive problems with most of the songs in the short set by Cannibal and the Headhunters. I did my best to fix those (which is why you see "[Edit]" in some song titles, but there was only so much I could do. The first half of "The Way You Do the Things You Do" is incomplete, and there's nothing I could do about that. There were the most problems with "Land of 1000 Dances," the band's sole hit, and the banter track right after that. I ran those though MVSEP multiple times to get rid of the strange crackling noises. Each pass got a rid of more, but I reached diminishing returns so I had to stop. It sounds a lot better than before, but there's still a lot of bothersome noise there.

The Beatles recorded this entire concert because they planned to make an hour-long BBC T.V. special out of it. And such a special was made, and shown in Britain in March 1966. However, there were a lot of flaws in the recording of the Beatles performance. For instance, Lennon's voice dropped out for one of the verses in "Help." I patched that using a different live version from 1965. Due to these problems, the Beatles went to a recording studio in January 1966 and completely rerecorded three of the songs: "Ticket to Ride," "I Feel Fine," and "Help." They used a different live version of "Twist and Shout." They also rerecorded other bits. For instance, Paul McCartney redid his bass parts for most of the songs. For Ringo Starr's vocals on "Act Naturally," they just patched in vocals from the studio version. This is the original recording of their concert performance, before the Beatles did their rerecordings (with the exception of the edit I made to "Help"). Perhaps I'll post that quite different BBC version of the concert at another time, since I like posting BBC stuff.

You can find a Wikipedia article about the BBC special of this concert, here:

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

One last comment. If anyone knows of any other recordings like this were the opening acts to the Beatles were recorded as well, please let me know. Like I said above, I'm just as interested in those parts as the Beatles' part, since there are so few live recordings of non-Beatles musical acts from this time period.

The music here is still officially unreleased, except for "Everybody's Trying to Be My Baby," which made it onto the "Anthology" albums.  

This album is an hour and 25 minutes long. 

01 talk by emcee (King Curtis)
02 talk by emcee (King Curtis)
03 What'd I Say (King Curtis)
04 talk (King Curtis)
05 The Prance (King Curtis)
06 Soul Twist [Instrumental] (King Curtis)
07 talk by emcee (Cannibal & the Headhunters)
08 Out of Sight (Cannibal & the Headhunters)
09 talk (Cannibal & the Headhunters)
10 Now Lady Now [Edit] (Cannibal & the Headhunters)
11 The Way You Do the Things You Do [Incomplete] (Cannibal & the Headhunters)
12 talk (Cannibal & the Headhunters)
13 Land of 1000 Dances [Edit] (Cannibal & the Headhunters)
14 talk by emcee [Edit] (Cannibal & the Headhunters)
15 talk by emcee (Brenda Holloway)
16 Shake - [I Can't Get No] Satisfaction (Brenda Holloway)
17 I Can't Help Myself [Sugar Pie Honey Bunch] (Brenda Holloway)
18 talk (Brenda Holloway)
19 You Can Cry On My Shoulder (Brenda Holloway)
20 When I'm Gone (Brenda Holloway)
21 talk by emcee with outro (Brenda Holloway)
22 talk by emcee (Sounds Incorporated)
23 America - Fingertips (Sounds Incorporated)
24 talk (Sounds Incorporated)
25 The William Tell Overture [Instrumental] (Sounds Incorporated)
26 Instrumental (Sounds Incorporated)
27 talk (Sounds Incorporated)
28 In the Hall of the Mountain King [Instrumental] (Sounds Incorporated)
29 talk by emcee (Beatles)
30 talk (Beatles)
31 Twist and Shout (Beatles)
32 She's a Woman (Beatles)
33 talk (Beatles)
34 I Feel Fine (Beatles)
35 talk (Beatles)
36 Dizzy Miss Lizzy (Beatles)
37 talk (Beatles)
38 Ticket to Ride (Beatles)
39 talk (Beatles)
40 Everybody's Trying to Be My Baby (Beatles)
41 talk (Beatles)
42 Can't Buy Me Love (Beatles)
43 talk (Beatles)
44 Baby's in Black (Beatles)
45 talk (Beatles)
46 Act Naturally (Beatles)
47 talk (Beatles)
48 A Hard Day's Night (Beatles)
49 talk (Beatles)
50 Help [Edit] (Beatles)
51 talk (Beatles)
52 I'm Down (Beatles)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/JXJAdAMN

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/NDfxXPlJ6q0RgxD/file

I had a lot of choices for a cover photo, since this concert was such a high profile event, with lots of photographers there. I chose this one, even though it only shows George Harrison and John Lennon, because they look so damn happy. I especially don't think I've ever seen any other photo of Lennon looking this overjoyed. When he later talked about the Shea Stadium concert being "the top of the mountain," this shows what he meant. 

And by the way, this photo was taken right at the end of the concert, when they were performing "I'm Down." Harrison and Lennon were especially amused and happy because Lennon had just played a short keyboard solo with his elbows.

Covered Albums

This is just a note to say that, over the past few days, I've updated all the links for all of the "Covered" albums posted on the blog so far. There are 154 of those by now, with more coming soon. I'd noticed that many of the links were from upload.ee, and are starting to die. So I redid all the album links, whether they were broken yet or not, to make sure there were at least two links for all of those albums. While I was at it, I also made some small improvements to the cover art for many of the albums.

This is a good moment to take stock of how that series is going. So far, I've profiled 75 songwriters or songwriting teams. I have about another 35 ready to go, cover art and all. I tend to drag my feet on posting those though, because I have to put more effort than usual into the write-ups for them. But I'm making a concerted effort to get to those lately. Some of the bigger names already finished include the Bee Gees, George Harrison, Gamble and Huff, Tom Petty, and Max Martin. 

But I also have plans to make albums for dozens more. A lot of those I haven't even started yet. For some, I'm getting key help from Fabio from Rio. Some of the ones where I'm getting closer include Bob Dylan, Ray Davies, Brian Wilson, Lennon and McCartney, Jagger and Richards, Leonard Cohen, Joni Mitchell, Paul Simon, Prince, and Willie Nelson. But there are many more than that on the wish list. 

