SINEAD O'CONNOR - PINK POP FESTIVAL 1988 (Flac)

Sinead O'Connor
Pinkpop Festival
Landgraaf
The Netherlands

May 23, 1988

01. Jackie
02. Mandinka
03. Never get old
04. Just like U said it would B
05. Jerusalem
06. The value of ignorance
07. The hand that rocks the cradle (Smiths cover)
08. Just call me Joe
09. Jump in the river
10. I want your (hands on me)
11. Troy
12. I am stretched on your grave

I don't often post music by artists that have recently passed. It happens so frequently nowadays, that the blog would resemble the audio version of a continuous obituary. Rarely does a few weeks go by without a great artist succumbing to the grim reaper. In some situations it lessons the grip fans have of a special recording that has not been shared. A bittersweet pill, that has provoked the release of this pre-FM. 

It is an excellent performance and superb recording, featuring many tracks from Sinead's debut album, The Lion & The Cobra. 

The set also includes live versions of the three singles that were taken from the album. The most successful was Mandinka the only one to make the UK top twenty. 

A couple of tracks, Jump In The River and set closer, I Am Stretched On Your Grave appeared on Sinead's massive breakthrough album 'I Do Not Want What I Haven't Got'  

Add in a cover of the Smiths, The Hand That Rocks The Cradle and it becomes a must listen. The best I have downloaded this year. 

So sad, it has taken such tragic circumstances to make it available. R.I.P. Sinead. 

 -----------------------

Original notes:

Complete, unedited pre-FM recording of Sinead's performance at the massive Pinkpop festival in the Netherlands. Allegedly leaked from the radio station, my copy is a second generation copy of the master. I traded it shortly after the performance and was asked not to spread it further. Twenty-five years onwards, I think it's time to liberate it...

The show was only partially broadcast on Dutch radio (unsure which songs) and TV (Troy only, you can find it on YouTube). I believe this is the first time it'll be in circulation in its entirety.

Acts on the bill that day, in order of appearance: Rainbirds, The Godfathers, Aswad, Herman Brood & His Wild Romance, Red Hot Chili Peppers, The Pogues, The Christians, Sinéad O’Connor, Joe Cocker.

Lineage: Pre-FM (2nd gen) > Audacity (wav, track splitting) > xACT (flac) > you

I'm digitizing my tape collection, mostly recorded from Dutch radio in the 80s and early 90s. The original tapes will be binned and after seeding I will not keep the original flac sets, so unfortunately I will not be able to reseed them in the future.

Enjoy, frankvink

LINK

FOR ONE NIGHT ILLEGALLY - the History of the Bootleg (Flac)

The first post in some three months. Only nine boots have been downloaded this year so far. An attempt to scale back and only keep the best. Two have been upgrades of boots that I already have. 

A lean time but we press on with this radio documentary about the history of bootlegs. Coming soon this month a pre-FM recording previously unavailable, from the Pink Pop festival. 

Writer and broadcaster David Hepworth charts the story of secret recordings, artist out-takes and demo tapes that make up the world of bootleg recordings, from Bob Dylan's Great White Wonder in 1969 to the file sharing internet sites of the 21st century, via the Beatles, the Stones, Bruce Springsteen, Sex Pistols and Led Zeppelin.

David also talks to contemporary artists including Ryan Adams who have come to embrace the bootleggers, and hears from bootleggers of the 1960s and 70s who pitted their wits against security guards, the Feds and the record companies to get their unofficial releases out to the public. A Bite Yer Legs production for BBC Radio 4.

