Happy birthday to Al Kooper, born as Alan Kuperschmidt in New York City on this day in 1944.
Once upon a time you dressed so fine threw the bums a dime
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Forty years ago today, one of my favorite Bob Dylan tours ever began.
Unfortunately, it was not one of Bob Dylan’s favorite Bob Dylan tours ever. Writing in Chronicles, he didn’t have much positive to say about his time with Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers. Dylan wrote:
I’d been on an eighteen month tour with Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers. It would be my last. I had no connection to any kind of inspiration. Whatever was there to begin with had all vanished and shrunk. Tom was at the top of his game and I was at the bottom of mine. I couldn’t overcome the odds. Everything was smashed. My own songs had become strangers to me, I didn’t have the skill to touch their raw nerves, couldn’t penetrate the surfaces. It wasn’t my moment of history anymore. There was a hollow singing in my heart and I couldn’t wait to retire and fold the tent. One more big payday with Petty and that would be it for me. I was what they called over the hill. If I wasn’t careful I could end up ranting and raving in shouting matches with the wall. The mirror had swung around and I could see the future — an old actor fumbling in garbage cans outside the theater of past triumphs.
There’s a Dylan-in-the-'80s collection coming out at some point where I contributed a chapter that makes the case that, frankly, Dylan’s wrong. More specifically, that he’s perhaps primarily remembering his second round of Petty touring in 1987, which everyone I’ve interviewed has reported was bleaker and less fun, even if the music remained strong. (Think Rolling Thunder ’75 vs Rolling Thunder ’76.)
So to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the tour dubbed True Confessions, I’m going to track the first seven 1986 shows with Petty. I’m not going to do the full tour this time—the shows and setlists get repetitive, plus more tapes than usual are missing or unlistenable. But maybe I’ll pick the project back up for the tour’s U.S. leg in the summer and do the first chunk of that too.
ONE HOME!
Again something from Gary Lucas’ Facebook page and his musical taste is so catholic we share an awful lot of musical taste so I am always checking his page out. This is from the Blue Oyster Cult page
Renaissance - Academy of Music, New York on May 17, 1974
FLOPPY BOOT STOMP
Source: FM Broadcast (WNEW - New York).Sound Quality: Very good stereo mp3@320kbps.Genre: Progressive rock, Folk.
Set: Full Set.
Notes from original poster:
One of my all time favourite (officially released) live albums has to be
Renaissance Live At Carnegie Hall from 1976.
Despite the emergence of punk and the associated back lash to the
'millionaire rock stars' and the music business excesses, somehow
Renaissance seemed to sit outside of the fury.
For me it was simply a band that were both astonishing musicians
and writers rather than posers and pretentious, and their live
performances reflected this. Annie Haslam's five octave range,
and the balanced use of a live orchestra just added to the bands credibility'
This is a recording originally broadcast live on WNEW from a
concert at the Academy of Music, New York on the 17th May 1974.
It makes a great companion to the subsequent Carnegie Hall album
and the sound quality is crisp and clear.
Set List:
1. Introduction & music
2. Can You Understand
3. Black Flame
4. Carpet Of The Sun
5. Cold Is Being
6. Things I Don't Understand
7. Running Hard
8. Ashes Are Burning
9. Mother Russia
Comments:
Renaissance were accompanied by a 24 piece orchestra & conductor.
Ashes Are Burning included Andy Powell (Wishbone Ash) on guitar
and promoter Howard Stein on piano.
The Academy of Music was a theatre and opera house located at
East 14th Street and Irving Place in Manhattan, New York City.
The Academy was built in 1854 and seated approximately 1,500 people.
It was rebuilt in 1866 after being destroyed by fire. It served as a venue
for rock concerts in the 1970s, and in 1985 became the Palladium nightclub.
The theatre was demolished by New York University and replaced by the
present Palladium Residence Hall.
a subadoo special
Curiously underrated somehow this US radio broadcast is great stuff
and highly worth collecting for Brit-Folk fans especially I guess
but deserved of a wider audience IMHO
O My Soul
“I couldn’t think of a thing
That I hope tomorrow brings
Oh what a surprise
Stupidity tries”
. . . what a line up a favourite set with Tal and Vinnie
Postmodern Jukebox are nothing if not prolific which means I don’t always like what they choose to cover but today I found this one and it made me smile so much