If you have suggestions for songwriters I might be overlooking, and/or if you want to get involved to help pick songs, please let me know. In particular, I'd also like to deal with the great songwriters from the pre-rock and roll era, but I struggle with that since I'm not very familiar with a lot of that music. Thanks.

Various Artists - Covered: Dennis Lambert & Brian Potter: 1965-1985

A week or two ago (as I write this in mid-May 2026), a commenter named Rich had the excellent suggestion that I should make a "Covered" album for the songwriting team of Dennis Lambert and Brian Potter. So thank you, Rich. They fit the format of the "Covered" series perfectly, because they had no careers as performers, but they wrote a lot of hits for others.

Lambert and Potter are a rare case of a successful trans-Atlantic songwriting partnership. Lambert was born in 1947 and raised in New York City. Potter was born in 1939 and raised in the Essex countryside of England. Lambert joined a record company in 1965, working in A&R, production, and songwriting. I'm not sure what Potter did at first (with him being almost ten years older than Lambert), but in 1965 he already had a big songwriting success, helping to write "What'cha Gonna Do about It," the first British hit for the Small Faces. Meanwhile, Lambert had a decent success in 1965 as well, co-writing "Do the Freddie," a hit for Freddie and the Dreamers.

Lambert and Potter met when Lambert was in London in 1969. The two of them decided to write songs together. They both moved to Los Angeles and began working with a record company there. One of their first songs they wrote together was "One Tin Solder." It made the Top Forty in the U.S. for the band the Original Caste. Then it would get higher on the charts in 1971 for the band Coven. Their first really big success together though was "Don't Pull Your Love," which was a Top Five U.S. hit in 1971 for Hamilton, Joe Frank and Reynolds.

From that point on, they had many more hits all through the 1970s. I've only included the ones I like best here. There were others that were Top Forty hits. Their songwriting continued until about 1980. I don't know much about Potter's career, but it seemed he stopped writing songs around that time, because I don't find any more songwriting credits for him after 1980. 

However, Lambert kept going well into the 1980s, writing with others. He didn't have that many hits, but he had a couple of really big ones. He co-wrote "Nightshift" with a member of the Commodores, and the Commodores had a Top Five hit with it in both the U.S. and Britain in 1985. 

He also helped write "We Built This City." That song was originally written by Martin Page and Bernie Taupin (the latter being the main co-writer for Elton John). But their version was lacking something. So Lambert and a producer named Peter Wolf drastically changed it. (That's a different Peter Wolf than the one in the J. Geils Band, by the way.) The result was a smash, going all the way to Number One in the U.S. for Starship in 1985. Personally, I don't think it's a bad song, but it's hated by a lot of people, making several worst songs of all time lists by critics.

Since then, Lambert and Potter presumably both eventually retired. But both of them are still alive as I write this in 2026. 

Here's the Wikipedia page for Lambert:

Dennis Lambert - Wikipedia

And here's the one for Potter:

Brian Potter (musician) - Wikipedia  

This album is 57 minutes long. 

01 What'cha Gonna Do about It (Small Faces)
02 Do the Freddie (Freddie & the Dreamers)
03 Delighted to See You (Honeybus)
04 One Tin Soldier (Original Caste)
05 Don't Pull Your Love (Hamilton, Joe Frank & Reynolds)
06 Keeper of the Castle (Four Tops)
07 The Runway (Grass Roots)
08 Ain’t No Woman [Like the One I’ve Got] (Four Tops)
09 Love Music (Sergio Mendes)
10 Are You Man Enough (Four Tops)
11 Country Boy [You Got Your Feet in L.A.] (Glen Campbell)
12 One Chain [Don’t Make No Prison] (Four Tops)
13 It Only Takes a Minute (Tavares)
14 Open Invitation (Santana)
15 Don't Look Any Further (Dennis Edwards & Siedah Garrett)
16 We Built This City (Starship)
17 Nightshift (Commodores)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/rrnJPb9s

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/oLZomJN7xtUUHiG/file

The cover image was the cover photo for an issue of Songwriter Magazine in 1977. That's Dennis Lambert on the left and Brian Potter (with the blue shirt) on the right.

Don McLean - Ebbets Field, Denver, CO, 4-14-1975

Here's another concert from the Ebbets Field radio broadcasts. This time, it's singer-songwriter Don McClean.

I've already posted a good amount of live music from McLean, thanks to various BBC recordings. This isn't much different in terms of the song selection from some of that around the same time period. However, the sound quality here is notable, maybe even a bit better than some of that BBC stuff. 

This is a solo acoustic performance. There's not much when it comes to banter between songs. 

This album is an hour and six minutes long. 

01 talk by emcee (Don McLean)
02 American Pie (Don McLean)
03 Dreidel (Don McLean)
04 La La Love You (Don McLean)
05 Wonderful Baby (Don McLean)
06 Birthday Song (Don McLean)
07 You Have Lived (Don McLean)
08 Magdalene Lane (Don McLean)
09 On the Amazon (Don McLean)
10 talk (Don McLean)
11 Old Joe Clark [Instrumental] (Don McLean)
12 East Virginia (Don McLean)
13 The Song of Wandering Aengus (Don McLean)
14 And I Love You So (Don McLean)
15 The Legend of Andrew McCrew (Don McLean)
16 Vincent (Don McLean)
17 talk by emcee (Don McLean)
18 talk (Don McLean)
19 I Guess It Doesn't Matter Anymore (Don McLean)
20 talk by emcee (Don McLean)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/AA2Pzz1m

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/347aUsJuHmyJZq0/file

The cover photo is from 1975. I don't know more details than that. 

Various Artists - Covered: Roquel 'Billy' Davis: 1957-2008

I was going through my "Covered" album collection to fix some broken links, and I saw that I haven't posted this one yet, even though I thought I did. So here it is now, better late than never. This highlights the songwriting of Roquel "Billy" Davis.

Chances are, you haven't heard of Davis. But he was involved in writing a lot of good soul hits. He was born in 1932 in Detroit. He got to know Berry Gordy in the 1950s, a few years before Gordy founded Motown Records. He got involved in writing some big hits with Gordy, and sometimes others, especially Gordy's sister Gwen, who was Davis's girlfriend at the time. Since I already posted a "Covered" album for Berry Gordy, I used the big hit versions for many of those. For instance, "Reet Petite" was a big hit for Jackie Wilson in 1957, "Lonely Teardrops" was an even bigger hit for Wilson in 1958, and "I'll Be Satisfied," was another Wilson hit in 1959, but I've used alternate versions for all of those.