For One Night Illegally - the History of the Bootleg
Presented by Dave Hepworth

BBC Radio 4 First Broadcast: Saturday 18 April, 2009 / 8pm (Running time: 56 minutes)

Lineage: Unknown > Downloaded file > CDr > Rip to WAV 16bit 44.1kHz > Flac

01. The earliest bootleg recording. Jazz and Charlie Parker (4:09)
02. The Great White Wonder and bootlegs in the pop and rock era (6:08)
03. Dylan's publisher demo (The Basement Tapes) (6:14)
04. The people behind the bootleg recordings and their release, including Rubber Dubber, TMQ & TAKRL (10:27)
05. Creative differences in the studio! (7:32)
06. Electrif Lycanthrope, Fire On The Fingertips, Static In The Attic etc. Peter Grant attempts to stop the bootleggers (5:06)
07. Artists endorse bootlegs, sometimes! BBC sessions & live shows indirectly encouraged bootlegs, promos and official releases (6:18)
08. Stock seizure and arrests (5:39)
09. Beatles, Beach Boys, Sam Cooke, Elvis, Dylan, The Troggs and the bootleggers legacy of preserving audio history (5:22)

LINK
 

THE CURE - JOHN PEEL SESSIONS (1979-85) Flac

For a time in the 80's and 90's, spring would coincide with a new Cure album, their latest work would often be released in mid-April or early May. A John Peel session, would often precede the album release with early versions different from the finalised studio tracks.

The band recorded six sessions for the BBC Radio 1 John Peel show. As you will have noted this upload does not included the word 'Complete'. The very first session that the Cure recorded for the Peel show was officially released on the Strange Fruit label in 1988 on vinyl and CD.

This post includes the five unreleased sessions that the band recorded between 1979 and 1985. Two of these have been upgraded and if you already have the BBC sessions by the Cure you will need this post as it includes the superior upgraded sources.

Session #2
Captured the spirit far more than the subsequent album versions. Michael Dempsey declared the first two sessions for Peel "as the defining sound of the early Cure." Desperate Journalist... is Robert Smith's interpretation of a disparaging review of the debut album by NME journalist, Ian Penman and is set to the rhythm of 'Grinding Halt'. The other tracks remain crucial, 'Subway Song' is especially chilling and 'Plastic Passion' is slightly faster but less angrier!

Session #3
Is slower and set to a darker pace than the final album versions, no mean feat when you consider 'Seventeen Seconds' as being the first of a doom laden trilogy, along with 'Faith' (1981) and 'Pornography' (1982). Little of the Cure's previous sound remained.

Session #4
A session that ranks among the greatest of the Cure's BBC performances. 'Cold Colours' is radically different from it's final version 'Primary'. 'Forever' never made it onto a studio album but did appear as a 1984 live cut on the album 'Curiosity'. 'The Holy Hour' and 'All Cats Are Grey' are more familiar but lyrical changes and passionate performance mark them out from the album tracks.

Session #5
Only three tracks this time as the fourth 'The Hanging Garden' was incomplete because of time constraints and subsequently not broadcast. Spectacular and aggressive, only 'Siamese Twins' with its desolate, sparse and jangly guitars would temper the raging anger of this haunting session.

Session #6
This remarkable session was their first in over four and a half years for Peel. Offering a more thoughtful side to the band than the public image of the Cure as successful charting pop band. The sound has echoes of the earlier 1980-81 sessions.

01. Grinding Halt
02. Desperate Journalist In Ongoing Meaningful Review Situation
03. Accuracy
04. Subway Song
05. Plastic Passion
John Peel Session #2 BBC Studio Maida Vale 4, London. Recorded 9 May 1979

06. A Forest
07. Seventeen Seconds
08. Play For Today
09. M
John Peel Session #3 Maida Vale Recording Studios, London. Recorded 3 March 1980

10. The Holy Hour
11. Forever
12. Primary (aka Cold Colours)
13. All Cats Are Grey
John Peel Session #4 BBC Langham Studio 1, London. Recorded 7 January 1981.   

14. Siamese Twins
15. One Hundred Years
16. The Figurehead
John Peel Session #5 Maida Vale Recording Studios, London. Recorded 21 December 1981

17. The Exploding Boy
18. Six Different Ways
19. Screw
20. Sinking
John Peel Session #6 BBC Maida Vale Studio 5, London. Recorded 30 July 1985 

Link 1 (session #2-4) 

Link 2 (session #5-6) 

The Band: Robert Smith, Simon Gallup & Lol Tolhurst (session 3 only Matthieu Hartley, session 6 only Boris Williams) 

N.B. The dates on this post are correct and are dated from the actual session recording and not the over-the-air broadcast.

