BTW, Brian's new lead vocal on "Still A Mystery" is from late 1999.

And there we have it. Wow...I would've pegged it as being even more recent than that. Wonders never cease!

So, I guess this was part of the aborted work that was to follow-up Imagination, and from which the applicable TWGMTR tracks also originated?

The only other thing I can think it might be is post-show sweetening which is highly possible, especially considering how on those back ups sound in "Do It Again" but if that was the case, you'd think they would have cleaned up the overall mix because it's pretty muddy.

The July 4th, '80 show was overdubbed/sweetened in the studio before the edited version ran on HBO. This was mentioned as far back as SU (the book).

Somewhere...I have a VHS tape that I made of the show off of HBO with my very first Panasonic VHS VCR when they re-ran it a couple of years later. Remember those ol' electronic dinosaurs (wired remote!)...lol?

Can't speak as to where BE got his info. All I can go by us what I have. The acetates are dated 1970, and the complete show is noted as the 2nd one, while the tape (evidently) an out on the first. 

Yeah, the notes and timings on those acetates, along with your aural description, sure would seem to plead a pretty darned good case for this. I mean, the show citations for both the # 5,  30 minute acetate (with its "tape runs out" notation on the acetate itself), as well as the #6, 31 minute acetate would probably only be questionable if the person who wrote "# 5 = 1st show, # 6 = 2nd show" simply and mistakenly ordered those chronological number designations wrong on the acetates...or wrote those gig citations backwards on that outside sleeve. Which *probably* isn't the case. The fact that both shows occurred on the same day would also make it easier for someone (e.g. Brad or anyone) to accidentally flip their chronology in a description later down-the-line. Obviously, I would be interested in hearing anything else from those in the know --either way -- on this issue. I guess anything's possible at this point?

Also, the entry in the wonderful new In Concert book only gives a small hint as to which show might be which by quoting Mike Love's "Hi, to those in the cheap seats" remark from the original NME review (i.e. but not stating "first" or "second" show of the night). I have that remark on the "lo-fi, complete performance of AIWTD" tape right after Bluebirds Over The Mountain and before God Only Knows. Though, I don't know if ML recycled that remark for the other show as well?

On the other hand, assuming all the above is correct, it's amusing that the song would be so much tighter, vocal cue-wise, for the first performance. Then again, they had already been performing the song live for a few weeks, so it wasn't as if it were just the effects of a brand new performance. More like, just a bad singular performance.

Also really interesting regarding your end-of-tape comments. I'd love to know where they got Bruce's "goodnight" outro from in the new mix? It might also again emphasize just how much editing and flying-in was done to often bring things "up-to-snuff," so to speak, on these new box set mixes. Even beyond the music.

Like for example, when was the vocals recorded?

Alan Boyd has previously stated on this site that the version on the new box set dates from "circa 1974." The liner notes in the box use this date as well. Alan also noted here that Dennis cut a demo for the song earlier in 1971.

Andrew's Bellagio site has that demo date listed as March 15, 1971. He also has a date listed of Oct. of 1974, which one would assume is directly related to the same "circa 1974," proper version that's on the box.


Thus, 1974 seems to be the prevailing wisdom, with October possibly being a pretty darned good bet as well. As Alan also noted on this site (and also stated in the box credits), it's Dennis, with Carl and Ricky on vocals


(which would've been right around the time that Ricky left the band)

[complete]

  as I see it/hear it,  (Tho I haven't listened to MIC as of yet):  
The tape ran out at the end of the First show; the second show has a complete version, albeit with the first vocals being "come let the power" part way into the song, with Mike then apologizing that they haven't really learned the song.   The song doesn't end with Bruce saying Goodnight. there's audience noise, "Thank you" Thank you very much"  then "we love you" and a bit more talking( I can't make it all out) and then it ends.  
 I think I may have posted about this in the past in the media section?, referencing my acetates for these shows( the memory eludes me)

Thanks, Bgas!