Note that I'm not including "You Got What It Takes," although it was a big hit that has been credited to Davis, Gordy, and others. That's because I think there's an airtight case that it was actually written entirely by Bobby Parker, since the first version of it came out by Parker with him listed as the sole songwriter. Gordy simply stole it later, and falsely changed the songwriting credits.

Anyway, around 1960, Gordy got heavily involved with his new record company, Motown Records. Davis didn't become a part of that, so his songwriting partnership with Gordy faded away. Their last song together that I've included is "All I Could Do Was Cry," which was a hit for Etta James in 1960. Since I used that version elsewhere, I've chosen a 2008 version by Beyonce.

Davis continued to write hits without Gordy for most of the 1960s. He usually worked with Chess Records, even taking charge of many A&R and production duties for that record company. "Seven Day Fool" was a rare case of Davis getting the sole credit for a song. More typically, he wrote with others, but he didn't have any consistent co-writers. In fact, most of the songs after "Seven Day Fool" were written with a different co-writer.

Davis had a sudden career change in 1968. He used his success as a songwriter and producer to get a job at one of the top advertising agencies in New York City. His primary client was Coca-Cola, and he was responsible for many successful ad campaigns for that company. But unfortunately, this meant that his songwriting pretty much stopped, except for writing ad jingles.

But his work with Coca-Cola would lead to his biggest songwriting success of all. I've told this story in the write-up for the "Covered" album for Roger Cook and Roger Greenaway, but I'll retell it here from Davis's point of view. Cook and Greenaway had already written a song called "True Love and Apple Pie." But it was released by an obscure artist and went nowhere. Then Cook happened to get stuck waiting in an airport in Ireland for many hours. Also stuck in the same airport was Davis, now working for Coca-Cola, and another Coca-Cola executive, Bill Backer. Backer came up with the line "I'd like to buy the world a Coke" while they waited for their plane. Later, back in New York City, Cook, Greenaway and Davis reworked "True Love and Apple Pie" into "I'd Like to Teach the World to Sing," which became one of the biggest hits of the decade, as well as a massively successful ad campaign for Coca-Cola.

"Country Sunshine" is also a song Davis first wrote for a Coca-Cola ad. But it was so catchy that it was fleshed out and became a country hit for Dottie West in 1973. That seems to be the last new song Davis was involved in that made the charts, although some of his earlier songs were hits in new versions, sometimes several times over.

Davis died in 2004 at the age of 72. By the way, he's also responsible for "it's the real thing," "things go better with Coke," "have a Coke and a smile," all for Coca-Cola, "If you've got the time, we've got the beer," for Miller Beer, and many, many other advertisements.

Here's his Wikipedia page:

Billy Davis (songwriter) - Wikipedia 

This album is 50 minutes long.

01 Jim Dandy Got Married (LaVern Baker)
02 To Be Loved (Malcolm Vaughan)
03 That's Why [I Love You So] (Jackie Wilson)
04 Seven Day Fool (Etta James)
05 Pushover (Etta James)
06 Reet Petite (Dinah Lee)
07 Two Sides to Every Story (Etta James)
08 Use What You Got (Sugar Pie DeSanto)
09 I Had a Talk with My Man (Mitty Collier)
10 We're Gonna Make It (Little Milton)
11 Recovery (Fontella Bass)
12 Who's Cheating Who (Little Milton)
13 I Can't Rest (Fontella Bass)
14 I'd Like to Teach the World to Sing (Hillside Singers)
15 Country Sunshine (Dottie West)
16 Lonely Teardrops (John Fogerty)
17 I'll Be Satisfied (Shakin' Stevens)
18 All I Could Do Was Cry (Beyonce)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/rGtRVEWA 

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/h0hrXz1oG7qsojq/file

The cover image is a screenshot I took from a video of an interview he gave many years after his songwriting career had ended. I don't know the exact year, however.

Sarah McLachlan - Capitol Theater, Port Chester, NY, 12-5-2015

Here's another concert from the April 2026 Port Chester soundboard leak. This one features Sarah McLachlan.

At the time of this concert, her most recent studio album was "Shine On," released in 2014, over a year earlier. She sang seven songs from that album. But it was an extra long concert, so she sang plenty of her earlier songs as well. She also sang "River," by Joni Mitchell. According to setlist.fm, she only performed that song three times that year, all of them during the Christmas season like this December concert.

The music here is unreleased. The sound quality is excellent. 

This album is an hour and 59 minutes long.

01 talk (Sarah McLachlan)
02 In Your Shoes (Sarah McLachlan)
03 Building a Mystery (Sarah McLachlan)
04 Adia (Sarah McLachlan)
05 Answer (Sarah McLachlan)
06 talk (Sarah McLachlan)
07 Broken Heart (Sarah McLachlan)
08 Fallen (Sarah McLachlan)
09 talk (Sarah McLachlan)
10 World on Fire (Sarah McLachlan)
11 Hold On (Sarah McLachlan)
12 talk (Sarah McLachlan)
13 Loving You Is Easy (Sarah McLachlan)
14 talk (Sarah McLachlan)
15 Monsters (Sarah McLachlan)
16 Stupid (Sarah McLachlan)
17 talk (Sarah McLachlan)
18 talk (Sarah McLachlan)
19 Song for My Father (Sarah McLachlan)
20 I Will Remember You (Sarah McLachlan)
21 talk (Sarah McLachlan)
22 Brink of Destruction (Sarah McLachlan)
23 talk (Sarah McLachlan)
24 River (Sarah McLachlan)
25 Elsewhere (Sarah McLachlan)
26 Fumbling Toward Ecstasy (Sarah McLachlan)
27 Witness (Sarah McLachlan)
28 Fear (Sarah McLachlan)
29 Sweet Surrender (Sarah McLachlan)
30 Possession (Sarah McLachlan)
31 Angel (Sarah McLachlan)
32 talk (Sarah McLachlan)
33 Beautiful Girl (Sarah McLachlan)
34 The Sound that Love Makes (Sarah McLachlan)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/GbgMZE6z

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/AOaLQZ9afJ19d3U/file

The cover photo is from a concert at the Kings Theatre, in New York City, on March 14, 2015.