RADIOHEAD - Grosser Sendesaal des SFB, Berlin 2000 (Flac)

"Radiohead's 2nd concert in Berlin, on July 4, 2000 at a venue that held about 1,000 people, is the acknowledged high point of the tour.

More than that, it's one of the all time great Radiohead shows, in which the band was still drawing on the anxious energy of playing scores of new songs to a mostly unprepared audience. And yet, by this point in the tour, they also had an obvious confidence in their material and didn't feel as obligated to couch unfamiliar songs with reliable greatest hits.

Eleven out of the twenty-two songs played that night were new, including four out of the first five songs. The version of "In Limbo" is especially transcendent. 

And then there's the staggering take on "Kid A" that absolutely destroys the version on the album. The studio take is a low-key hum, like a robot voice sending a distress signal from the deepest reaches of inner space. Live, however, Radiohead made "Kid A" sound like an excursion into outer space, a positively huge and demented sonic explosion puctuated with a wholly unexpected harmonica breakdown, like Bruce Springsteen discovering "Another Green World.""   

(Extract from the book 'This Isn't Happening Radiohead's Kid A And The Beginning Of The 21st Century' by Steven Hyden. It's an essential purchase and will give you a new perspective on 'Kid A' and the music released around Y2k)

Großer Sendesaal des SFB
Berlin, Germany
4 July, 2000

Disc 1
01 Optimistic
02 Morning Bell
03 Karma Police
04 The National Anthem
05 In Limbo
06 No Surprises
07 My Iron Lung
08 Dollars And Cents
09 Bishop's Robes
10 Talk Show Host
11 Kid A

Disc 2
01 You And Whose Army?
02 Airbag
03 Lucky
04 How To Disappear Completely
05 Paranoid Android
06 Everything In Its Right Place
07 Pyramid Song
08 Exit Music (For A Film)
08 Knives Out
10 Nude (Tease)
11 (Nice Dream)

 

Uploader Notes (Fixed Version)

Audio patching and artwork by ridleybradout

"This is quite possibly the best Radiohead bootleg ever. Rumoured to be professionally mixed by none other than Nigel Godrich himself, it sounds as good if not better than the 'I Might Be Wrong' EP, but with a much more comprehensive tracklist. It features many expertly played versions of then unreleased Kid A/Amnesiac songs and rarities such as Bishop's Robes and Nice Dream.

It always frustrated me that such a pristine recording had micro-glitches between tracks, not to mention several annoying fade-in/outs. I took it upon myself to manually fix these and patch over the fades so that it now plays as a continuous listen.

I've also  put together some artwork that sits nicely next to that done for Nijmegen 2000-09-16 by Ben Z: http://www.angelfire.com/nb/cykwan/radioheadboota.html

I used the .shn archived 'Satellite (pre-FM)' source for this (which checked out as 100% CDDA in auCDtect) rather than the 'Revolves Around' source."

SOURCE: Satellite (PRE-FM) > DAT > CD-R > SHN > WAV > Nero Wave Editor/Soundtrax for patching > FLAC

With thanks to Ridley Bradout, believe the well deserved hype. This is a cracker.

LINK 1

LINK 2 

TOM VERLAINE (December 13, 1949 – January 28, 2023)

TELEVISION
02 ABC, Glasgow, Scotland
8 June 2016

PERSIA (20:56)

This show was the only time I managed to see Television. I had been hoping to see their support slot with Billy Idol last year but it was unfortunately cancelled.

The show consisted of just ten songs but three of them were epics in length and stature, Little Johnny Jewel, Persia & Marquee Moon.
There are numerous performances of Little Johnny Jewel and Marquee Moon and they can be found on many of the sites listed in the Bootlegs of the Year document.

