Cat Stevens - Boston Music Hall, Boston, MA, 4-26-1974 | Albums That Should Exist

 

Cat Stevens - Boston Music Hall, Boston, MA, 4-26-1974

Paul says: Here is a full-length bootleg Cat Stevens concert from 1974. He was backed by a full band.

There are tons of great Cat Stevens concert recordings from 1970 and 1971, both officially released and unofficial. Then there's a pretty obscure official live album from 1974, called "Saturnight." I don't like that one though, because it's far short of a full-length concert, and the song order is mixed up. It was only released in Japan (where the concert took place) until 2024, and still has only a limited release since then. Also in 2024, an official concert album from 1976 was released, called "Majikat." That one is very nice, but there's a lot of years between 1971 and 1976, considering that was the prime of his music career.

When it comes to concert bootlegs for him, it's very slim pickings between 1971 and 1976. The best full-length one I could find is this one, from Boston in 1974. It's an audience boot, which is disappointing, but it's a particularly good one. It occurred to me that, thanks to the advances in audio editing technology in recent years, I could bring this up to nearly soundboard level. So that's what I tried to do. I used the MVSEP program to clean up crowd noise during songs, boost the lead vocals that were low in the mix, and so forth. I think it sounds a lot better. It's not as good as the "Majikat" or "Saturnight" official live albums, but it sounds plenty worthy to my ears.

This concert took place a month after the release of his 1974 studio album "Buddha and the Chocolate Box." That's one of my favorite albums from him. (I've posted an alternate version of it at this blog that makes it even better.) So naturally he played some songs from that. This also contains an except from his long "Foreigner Suite" called "Sunnyside Road" that makes a nice song when all on its own.

One song here, "Sitting" has "[Edit]" in its title. That's because there was a particularly difficult section of the song near the beginning. You can probably hear it. I tried all I could to make that sound better, but I could only do so much. 

This album is an hour and twenty minutes long.

01 talk 
02 Wild World 
03 talk 
04 Longer Boats 
05 Oh Very Young 
06 Sitting [Edit] 
07 talk 
08 Foreigner Suite- Sunnyside Road 
09 talk 
10 Where Do the Children Play 
11 talk 
12 Moonshadow 
13 How Can I Tell You 
14 Bad Penny 
15 Later 
16 Lady D'Arbanville 
17 talk 
18 Peace Train 
19 Father and Son 
20 Music 
21 18th Avenue 
22 Bitterblue
23 Hard Headed Woman 
24 talk 
25 King of Trees
26 Sun-C79
27 Sad Lisa

 (all tracks Cat Stevens)

Not entirely sure why I have posted links to this one as I feel a tad ‘Meh!’ about Cat Stevens now despite enjoying his work up until Catchbull At Four at the time and introduced to him via my wife and now can take or leave his rather over worked, tired and sentimental schtick but hey . . . he was important once

The Weeknd - Blinding Lights

 

The Weeknd - Blinding Lights 

This song was announced by Michael Sheen as his 'Daddies choice' of car song with his children!

He’s SO cool!

Leland Sklar on bass playing in the studio

I have always suspected a wisdom and wit beyond the normal expectations of a bass player but this anecdote from a favourite musician fills my heart with glee!

 

R.Crumb on music

Pretty much how Robert (Crumb) and I share music!

 

Captain Beehfeart ‘Hot Head' Live on TV 1980

 

Captain Beefheart and The Magic Band perform the song “Hothead“ live on national television in 1980. From the album Doc at the Radar Station

Shall we?

 

 . . . . .I think we should

Christy Moore - John O’ Dreams (Bill Caddick)

might wind up the day with a friend and companion of Luke Kelly’s the master Irish folk legend that is Christy Moore . . . . .

Christy Moore  - John O’ Dreams (Bill Caddick)

It’s not Tchaikovsky but an Italian folk tune, the words are Caddick’s as Bill discovered but most claim it is Tchaikovsky but they stole it from Italy!😉

Matt Berninger - One More Second

 Matt Berninger (The National) - One More Second

not sure where I found this one but I like it . . . . . maybe my interest in The National of whom Matt is the lead vocalist threw up this from the algorithms

This month in 1984 American author Richard Brautigan body found | Book Norm Blog

OCTOBER 25, 2017 BY NORM SIGURDSON

Today in Literary History – October 25, 1984 – Richard Brautigan’s body discovered

On October 25, 1984, the badly decomposed body of the novelist, poet and short story writer Richard Brautigan was found in the living room of his house in Bolinas, California.