Pink Floyd - Allen Theater, Cleveland, OH, 4-24-1972

Wow! I try not to hype things up on this blog, since there's way too much of that on the Internet these days already. But if you're a Pink Floyd fan, you definitely need to give this a listen.

Back in the 1960s and 1970s, Pink Floyd made no attempts to record themselves in concert. So the relatively small number of excellent sounding recordings we have are due to lucky chance, like the times they were recorded by the BBC. One unfortunate gap due to this is there's no great live recording of the "Dark Side of the Moon" album from 1972 or 1973. (There is one from a 1974 BBC broadcast.) For a long time now, I've especially wanted to hear what that sounded like in 1972, because the band performed that album in concert for over a year before recording it, and there were a lot of changes along the way. So it's pretty damn shocking to me that, 54 years later, a recording of this quality showed up on the Internet in the last couple of weeks. (I write this in mid-May 2026.)

This is an audience recording. Normally, that's a step below a soundboard or radio broadcast, sometimes several steps below. But not in this case. In my opinion, this sounds as good or better than most soundboards from the era. Previously, most people felt that a concert recording from the Rainbow Theatre in London on February 20, 1972 was the best live recording that included an early version of Dark Side. However, there were some big flaws with that, including some big chunks of the quality recording that were missing and had to be filled in with a much inferior recording from another source. I think this sounds better all the way through, and there are no missing chunks or other flaws like that.

I've included a PDF file that explains the story of how this recording was made public so many decades after the show. So read that if you're interested. That story makes me wonder what other audio treasures are still sitting in people's houses, forgotten or hoarded.

I made one big change to this already fine recording. I ran all the songs through an MVSEP audio filter to get rid of ambient crowd noise. At the time of this concert, in early 1972, Pink Floyd was more of a cult band, with a decent sized devoted fan base. As a result, the crowd listened very attentively and respectfully. So there wasn't much crowd noise to begin with. But I got rid of all I could during the songs, while keeping the cheering at the ends of songs. There wasn't a lot of even that because the Dark Side portion of the concert was played like one big song medley, with few occasions for the audience to really cheer until the whole album was over. Plus, the music of that album was brand new to everyone, so one didn't have the usual phenomenon of big cheers when recognizable songs started.

Additionally, there was very little in the way of random "woo-hoo" noises and talking during this recording. I found a little bit of that on two tracks, and ran those two through an extra MVSEP filter to get rid of that. Oh, and I also got rid of some dead air between songs. In particular, there were a few minutes of the sound of the crowd while the band took a short intermission at the end of the Dark Side portion of the concert. I got rid of that entirely.

Note that two songs that were a part of Dark Side at this point were later totally changed, with only a vague concept staying the same. "The Travel Sequence" was replaced by "On the Run." And "The Mortality Sequence," also sometimes known as "Religion," was replaced by "The Great Gig in the Sky." 

This album is an hour and 58 minutes long.

01 Speak to Me [Instrumental] (Pink Floyd)
02 Breathe (Pink Floyd)
03 The Travel Sequence [Instrumental] (Pink Floyd)
04 Time - Breathe [Reprise] (Pink Floyd)
05 The Mortality Sequence [Instrumental] (Pink Floyd)
06 Money (Pink Floyd)
07 Us and Them (Pink Floyd)
08 Any Colour You Like [Instrumental] (Pink Floyd)
09 Brain Damage - Eclipse (Pink Floyd)
10 One of These Days [Instrumental] (Pink Floyd)
11 talk (Pink Floyd)
12 Careful with That Axe, Eugene [Instrumental] (Pink Floyd)
13 Echoes (Pink Floyd)
14 talk (Pink Floyd)
15 Set the Controls for the Heart of the Sun (Pink Floyd)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/VvXP9ZkE

alternate: 

https://bestfile.io/en/S9NNWY3jyprpp93/file

The cover image is the only photo that I was able to confirm actually was taken at this exact concert. It shows lead guitarist David Gilmour. 

Elton John - Great Amphitheatre, Ephesus, Turkey, 7-17-2001

Recently, guest poster Fabio from Rio posted a couple of albums of the Carpenters stripped down to just piano and lead vocals. That led to a commenter suggesting that a similar album or albums be made for Elton John. That, in turn, got me thinking about how much music is available that just features John and his piano. It turns out not much. But I did find this 2001 concert, with excellent sound quality.

The concert was originally done for a pay-per-view service back in 2001. Then, in 2020, during the pandemic, John briefly released it on YouTube as part of a series of concerts he posted there to make up for the fact that he couldn't go on tour that year. Here's some of the promotional description from that 2020 posting: 

"Elton walks on to the oldest stage he has ever played (built circa 200 B.C.) and invites the audience to join him in one of the most intimate performances he has ever given. Everything about this concert is the opposite of what most people think of when they bring Elton to mind: his wardrobe is sedate, his staging virtually non-existent, no wild spectacles or platform shoes... Nor, for that matter, a band – just the piano player and his instrument, revealing in sublime simplicity that it’s really all about the songs."

Apparently, the people behind the pay-per-view idea wanted a dramatic setting for the concert, similar to Pink Floyd playing in the ancient Pompeii amphitheater in 1972. The Ephesus amphitheatre was built by the ancient Greeks. At its peak, it held about 25,000 people. In recent decades, it has been used for some concerts again. Many stars have performed there, including Diana Ross, Joan Baez, Chris de Burgh, Bryan Adams, Sting, Julio Iglesias, and Luciano Pavarotti, as well as classical concerts. But parts of it were ruined. so these modern concerts only hold about 2,500 people. In 2018, it was closed for three years to repair damage from some of these concerts. 

As far as I can tell, John hasn't performed in a solo format very often, especially considering how often he has performed. He's given well over 4,000 concerts in his long career, more than nearly any other big star, except for Willie Nelson, and B.B. King. In all that time, he only did one solo tour, in 1999. He's also done occasional solo concerts, usually for special events, like charity benefits. This was the only solo concert he did in 2001.

At the time of this concert, his album "Songs from the West Coast" was going to be released in a few months. He played one song from it, "This Train Don't Stop There Anymore." But mostly he stuck to his best known songs.