I was simply going by BE's original notes where he referenced the first performance as being the "sloppy," complete one (i.e. the "lo-fi" one that circulates and which I also have), and with Mike's "bear with us, we hardly know it yet" comment during the song. While, conversely, noting that the second one was the "good," yet incomplete one (i.e. the one used and released back in '83).

"[It turned out to] be All I Want to Do. When we played it, we found the version from the first show was really sad. Vocally, they miss all their cues. After one verse, Mike Love says, “This is a song we really don't know yet, so bear with us.” The second show was better and that's the one we used, but you'll notice that it fades out before the end of the song. The reason for that is because while they were recording it, they actually ran out of (eight-track) tape. We tried to splice in the ending of the other version, but it was just too sloppy."


http://www.bradelliott.com/writings/rarities/live.html


I guess he may have just had it backwards then?

1:55 - there's a clear edit between the two takes - the drums suddenly move to the left!

There's a lot of interesting things going on right around that point. There's a background "hey" that appears at 1:47 that also *seems* to to show up again at the 1:50 mark, albeit a bit more faintly. All speculation of course, but I'm still not 100% convinced that either part or all of that "c'mon c'mon c'mon baby" line wasn't looped once -- or simply edited with the other performance's line -- for this new mix. The fact that not even a fraction of that "second-go-around" of the line was used for the '83 mix raises my suspicions all the more as to it even existing on the performance two multi  -- even though other things going on in the mix change ever-so-slightly in terms of balances and audibility (e.g. Mike's vocal seems slightly doubled by him or someone else for that second-go-around).

In any event, whatever he did, I think it's a pretty interesting mix creation from ML. Though, I'd still love to know if those original guitar parts existed in usable form for performance two, or perhaps, were simply picked up improperly to begin with? If so, why weren't they used for the '83 mix? And if they don't exist or weren't usable, it probably explains why they flew-in the ones from performance one for this new mix. Also, comparing the "lo-fi mix" of performance one to the new mix of performance two, the guitar bit at the very end seems to be edited slightly to shorten it on the new mix. While the other guitar bits throughout the song seem intact. At least, that's what's sticking out to me and my aging ears at this point ****.

I also find it a bit of a real head-scratcher that they ran out of tape to begin with. IIRC, it mentions somewhere in print that the 8-track machine (or machines) and a couple of mixers were borrowed from EMI. The audience bootleg of performance one runs around 29:45 (without Bruce's farewell), so if that's any indicator, they just barely snuck in under the wire in terms of tape for that show, and yet, they weren't so lucky for the next performance (close...but no cigar). Did they really only run one machine, not running a second for overlap? That is, assuming either 30 or 32 minutes, max, per reel. In any event, they must've learned their lesson a week later for Finsbury...lol. That show, at least as it was released, runs 34+ minutes!


**** Note: Any observations I'm making between all these different mixes/versions...are just that...observations. Certainly not infallible or foolproof.

About I can hear music: Is the version on MIC slowed down or did they actually play the song in a different key (it's in B here, they normally played it in C live)?

Hi Christoph,

I don't know if is this any help to your question, but...

The only audience tape I have from that summer of '75 era where ICHM was played is the Wembley show from a week before the Landover series of gigs (i.e. one of which the box set version originates from). However, that Wembley audience tape plays waayyy too fast to begin with - not to mention being in virtually unlistenable quality (probably a consumer recorder of the era running at the wrong speed, and/or multiple analog generations in there to compound things even worse). Thus, that one is pitched and tempoed too fast for any useful frame of reference.

However, I also have several audience shows from the fall '74 tour, and where ICHM was also played, and the key does seem to roughly match the box set version. Again, taking any slight analog consumer taping speed variations into account. The Boston Gardens show probably being the best example (and most listenable).

So, my wager would be that the box set version is in the same/correct key that they performed it during that era...with no slow-down.


Hope this helps a little.