It is to 'Persia' we return. This near 21-minute performance of an unreleased song. If Television had got round to recording a fourth studio album, then surely this would have take up one side of the vinyl release.

Standing watching this performance live I was rooted to the spot, the audience had quietened down from a boisterous beginning, an altercation near the centre front of the stage. There was a guy dressed like Jimmy Rip with accompanying hat being jostled by some younger guy, who was trying to show off his dance moves to a woman he was trying to impress. (Dance moves at a Television show! see also the Mogwai post.)

It's interesting that the person recording this show moved position to the left as I did to get peace to concentrate and enjoy the show without any distractions, he must have been close to where I was standing. The sound quality in the venue was stunning as was the performance. 

It's a great shame that one of Glasgow's newer iconic music venues suffered such a fate of having to be knocked down, after damage because of the fire to the nearby Charles Rennie Mackintosh-designed Glasgow School of Art in 2018. The O2 ABC had the largest mirror ball suspended from the ceiling that I've ever seen, not one you would have felt comfortable standing underneath.  

Lineage:
CA14 Cards-CA 9200-Sony PCM-M10-Sandisk Ultra Class 10 Micro SDHC 16gb sd card-Audacity,amplify 4db,Compresser,CD Wave-Traders Little Helper level 6 to flac (Recorded at first 30ft center till 3rd song, then 30ft left hand PA speaker.)

Band:
Tom Verlaine-Vocals & Guitar / Jimmy Rip-Guitars / Fred Smith-Bass / Billy Ficca-Drums

LINK

 

                                  R.I.P. Tom

EVERYTHING BUT THE GIRL - Black Sessions 1993

Black Session no. 29
Recorded live at Studio 105, Paris, France.
June 1, 1993

French FM Radio broadcast

A quantity of high quality recordings of the John Peel show were made available for the first time last summer on the John Peel Wiki. These range from 1979 through 1983 with the majority of them from 1980. 

Included were 25 Peel shows from 1983, most of these included the complete shows plus the ten o'clock news. I've listened to a few of these this year on the exact date but forty years on. It's a strange experience listening to radio shows again that I first heard on their original broadcast as a young man. 1983 would be my last year as a regular weekly listener of the Peel show. I would return now and again throughout the years but my most regular listening took place in the seven year period between 1977 and 1983. 

The rapid change in the music scene was incredible and is documented extremely well in Jon Savage's book 'England's Dreaming' and Simon Reynolds book 'Rip It Up And Start Again.' There are many high quality shows from this era available on the Peel Wiki site and I will feature one of the best on a future post.

I coincidentally downloaded this show on the same day that I listened to the 5 January 1983 Peel show recording. The second track Peel played was by Tracey Thorn, 'Plain Sailing' included on her solo debut album in 1982 and later re-recorded for release as a single. By the time Tracey Thorn had formed Everything But The Girl with Ben Watt and released their debut album 'Eden' in 1984, she had already been through two bands and a short solo career.

Everything But The Girl released their eighth album in 1994, 'Amplified Heart' which took them into mainstream success via the remixed single 'Missing.' The follow up in 1996, 'Walking Wounded' was also highly successful and the 90's closed with their tenth album, 'Temperamental.' Tracey had twin daughters with Ben in 1998 and this led to the dissolution of the band in 2000.
 

They will return in spring with a new album, 'Fuse' their first in twenty-four years, scheduled for release on April 21st. A new single 'Nothing Left To Lose' is out now and this post may hopefully nudge you into exploring their back catalogue.

There is little lineage information with the download notes but it's a superb sounding recording and has been made using high quality audio equipment. Those who have a copy of the 'Bootlegs of the Year' pdf document will know how great the best Black sessions recordings sound. This is another to add to your collection and is the equal of those listed in the pdf above. 