This album is an hour and 58 minutes long. 

01 Your Song (Elton John)
02 talk (Elton John)
03 Someone Saved My Life Tonight (Elton John)
04 Daniel (Elton John)
05 talk (Elton John)
06 Mona Lisas and Mad Hatters (Elton John)
07 Honky Cat (Elton John)
08 Rocket Man [I Think It's Going to Be a Long, Long Time] (Elton John)
09 talk (Elton John)
10 Philadelphia Freedom (Elton John)
11 Nikita (Elton John)
12 talk (Elton John)
13 Sacrifice (Elton John)
14 talk (Elton John)
15 Sorry Seems to Be the Hardest Word (Elton John)
16 I Guess That's Why They Call It the Blues (Elton John)
17 talk (Elton John)
18 This Train Don't Stop There Anymore (Elton John)
19 talk (Elton John)
20 Burn Down the Mission (Elton John)
21 The One (Elton John)
22 Blue Eyes (Elton John)
23 I'm Still Standing (Elton John)
24 Crocodile Rock (Elton John)
25 Don't Let the Sun Go Down on Me (Elton John)
26 talk (Elton John)
27 Circle of Life (Elton John)
28 talk (Elton John)
29 Candle in the Wind (Elton John)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/GDzBMzci

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/uUGfdE5hLOzPUXG/file

The cover image is from this exact concert. I wanted a wide view that showed some of the Roman ruins in the background.

The Great American Music Band with Eric Andersen - Ebbets Field, Denver, CO, 5-7-1974

Here's another concert from the Ebbets Field radio broadcasts. But this is a rather unusual one, because it's from a band that never officially released any music: the Great American Music Band. This band was a collaboration between David Grisman, Jerry Garcia, Taj Mahal, and others. It was a mostly instrumental and acoustic band that combined folk, bluegrass, and jazz. It was a loose association, with people coming and going, and unfortunately, Garcia didn't take part in this concert. However, singer-songwriter Eric Andersen did join in to sing two songs.

In my opinion, the main figure in this band was mandolin player David Grisman. After playing in some bands in New York City in the late 1960s, he moved to the San Francisco Bay Area. He made a key musical connection with Jerry Garcia. He played some mandolin on the classic Grateful Dead album "American Beauty" in 1970. He also played with Garcia for about 50 concerts and one album in 1973 as part of the bluegrass band Old and in the Way. 

That association apparently led to this different grouping a year later. The liner notes to the official David Grisman compilation album "DGQ20: A Twenty-Year Retrospective 1976-1996" explains what happened next:

"In 1974, mandolinist David Grisman and violinist Richard Greene, with Jerry Garcia, Taj Mahal, and others, formed a loose aggregation called the Great American Music Band.  The concept was simple: sophisticated folk and bluegrass instrumentalists creating a format to play and improvise without vocals.  The repertoire would draw on varied sources: traditional fiddle tunes, swing tunes from the Hot Club of France, and music from great American composers Bill Monroe, Fats Waller, and Duke Ellington. David Grisman had also been writing music, mostly bluegrass style mandolin tunes, patterned after those of his heroes Monroe, Frank Wakefield and others. Now, with this new vehicle, David started composing pieces with greater scope and a more personal stamp; 'dawg' music had come into being."

The band only played about 20 shows in the middle of 1974 before breaking up. Six of those were from this stand at Ebbets Field. By the end of the year, Grisman and Greene formed a new band with a similar style. That evolved into the David Grisman Quintet, which released its debut album in 1976. 

The quote above says the band was designed to be an instrumentals-only band. That was mostly true, but it wasn't entirely true. I find it curious that the band's bassist was Taj Mahal, who was a concert headliner of his own by this time, and generally played guitar, not bass. Maybe he just wanted to try something different for a while, and hone his bass playing skills. Anyway, he was a very capable vocalist, so although this concert was mostly instrumental, he did sing a couple of songs near the end ("Will the Circle Be Unbroken" and "Sweet Georgia Brown"). 

Also, singer-songwriter Eric Andersen was a surprise guest lead singer on two other songs. It seems like he just happened to be in town, and otherwise didn't have any involvement with this band.

By the way, this band was such a loose, low-key thing that even its name wasn't certain. Apparently, for most of the 20 or so concerts the band played, they were introduced as the "Great American String Band." But sometimes they were introduced as the "Great American Music Band." I went with the second name, since that's the name used for the band in the liner notes to an official David Grisman album years later. 

I was rather disappointed to find out that Jerry Garcia wasn't a part of this concert. So I looked around, and found that there is a excellent recording of a different 1974 concert that did involve Garcia, as well as Maria Muldaur. I plan on posting that here soon as well.

This album is an hour and two minutes long. 

01 talk by emcee (Great American Music Band)
02 Instrumental (Great American Music Band)
03 talk (Great American Music Band)
04 Dawg's Rag [Instrumental] (Great American Music Band)
05 talk (Great American Music Band)
06 Bud's Bounce [Instrumental] (Great American Music Band)
07 talk (Great American Music Band with Eric Andersen)
08 Beautiful Brown Eyes (Great American Music Band with Eric Andersen)
09 talk (Great American Music Band with Eric Andersen)
10 Why Don't You Love Me (Great American Music Band with Eric Andersen)
11 talk (Great American Music Band)
12 Swing '42 [Instrumental] (Great American Music Band)
13 talk (Great American Music Band)
14 Will the Circle Be Unbroken (Great American Music Band)
15 talk (Great American Music Band)
16 My Plastic Banana Is Not Stupid [Instrumental] (Great American Music Band)
17 talk (Great American Music Band)
18 It's Cold Outside [Instrumental] (Great American Music Band)
19 Back on the Porch [Instrumental] (Great American Music Band)
20 talk (Great American Music Band)
21 Sweet Georgia Brown (Great American Music Band)

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

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/I2VyZUac9aJWYOp/file

The cover photo shows Taj Mahal. It features him playing upright bass in a 1974 Great American Music Band concert, but a different one than the one presented here.

Various Artists - Covered: Joan Baez, Volume 2: 2017-2023 (A Fabio from Rio Guest Post)

Here's the second and last "Covered" album for Joan Baez. Like the first one, it's a guest post by Fabio from Rio. 