By then Brautigan had become almost completely reclusive and police speculated that he had been dead for at least a month. The cause of death was suicide by gunshot from a .44 Magnum pistol.

Brautigan had published three poetry collections in the late 1950s, but his fame came from the bittersweetly humorous and dreamlike novels he began publishing in the 1960s while he lived in San Fransisco and flourished amid the counter-culture scene.

A Confederate General from Big Sur (1964), his first published novel didn’t fare well at the time but his second novel (actually written earlier and more of a series of inter-related short stories in my opinion) Trout Fishing in America (1967) caught on.

It was so popular that a number of hippy communes at the time renamed themselves after it. He also published four more books of poetry in the sixties.

He published five more novels in the 1970s, including The Abortion: An Historical Romance 1966 (1971) and solidified his reputation as a cult writer. The Abortion is about a recluse who runs The Library for Unpublished Works where anyone could bring in an unpublished manuscript to be lovingly cared for. It highlights Brautigan’s almost sentimental love of words and writing.

Critic Tony Tanner described Brautigan’s style: “He retains the illusion of orthodox syntax and grammar, but the sentences are continually turning off into unexpectedness in ways which pleasantly dissolve our habitual semantic expectations. At the same time, Brautigan is constantly, cunningly, deviating into sense; there is enough linguistic coherence left for us to experience the book as communication, and enough linguistic sport for Brautigan to demonstrate his own freedom from control.”

He even “published” a work called Plant This Book, with poems written on the backs of seed packages, a very hippy high-concept project.

Brautigan himself had had a hard upbringing, being physically abused by some of his alcoholic mother’s male partners.

When the boom years for his books died with the advent of the more materialistic 1980s Brautigan fell on hard times both financially and psychologically, giving in to paranoia and alcoholism.

At the time of his death he was living on welfare. “When the 1960’s ended, he was the baby thrown out with the bath water,” said his friend, novelist Thomas McGuane.

I first started reading Brautigan in high school at about the time I first encountered Kurt Vonnegut. I loved them both for their humorous wordplay and fantastical plots. I continued to read and re-read them for the rest of my life.

Brautigan has had periodic resurgences of popularity and his novels are still in print. It’s a shame he didn’t get to write more and see a new generation of fans emerge.

I have pretty much everything Brautigan ever published and he was a central figure in my reading for the longest time after first discovering him . . .I was distraught when finding he had taken his own life in the depths of despair

https://booknormblog.wordpress.com/2017/10/25/today-in-literary-history-october-25-1984-richard-brautigans-body-discovered/

This is The Cure - Festival Summer 2026, The Studio Versions (A Hervé Guilleminot Special Presentation) + Rock En Seine 30.08.2026 + Movie |

 This is The Cure - Festival Summer 2026, The Studio Versions (A Hervé Guilleminot Special Presentation) + Rock En Seine 30.08.2026 + Movie

This is The Cure - Festival Summer 2026, The Studio Versions (A Hervé Guilleminot Special Presentation) 

THE CURE -  FROM BEDROOMS TO STADIUMS

Few bands bring people together quite like The Cure. Their audiences span several generations: fans who discovered them in the early 1980s stand alongside younger listeners who have found the same comfort, excitement and sense of belonging in their songs. Music once played alone in teenage bedrooms now fills arenas, stadiums and festival fields. That journey makes The Cure one of the most remarkable bands to emerge from the closing decades of the twentieth century. Even in front of tens of thousands of people, their songs can still feel intensely personal.

One of their greatest strengths is their extraordinary range. The Cure move from the stark landscapes of cold wave and post-punk to bright pop melodies, restless psychedelia and long, slowly unfolding pieces with something of the scale of progressive rock. “A Forest”, “Just Like Heaven” and “Disintegration” express very different moods, yet all belong unmistakably to the same musical world. Their darkness has never excluded pleasure, humour or joy. They can make an audience dance, then draw it into a song about loneliness, love or loss, with equal conviction.