[Get Info]

I openly admit to being a dick here.  Yes, the 2-second thing is an inconvenience.  However, it is a minor one.  And unless a replacement disc is forthcoming, there is an easy workaround here.  Using iTunes, I trimmed off the first two seconds of each track and went on with my day.  It is hardly a complicated procedure.  You just right-click on the track in question, select Get Info, select the Options tab and change that Start Time to 2 seconds.  But if we're too snobby for iTunes, there are plenty of other ways to pull this off.  Is it that big of a deal that the fade out in "Surf's Up" abruptly cuts off?  I mean, don't we have this song on at least 20 other CD's?  I didn't even bother ripping it; what's the point?  It's the same exact remaster from last year's Surf's Up re-release!  

Just trying to find a workable solution.  Beats complaining about it.  

What I'll probably do is re-rip the entire disc as one big image file, and then simply manually edit the cue sheet for new track points. I've done this many times on a lesser scale where discs were mis-indexed, lopping off stuff on individual track playback, etc. Obviously, the end of SU still can't be restored this way, but as noted,.....

Dave
in our book The Beach Boys In Concert, Jon and I discussed this. For a long time the bb tracks were missing but brother now has them. But the encores are still missing

Thanks, Ian! I actually have the new book.

Serves me right for not looking...lol!   

Interesting that we now get an honest-to-goodness Beach Boys track from The Beachago Tour. Obviously, this 6-27-75 performance in Largo, MD is from the same set of shows that produced the (somewhat mix/fidelity-challenged) Chicago Live in '75 Rhino set a few years back (though, FWIW, those tracks are stated as being recorded from the 6/24-6/26 shows).

Thus, I guess the multis from this set of professionally recorded shows still exist for the full BB's sets (hopefully complete and intact, that is), and it's only the earlier-recorded shows on the tour where the "half-the-tracks-of-multis" problem exists?

Really would be great to get a full release of both groups' sets -- as well as the combined one -- at some point. At the very least, more of the BBs stuff from those shows.

Wishful thinking.

One other thing that I was on the fence about while comparing, and which others who already have the box set can help me with...

Does that "c'mon, c'mon, c'mon baby" bit at the very end sound looped (once), or does it sound like two actually performed lines?

The reason I ask: The initial '83 mix fades abruptly before that first "cmon" line is even completed. In fact, at first listen to the "lo-fi tape" of performance one, I thought that's where the actual edit point in the new mix was made, as he did sing that "c'mon" line, once, for performance number one as well. That is, perhaps one line, or parts of one line from each performance edited together at some point. Unfortunately, the fidelity was too crappy for my admittedly aging ears for me determine if it was used in the new mix, and even then it kind of sounds subtly different to me. If it wasn't, there's only two other options: Either that second go-around of the line still exists on the 8-track tape of version two. Or, it was looped once. The other tiny option could be that they just borrowed a little bit from version one line (it really would be nice to hear the actual 8-track, and to see exactly where the tape abruptly ends).

Any thoughts? Does that repeated "c'mon" line on the new box set sound identical/repeated or not?

I remember that on the released Live in London LP the parts of the additional players were muted in varying degrees. Horns are mostly audible and Ed Carters lead guitar on "Bluebirds...". This may have something to do with the suddenly audible guitar on "All I want to do"

In the new mix, it is indeed suddenly audible, but again, and most importantly, it's the exact same isolated guitar parts from the earlier performance. Every little subtle, improvised inflection, etc.

Hmmm, I always thought that it was Ed Carter playing lead guitar on this track  

Could be. I simply looked at Eric's setlist archive, and only Ed, Daryl and Mike Kowalski were listed as additional musicians. So, I just initially assumed it was Ed on bass for that show. Thinking about it now, it just as easily could've  been Bruce...or even Carl...on bass for some/most tracks. Right?