If you want to know more, please read Fabio's notes, included in the download zip. In short, he feels Baez's songwriting has been underappreciated. As such, you don't see a lot of famous musical acts covering her songs. But just because someone isn't well known, that doesn't mean their cover version isn't good.

By the way, tracks 2 and 10 are unreleased versions. Track 2 was done in a studio without crowd noise. But for track 10, I used MVSEP to remove the cheering. 

This album is 46 minutes long.

01 Honest Lullaby (Monika Akselsen)
02 Prison Trilogy [Billy Rose] (Harpeth Rising)
03 Children of the Eighties (Chyi Yu)
04 Isaac and Abraham (Cameron Skillen & Melissa DuPuy)
05 The Story of Bangladesh (Bappa Mazumder & Elita Karim)
06 Gabriel and Me (Bay Love)
07 Love Song to a Stranger (Aoife O'Donovan)
08 Saigon Bride (Melmo)
09 Michael (Randy Bowles)
10 Children and All That Jazz (Genevieve Philips)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/D6rvk4os

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/PgcAF7l4Wx3yZAA/file 

The cover image is from 2017.

Various Artists - Covered: Joan Baez, Volume 1: 1967-2016 (A Fabio from Rio Guest Post)

Here's another Fabio from Rio guest post. A couple of months ago (as I write this in May 2026), he really got into Joan Baez's music for the first time. In particular, he was struck by her songwriting talent, despite the fact that she's best known for covering songs written by others. So he put together five albums containing all of her original songs, which I recently posted. But he also made two "Covered" albums, showing off her songwriting in a different way. Some people don't like her singing. I have a friend like that, who finds it too high and shrill. So here you can enjoy her songs entirely through cover versions.

Probably the most unexpected cover here is the version of "Diamonds and Rust" by heavy metal band Judas Priest. Even more surprising, it went on to be quite popular, making their "best of" albums and inspiring more hard rocking cover versions. Here's what Baez had to say about it:

"I love that! I was so stunned when I first heard it. I thought it was wonderful. It's very rare for people to cover my songs. I think there are a couple of reasons. One is they're personal – they don't have a universal quality to them. And I think maybe it's because I've already sung them, and who wants to compete with that? But it's always flattering when somebody does." 

There's a lot more to be said about this album. But, as usual with Fabio guest posts, I'll leave that to the liner notes he wrote, which are included in the download zip. 

This album is 49 minutes long.

01 North (Tom Scott with the California Dreamers)
02 Saigon Bride (Gabor Szabo & the California Dreamers)
03 Sweet Sir Galahad (Gary & Randy Scruggs)
04 Song for David (Judy Collins)
05 Last Lonely and Wretched (Wild Rice)
06 Outside the Nashville City Limits (Mabel Joy)
07 Diamonds and Rust (Judas Priest)
08 For Sasha (Louise Tobestill)
09 All the Weary Mothers of the Earth (Annie Patterson)
10 Play Me Backwards (Sin Frontera)
11 Winds of the Old Days (Lori Blois)
12 Here's to You (Lisa Simmons)
13 Only Heaven Knows (Joanne Cooper)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/D4agojYd

alternate: 

https://bestfile.io/en/NJ5kf1Y6ukB05fs/file

The cover image is from 1974.

Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell - City Winery, Nashville, TN, 11-29-2021

Yesterday, I posted an acoustic concert of Emmylou Harris performing with Steve Earle at a small club in Nashville in 2021. They traded songs and shared stories for the entire concert. Today, I'm posting the exact same thing, except Harris did it with Rodney Crowell. 

It seems Harris did about six of these concerts in 2021, as people were starting to return to concerts as the Covid pandemic was easing up. All of these concerts went to benefit local charities. I could only find these two, but it seems they got a lot a bit more because they featured the best known guests. I know one more is with Harris and Buddy Miller. If anyone has that one, please let me know and I'll post it too.

Most or all of these concerts Harris did at this venue in 2021 were webcasts. So that means the sound quality is excellent, despite the fact that the music is unreleased.

Harris and Crowell have been musical collaborators and friends going back to the early 1970s, at the start of their respective musical careers. But it's very unique to have them share a full concert like this together, with just the two of them. For all I know, this may have been the only time this has happened. 

This album is an hour and 47 minutes long. 

01 talk (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
02 Even Cowgirls Get the Blues (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
03 talk (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
04 Still Learning How to Fly (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
05 talk (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
06 Red Dirt Girl (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
07 talk (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
08 Bluebird Wine (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
09 talk (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
10 You Can't Say We Didn't Try (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
11 talk (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
12 Evangelina (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
13 talk (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
14 I'll Be Your San Antone Rose (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
15 talk (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
16 It Ain't Over Yet (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
17 talk (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
18 If I Could Only Win Your Love (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
19 talk (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
20 Just Pleasing You (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
21 talk (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
22 Invitation to the Blues (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
23 talk (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
24 Dreaming My Dreams with You (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
25 'Till I Gain Control Again (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
26 talk (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
27 Pancho and Lefty (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
28 talk (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
29 Return of the Grievous Angel (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
30 talk (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
31 Tulsa Queen (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
32 talk (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
33 Old Yellow Moon (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
34 Leaving Louisiana in the Broad Daylight (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
35 talk (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
36 talk (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
37 Boulder to Birmingham (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)
38 talk (Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell)  

https://pixeldrain.com/u/7vqNgSLJ

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/Km3fPRfWjrHjJrd/file

The cover is a screenshot I took from a video of this exact concert. However, I used Photoshop to move the two people closer together.

Flo & Eddie - Ebbets Field, Denver, CO, 12-3-1974

Here's another concert from the Ebbets Field radio broadcasts. This one stars Flo and Eddie. 

If you don't know who that is, they were the two main leaders of the 1960s band the Turtles, Mark Volman (Flo) and Howard Kaylan (Eddie). But when the Turtles broke up, they weren't legally allowed to use the band name, or even their own birth names, in their music careers.

In 1972 and 1973, Flo and Eddie released studio albums. But there was no new album in 1974. The songs here are generally a mix of Turtles hits and songs from the first two Flo and Eddie albums. 