Tracklist:

1.  Love is Strange (Mickey & Sylvia)
2.  Lonesome for a Place I Know
3.  Each & Every                 
4.  My Hometown (Bruce Springsteen cover)
5.  I Didn't Know I Was Looking for Love    
6.  Sugar Finney
7.  I Don't Want to Talk About It (Danny Whitten, Crazy Horse cover)
8.  Me and Bobby D
9.  The Road
10. Another Bridge
11. Only Living Boy in New York (Simon & Garfunkel cover)

Lineage: Unknown CDr > EAC > You

LINK 

 

                    scheduled release date: 21 April 2023

 

R.E.M. - A Clown On A Circus Mount (Live 1984)

University of East Anglia, Norwich, 23 November 1984 

01 Femme Fatale
02 Moral Kiosk
03 Gardening At Night
04 9-9
05 Windout           
06 Old Man Kensey           
07 So Central Rain (I'm Sorry)           
08 Seven Chinese Bros.           
09 (Don't Go Back To) Rockville           
10 Thanks To The Lucy Show           
11 Hyena           
12 Swing Low Sweet Chariot/Sitting Still           
13 Auctioneer (Another Engine)           
14 Talk About The Passion           
15 Pretty Persuasion           
16 Little America           
17 Moon River           
18 Second Guessing           
19 Bandwagon           
20 We Walk/After Hours           
21 1,000,000           
22 Ghostriders In The Sky           
23 See No Evil           
24 Wendell Gee           
25 Just A Touch  

Dream Remastered @ Reflecting Sound Studios, Southampton, England, Winter 2020.

 

R.E.M sold almost no records for the first ten years of their existence, and became 'The biggest rock group in the world' for the second ten.

Despite their debut album 'Murmur' receiving five star reviews, accolades and front covers of ther music press, it had only sold around 200,000 copies. It failed to break the Top 100 in the UK and was only a moderate success in the USA. Their record company I.R.S felt the album had under-performed sales wise and the band faced pressure to deliver a more successful follow-up. 'Reckoning' was well titled, the band had booked a month of studio time for their second album.

In the autumn of 1983, the band made their first-ever trip to Europe. They appeared on UK television on Channel 4's 'The Tube' performing Radio Free Europe, South Central Rain & Talk About The Passion. It began a promo drive but poor distribution and infrequent airplay meant there was little support. Reckoning did well in the USA reaching #27 on the album chart but only #91 in the UK by any standards a poor commercial result.

The 1984 tour was the band's fourth year on the road and like most bands of the era, drink and drugs were taking their toll. 

During the Reckoning tour, new material already demoed and worked on during sound checks, would be inserted into the set. 'Driver 8', replete with more surf-style guitars, was a fast and furious song in their old musical tradition but Stipe's focus was changing. His new material would reflect an introverted and deep connection with the myths and legends of America's past, a sort of American gothic in sound. It was time to change the sonic landcape and refresh the group's lyrical matter. (source R.E.M. | Fiction An Alternative Biography by David Buckley, Virgin Books 2002)

For those fans of R.E.M who especially like the first two albums and the 'Chronic Town EP' this is one show that is an absolute necessity for your collection. It's a really superb soundboard with a great mix. This recording captures the point of change as mentioned above by author David Buckley and includes three early versions of tracks that would appear on the third album 'Fables of The Reconstruction', released on 10 June, 1985.

 

Original Notes & Review by Eric Zimmermann

The Norwich show was a bit of a surprise when I first laid my hands on it. There are two versions of this show, a more normal audience-sounding version, which is a full version of the show, and the soundboard version that is missing two songs (Driver 8 and Radio Free Europe).

This review is on the soundboard show.  
When I first ran across this show in Low Yo Yo’s I had not been aware that this even existed.

I thought that on many of the soundboards that were done during the tours supporting 'Reckoning' were very vocal shy. This performance has plenty of Stipe and his mumbling and sounds like a more intimate venue. 

There are a few key moments that should be cherished on this performance. First off, it is the first time that the band performed Bandwagon, and out of all the performances of this particular song (only fifteen live) this is the best copy out there.  

The second standout performance Wendell Gee would definitely be one of the top two performances and was performed only twelve times live!