As one of the last great British new wave and post-punk bands still performing on this scale, The Cure carry an enormous history. Much of their enduring appeal comes from Robert Smith. Behind the wild hair and familiar make-up is a singer whose vulnerability, dry humour and independence have made him an unusually endearing public figure. His voice remains immediately recognisable, while the musicians around him give the songs their depth and physical force. Together, they have built a relationship with listeners that reaches far beyond fashion or nostalgia.

Their generosity is especially clear on stage. Full-length Cure concerts often exceed two and a half hours, allowing room for familiar favourites, less obvious songs and extended passages that need time to reveal their power. These performances offer more than a succession of hits: they invite the audience to inhabit the music. The same emotional openness helps explain why The Cure continue to inspire musicians, writers, filmmakers and countless listeners for whom their songs have become part of everyday life.

Trent Reznor expressed this connection memorably when he inducted the band into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2019. His deeply sincere tribute recalled discovering music that seemed to understand his own feelings and made him feel less alone. It captured something essential about The Cure: their ability to turn private uncertainty into a shared experience.

They also continue to create music worthy of that attachment. Songs of a Lost World demonstrated that their themes could grow older with them, giving grief and passing time a powerful musical form. Robert Smith has spoken of a possible ending around 2029, but their continuing commitment gives these later years a sense of purpose.

The triumphant summer of 2026 provides the starting point for this collection. Bringing together 50 studio recordings, this imagined complete concert brings together every song played across the tour, making it easier to hear which periods the band chose to favour. Alongside it, I have included the closing Paris-area performance from Rock en Seine on 30 August 2026 in FLAC audio and video. I was there... it felt like a genuine musical firework display, and a moving reminder that songs first loved in solitude can become an extraordinary collective celebration. (Hervé Guilleminot)

Include are the following:

This is The Cure - Festival Summer 2026, The Studio Versions (A Hervé Guilleminot Special Presentation) 50 tracks (320 Kbps) + Rock En Seine 30.08.2026 31 tracks (flac)

+MOVIE 

The Cure - Rock En Seine 30.08.2026 

TRACK LIST

1 - Plainsong - 1989

2 - Alone - 2024

3 - Pictures of You - 1989

4 - High - 1992

5 - Lovesong - 1989

6 - Catch - 1987

7 - Burn - 1994

8 - 2 Late - 1989

9 - Fascination Street - 1989

10 - Never Enough - 1990

11 - alt.end - 2004

12 - A Fragile Thing - 2024

13 - Push - 1985

14 - In Between Days - 1985

15 - Just Like Heaven - 1987

16 - Treasure - 1996

17 - The Last Day of Summer - 2000

18 - Trust - 1992

19 - Three Imaginary Boys - 1979

20 - Charlotte Sometimes - 1981

21 - Want - 1996

22 - A Night Like This - 1985

23 - Secrets - 1980

24 - A Strange Day - 1982

25 - Cold - 1982

26 - Play for Today - 1980

27 - In Your House - 1980

28 - A Forest - 1980

29 - Shake Dog Shake - 1984

30 - Primary - 1981

31 - From the Edge of the Deep Green Sea - 1992

32 - One Hundred Years - 1982

33 - Endsong - 2024

34 - Prayers for Rain - 1989

35 - M - 1980

36 - It Can Never Be the Same - 2016

37 - Faith - 1981

38 - A Letter to Elise - 1992

39 - Disintegration - 1989

40 - Lullaby - 1989

41 - Hot Hot Hot!!! - 1987

42 - Wrong Number - 1997

43 - The Walk - 1983

44 - Mint Car - 1996

45 - The Lovecats - 1983

46 - Let's Go to Bed - 1983

47 - Friday I'm in Love - 1992

48 - Close to Me - 1985

49 - Why Can't I Be You? - 1987

50 - Boys Don't Cry - 1979

Total running time: 4 hours, 12 minutes.

The Cure "Boys Don't Cry" Live | Rock Hall 2019 Induction