However, they performed "Colorado," a song they never released. That was a comedic song released on a 1973 National Lampoon album, sung by none other than comedian Chevy Chase. I think it's pretty likely they did it as a special thing just for this show, since it took place in Colorado. It's an example of how they tended to add a lot of humor to their concerts.

The music here is unreleased. The sound quality is close to excellent. 

This album is 47 minutes long.

01 talk by emcee (Flo & Eddie)
02 talk (Flo & Eddie)
03 She'd Rather Be with Me (Flo & Eddie)
04 talk (Flo & Eddie)
05 Colorado (Flo & Eddie)
06 talk (Flo & Eddie)
07 Another Pop Star's Life (Flo & Eddie)
08 talk (Flo & Eddie)
09 Nikki Hoi (Flo & Eddie)
10 Rebecca (Flo & Eddie)
11 Livin' in the Jungle (Flo & Eddie)
12 talk (Flo & Eddie)
13 She's My Girl (Flo & Eddie)
14 Lights Go Down (Flo & Eddie)
15 Happy Together (Flo & Eddie)
16 There's No Business like Show Business (Flo & Eddie)
17 talk by emcee (Flo & Eddie)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/J2wexia1

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/ooyNcd1McHeEj4X/file

The cover image from a concert in London, on November 12, 1972.

Taj Mahal with John Fogerty, Bob Dylan, George Harrison, and Jesse Ed Davis - Palomino Club, Los Angeles, CA, 2-19-1987

This is a pretty amazing Taj Mahal concert, because just look at who his special guests were: John Fogerty, Bob Dylan, AND George Harrison! And all three of them stayed on stage for the vast majority of the concert, with Fogerty and Harrison singing several songs each. (Dylan was content just to play guitar and sing backing vocals.) I had known about this concert for a long time, but I'd never had it in my collection due to sound quality issues. But recently I revisited it, because advances in audio editing technology enabled me to make some improvements. Now, it sounds like a soundboard, even though the sound quality still is not ideal.

I found an extensive quote about this concert that George Harrison gave to Q Magazine in 1988, so I'll start with that:

"I'll tell you what happened there. I'd gone to America, and Bob [Dylan] rang me and said, you know, did I want to come out for an evening and see Taj Mahal who was playing at the Palomino? So we went there and had a few of these Mexican beers, and had a few more. And Jesse Ed Davis, who played guitar on 'Watching the River Flow,' is in the audience, and Bob says, 'Hey, why don't we all get up and play - we've had a few beers, right - and you can sing!' So we get up there and I'm in the spotlight and Bob's hanging back in the shadows and I start singing: 'What’s the matter with me? I don't have much to say...' and every time I get near the microphone, Dylan comes running up and just starts singing this rubbish in my ear, trying to throw me off. But it was really funny because when I got pushed on stage at Wembley [in London, with Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers and Dylan] and sang a bit of 'Rainy Day Women' I couldn't remember the words and just made up this stuff. And Bob came up to me afterwards, backstage, and said, 'So you got even with me!' But it was nice to recapture the feeling of what it was like on stage to make sure I could go back into that situation in the future."

Most of that is correct, but a couple of things he said were slightly off. We can tell a lot about what really happened because the video of this entire recording is available on YouTube, though the picture quality is extremely poor. It seems Jesse Ed Davis - a very talented lead guitarist who had worked with many big names since the late 1960s - was already there as part of Taj Mahal's backing band from the start of the recording. Then, after just the first song, Harrison went up on stage. It seems he went up unprompted, and there was absolutely no comment made by Mahal or anyone else about him being there. But if you watch the video, you can see Mahal give him an electric guitar and help him get in position to play by the start of the second song, "Checkin' Up on My Baby."

For a few songs, it was Taj Mahal and four members of his backing band on stage (Jesse Ed Davis, Mark Shark, Bobby Tsukamoto, and Gary Ray), plus Harrison. Then, before the start of "Matchbox," Mahal very strongly encouraged Dylan to also join them on stage, teasing him that he was going to come get him if he didn't. So Dylan went on stage, got a guitar, and started playing it.

Halfway through "Matchbox," Harrison surprised by taking over lead vocals for most of the rest of the song. Then, near the very end of the song, John Fogerty went on stage too. He was plugged in and ready to join in by the start of the next song, "Lucille." Once again though, there's no mention by Mahal or anyone else about him being there.

Up until that point, it had basically been a Taj Mahal concert. And Mahal was the sole lead singer for the next few songs. But Harrison, Dylan, and Fogerty stayed on stage for the entire rest of the concert. And from "Knock on Wood" to the end of the concert, 11 songs in all, Harrison and Fogerty stepped up and basically dominated. They sang lead on all but two of the songs from that point on.

However, if you're a Dylan fan, there's a lot less here for you. He was definitely involved playing guitar. If you watch the video, you can see he even got a couple of the songs started. And he did sing some backing vocals. But he seemed determined not to sing any lead vocals. When Harrison started singing "Watching the River Flow," it happened just as Harrison described in the above quote: Dylan basically shouted nonsense words right into Harrison's ear, playfully trying to get him to screw up! Perhaps Harrison, being a huge Dylan fan, started that song because he knew that Jesse Ed Davis played the guitar solo on Dylan's studio version, recorded in 1971. Davis got to reprise his solo in this performance.

One historic aspect of this concert was that it caused John Fogerty play a Creedence Clearwater Revival (CCR) song in public for the first time in 15 years. Many years later, he explained how it happened:

"I'd gone there to see Taj Mahal, who I love, and sat down. And at some point, I heard a rumor that George Harrison was there, that he was kind of in this cloak room. So I went in and talked to George for a little bit, and that was really fun. Then I went back and sat down. Then I heard a rumor that Bob Dylan was somewhere in the room. I didn't know until much later that actually George and Bob were really tight, they were great friends, and they had arrived together."

Fogerty watched from the audience as first Harrison and then Dylan joined Mahal on stage. "I'm usually kinda shy, but for some reason I thought, 'Man, I hope they have another guitar! Please call me up there!' I just wanted to get up there. It just looked historic and a lot of fun."