It is unfortunate that R.E.M. has failed to come to terms with Wendell Gee, truly one of the most beautiful and more stunning songs in the R.E.M. catalog. 

From what I understand, Peter had some issues with the song and never liked it. Mike Mills did perform it a couple years ago when he also sung the infamous Eagle Song, and claimed to have written it. 

Looking back on ‘Fables of the Reconstruction’, I felt that the song has always been a great bookend to that album.

Otherwise this boot contains pretty much a standard fare of R.E.M. songs for the Reckoning Tour.
The beginning of the show starts off quite odd with Femme Fatale which makes it interesting.

They also threw in Moral Kiosk, which had pretty much been eliminated from the setlists by this time of the tour, and there is a nice rendition of We Walk close to the end of the show that always is fun with Stipe doing his Behind Closed Door rendition; albeit this time around I think he is spending more time in a library.

The song quickly gets transformed into the Velvets After Hours, before kicking it up a notch with “Chronic Town’s“ 1,000,000. A couple of standard covers, the aforementioned Wendell Gee, and Just a Touch, close out the show.

This show has always been underrated in my opinion, and should be in every R.E.M. fans collection.

part one

part two 

ARCTIC MONKEYS - Studio Brussel FM broadcast 2022

Marconi Studio, Schaerbeek (Belgium) Studio Brussel FM Broadcasts. 10 October, 2022

Private showcase for Studio Brussel, VRT Radio Marconi Studio, Schaarbeek/Schaerbeek (Brussels), Belgium.

Setlist :
01. DJ intro / There'd Better Be A Mirrorball
02. Fireside
03. Big Ideas (New song - Live debut)
04. Do I Wanna Know?
05. Snap Out Of It
06. Tranquility Base Hotel + Casino
07. Crying Lightning
08. Body Paint
09. One Point Perspective
10. That's Where You're Wrong
11. I Bet You Look Good On The Dancefloor
12. R U Mine?
13. 505

The Arctic Monkeys have played a run of modest and intimate festival sets over the past month across Europe, culminating in a headlining slot at the Reading & Leeds festivals. It was their first UK shows for nearly four years.

This intimate show, a promotional appearance to publicise the release of the new album ‘The Car’ showcases that their stunning live set, has lost little potency, despite numerous musical changes of direction since the release of their debut album way back in 2006

Alex Turner and Matt Helders were interviewed before this studio performance. 3FM’s Vera Siemons asked about the new album: “Do you remember the moment when you felt like it clicked, it was complete. The entire record is finished, done, it’s perfect?”

“It took us a lot longer to get to the end point of this one than any of the others,” replied lead singer Alex Turner. “I suppose because we had a bit more time. Maybe the longer you let it go on, the more you want to let yourself make adjustments. Perhaps all of that might have got a bit silly at the end in that respect…Remarkably, I don’t know if I’ve ever listened to this one in a car.”

The new album, ‘The Car’ was released on 21 October, 2022 and they have already confirmed details of a UK stadium tour and North American dates with Fontaines D.C. for next year. Across late April and early May of 2023, the band will play a number of gigs on the continent, reaching Germany, Norway, Sweden, France and beyond.

Complete Studio Brussel FM Broadcasts. An incomplete set, but only one song wasn't broadcast, the third of the show, "Four Out Of Five"

This is an edited version, no music has been cut, only some of the DJ presenter's lengthy inbetween song comments. Some of the transitions and the abrupt cuts have also been smoothed over.

Recording Gear: Marantz M-CR610 with an additional external antenna homemade --> Roland Edirol R09HR v.1.04 (16bit/44kHz) input level at 41 --> PC with USB cable.
Post production: Volume adjusted, fade in (tracks 01, 03, 25, 26 & 27) / fade out (tracks 13, 24, 25, 26 & 27), tracks created and tagged with SoundForgePro.
Tracks in wav --> Flac 8, Align on sector boundaries using fix and .ffp with Trader's Little Helper.
Transferred, mastered and uploaded by trebor on Dimeadozen, 2022-10-15.

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