Chicago Auditorium, Chicago, IL.
November 15, 1976
Late Show
Soundboard Upgrade via JEMS
Lineage:
Lowest-generation origin cassette > Nakamichi CR-7A azimuth-adjusted
playback > Sound Devices USBPre2 > Audacity 2.0 (24/96 capture to
.wav) > iZotope RX6 and Ozone 6 mastering > iZotope MBIT+ resample
and dither to 16/44.1 > Audacity > TLH > FLAC
01. Heart of Gold
02. The Old Laughing Lady
03. Journey Through the Past
04. Too Far Gone
05. Give Me Strength
06. The Needle and the Damage Done
07. A Man Needs a Maid
08. Tell Me Why
09. Sugar Mountain
10. Country Home
11. Don't Cry No Tears
12. Peace of Mind
13. Lotta Love
14. Like a Hurricane
15. After the Gold Rush
16. Are You Ready for the Country?
Band:
Neil Young - vocals, guitar, keyboards, banjo, harmonica
Frank Sampedro - guitar, keyboards, vocals
Billy Talbot - bass, vocals
Ralph Molina - drums, vocals
Original notes below:
About
this recording. I’m sure this is one of those Neil Young recordings
that all of you are familiar with, but this marks the first time this
specific source has been shared. During all those years there has always
been the same underlying version of this concert, but always from a
bootleg release, never a version with known generation, let alone a
source with known lineage to the master.
But that changes now. BK of JEMS explains:
“This
cassette comes from the collection of our longtime friend and ally SS,
and given everything we know about the provenance of this famous and
fabulous recording and the person from which SS received it, we strongly
believe this cassette is the point of origin for every known version of
the show. Meaning, all copies in circulation go back to this tape. It
is ground zero. What we do not know for sure is if it is THE actual
soundboard master. My assumption is that this is a first-generation tape
made off either a cassette or reel master. Regardless, I believe it to
be the best known version of the recording and the first with a lineage
back to analog source with no digital tape or CD generation in-between.”
Firstly,
this version, although it had several of the noises and minor sonic
defects also present in the bootleg releases, unlike those, in this
version they are barely perceptible, able to be heard only if you pay
full attention or if you are fully interested in those details, either
because you are someone interested in those type of issues or because
you're planning to fix them yourself.
In my opinion, sonically
this transfer sounds much warmer, with more clarity both in the vocals
as much as in the sound of the guitar. It feels more natural, unlike the
bootleg releases that surely, at some point, had some kind of noise
reduction. Here the mastering has no residue of such a process.
I
am very happy to know that this recording is finally getting a release
worthy of its quality. As always, I thank the JEMS team for their
eternal confidence in me (and those who support me) in releasing
recordings to the public. Huge thanks as well to SS for loaning BK his
cassette source and blessing its dissemination.
If you, like me,
are grateful to this, do not hesitate to show your gratitude in the
comments, I know that this recording will be appreciated by all of you. (frogster)
LINK
Above cover is of the now obsolete silver bootleg