Apparently, Mahal saw Fogerty in the audience and gave him a signal to come up. After a while, the crowd wanted the famous guests to play some of their original songs. As mentioned above, Dylan's "Watching the River Flow" was played, although that seemed to be against Dylan's wishes. Then Harrison sang "Honey Don't." Although it was originally by Carl Perkins, it had been recorded by the Beatles. Plus, Harrison had helped sing "Matchbox," which also had been recorded by the Beatles. So now the pressure was on for Fogerty to do one of his songs. 

Fogerty further explained, "And then the audience started going, 'John, John! C'mon! Play "Proud Mary!" And this was during the time that I had sworn off playing my own songs from the Creedence days because of legal and emotional entanglements. I'm really being kind of, let's say, stubborn about it. But suddenly Bob Dylan turns me and he goes, 'John, if you don't play "Proud Mary," everybody's gonna think it's a Tina Turner song.' And I looked at him, and by God, I played 'Proud Mary.'" 

Clearly, he had fun. After the song finished, you can hear him say, "Eat your heart out, Tina!" 

Fogerty had just done a concert tour in 1986 for the first time since 1972. He wouldn't do another full tour until 1997. But later in 1987, he would take part in "Welcome Home," a benefit concert, and he would play more CCR songs for it. And he would keep playing them from that point on. So this Taj Mahal concert was a turning point for him, breaking his stubbornness about not wanting to give any royalties to his record company for the CCR songs. And while Dylan didn't do much singing on stage, his involvement may have been the key factor that got Fogerty singing his old songs again.

Now, let's get to sound quality. From what I understand, the owner of the Palomino Club saw something special was likely to happen, and began videotaping the concert. (He probably missed some Taj Mahal songs before the first one that shows up here.) So it has been recorded for posterity due to the video tape. That video later got converted to audio, and made into a popular bootleg under the name the "Silver Wilburys." However, that only included about half of the songs here, generally the later ones starring the famous guests. So I found a YouTube video to get the audio for the entire thing.

The sound quality was pretty good, but there was a lot of hiss, and some other issues. I ran all of it through the MVSEP program, using the "Denoise" filter to get rid of most of the hiss. Then I ran it through another filter to get rid of even more hiss. I also made some other adjustments, like boosting the lead vocals relative to the instruments. I think it sounds a lot better now. 

Additionally, there was a lot of dead air between songs. The musicians on stage were winging it, so it took time for them to decide what song to play next, then determine what key to play it in, and things like that. Most of that discussion couldn't be heard at all. Plus, there was a lot of guitar tuning. So I cut out some of that, when it started to really drag between songs. But still, I kept most it, especially whenever any talking on stage could be heard. I also turned down the volume of the guitar noodling between songs, so one could better hear what else was going on.

I made an additional edit on the song "Proud Mary," enough to add "[Edit]" to the song title. Taj Mahal was helping with the singing. On the other songs, this was fine. But this song was Fogerty's moment, singing a CCR song for the first time in 15 years, and Mahal's vocal ad-libs were a distraction for the most part. I read a comment on the YouTube video of this concert that likened his singing on that song to the way Yoko Ono sometimes ruined a John Lennon song. I had to agree. So, using MVSEP again, I cut out just the parts of his vocals that annoyed me. For instance, at one point, Mahal began singing one part of the song when Fogerty sang another part of the song. Needless to say, Fogerty sang the correct part. 

When listening to this, please keep in mind the spirit of this performance. After the first few songs, which Taj Mahal and his band knew well, it's safe to assume that the rest involved everyone winging it. So you have some mistakes that even an average bar band wouldn't make, like how Taj Mahal forgot half the lyrics to "Johnny B. Goode." But that wasn't point. Some legendary musical figures were just having fun on stage (including both Harrison and Fogerty playing some guitar solos). This is pretty much the only and only time in rock music history these people did anything like this. 

This album is an hour and 48 minutes long. 

Here's another photo from the concert. 

01 Leaving Trunk (Taj Mahal)
02 talk (Taj Mahal)
03 Checkin' Up on My Baby (Taj Mahal)
04 She Caught the Katy and Left Me a Mule to Ride (Taj Mahal)
05 Farther on Down the Road [You Will Accompany Me] (Jesse Ed Davis with Taj Mahal)
06 You're Gonna Need Somebody on Your Bond (Taj Mahal)
07 talk (Taj Mahal)
08 Matchbox - Gone, Gone, Gone (George Harrison & Taj Mahal)
09 talk (Everyone)
10 Lucille (Taj Mahal)
11 Crosscut Saw (Taj Mahal)
12 talk (Everyone)
13 Bacon Fat (Taj Mahal)
14 talk (Everyone)
15 Knock on Wood (John Fogerty with Taj Mahal)
16 talk (Everyone)
17 In the Midnight Hour (John Fogerty with Taj Mahal)
18 talk (Everyone)
19 Honey Don't (George Harrison)
20 talk (Everyone)
21 Blue Suede Shoes (John Fogerty & George Harrison)
22 talk (Everyone)
23 Watching the River Flow (George Harrison with Bob Dylan)
24 talk (Everyone)
25 Proud Mary [Edit] (John Fogerty with Taj Mahal)
26 talk (John Fogerty)
27 Johnny B. Goode (Taj Mahal)
28 talk (Everyone)
29 Willie and the Hand Jive (Taj Mahal)
30 Peggy Sue (George Harrison with Bob Dylan)
31 talk (Everyone)
32 Dizzy Miss Lizzy (George Harrison)
33 talk (Everyone)
34 Twist and Shout (John Fogerty & Taj Mahal)
35 talk (Taj Mahal)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/nStUSnDq 

alternate: 

https://bestfile.io/en/GV7bA4Zovc8wkh7/file

I was only about to find two photos of this concert that looked even halfway decent. I posted the best one as the cover, even though it only shows Dylan, Harrison, and a member of the backing band standing between them. I posted the other one up above the song list. It sounds the overall club environment, but you can barely make out who is on stage.

There also are a couple of photos of all the band members together back stage, which must have been taken after the concert, since Fogerty said he wasn't sure the likes of Dylan and Harrison were there when the concert began. The Native American musician John Trudell is in the picture as well. He was probably there to see Jesse Ed Davis, another Native American, who played on Trudell's albums. Unfortunately, Davis had a lot of problems with drug addiction. He died of a drug overdose a year after this concert took place.