[However]

I know some other people are interested in this kind of stuff, but I was curious as to what exactly they did on the new set to get the live '68 London version of "All I Want To Do" up to snuff on MIC? Thus, I did a little comparing tonight:

As many know, there were two shows done at the London Palladium on Dec. 1, 1968. "All I Want To Do" was performed at both shows, but the story always had it that the 8-track reel ran out at the very end of the performance from the second show before it finished. This was the version that was mixed by Capitol's Bob Norberg in 1983 for the Rarities album, and it was decided to simply fade the track out. As B. Elliot noted, and I'm paraphrasing, "they originally tried to edit on the ending from the first show performance but decided the results were unacceptable." It should also be noted that the first performance was pretty ragged and shambolic. Thus, it would've been unusable as a whole on its own; The second performance was much better. Long story short...I was interested in how they managed to get a full, complete ending on the new box set version. I assumed they just did what the earlier team also attempted, and simply made an edit between the two performances. And...that's indeed exactly what they did here -- albeit a little creatively. A very lo-fi recording of the first Palladium show performance circulates, and it confirms it. There's a little piano and drum flourish at the very end of performance one that now sits at the end of this new mix of performance two. Obviously, I can't post the lo-fi file of version one here, but it is out there for the ambitious. Also obviously, and as noted, the '83 mix of version two exists on Rarities for those who want to seek it out.


However, they didn't stop there for that new mix, and here's where it gets kind of cool (to me anyway)...


For whatever reason, Carl's lead guitar fills were either never recorded on the 8-track tape for the second performance, or were unacceptable, as virtually no licks are anywhere to be found on the 1983 mix (there are some a *little* bit audible, deep in the mix). So, for the new set they flew in the isolated guitar licks from the *first* performance (where they did obviously exist AND were usable) into to this new, second performance mix -- including the solo in the middle. I verified using that lo-fi tape of the first performance, and they're exactly the same. They also do some ADT-type effects in some but not all places, so it appears delayed in both channels at times (mostly the solo and the song's ending).


In conclusion, this new mix still uses the main elements/body from the second performance but tags on the complete ending from the first performance, as well as flying-in Carl's guitar licks from it. Note: It should also be said that the lo-fi tape that circulates of version one, fades out almost as soon as the performance ends. So, there's no evidence of Bruce's "Goodnight" outro comment that is on this new mix. Yet, judging by how it all plays out, I'll assume it's authentic and from performance one as well.



So...I guess that 8-track reel really did run-out while recording? Any other observations or corrections cheerfully welcomed.

The main interest in lossless is for preservation's sake. Also, it really depends on how the MP3 file is encoded, what kind of music you're dealing with, mastering etc. etc. Sometimes you lose a lot, even with optimum settings.

BTW, Runners, would you (or anyone) happen to know, offhand, if the Pink Man's SOT uploads are all unscathed and as they originally were? I've never taken the time to do a frequency analysis or look/listen for other nasties.

TIA!

Unlikely it was broadcast live but can't say for sure.

Scott Totten stated that no way, no how did the band use any kind of pre-recorded parts on stage, yet, IIT, for example, has the studio vocals flown-in in places for this airing (the studio single a capella  intro as well). So, it couldn't have been live. There's a few other moments as well ...Brian's aforementioned lead on H&V for one.

Yes but live on stage and a live (yet delayed broadcast) TV concert a two different beasts.

I'm not catching your drift here. Or...maybe we're simply misunderstanding one another.


There was post-production work done to the concert, so my point is simply that it wasn't broadcast live, as-it-happened.

Yeah crossed wires somewhere. I'm saying Scott is right with his no pre-recorded vocals on stage, as is, on the night at the concert. Yet sometime between Aug 16 and the broadcast on the 23rd, flown in leads/ vocals were added.

I'd have to research on YouTube (if a clip of the song is available) to reacquaint myself to know for 100% sure, but I saw the tour stop on June 1st in Berkeley, CA. At that stage, "Isn't It Time" had been added not too long prior, and I recall hearing elements of the studio recording in the house mix.

I didn't hear much of anything else like that on any other song as far as studio backing (other than Dennis' and Carl's leads of course), and no autotune was present, but it sounded like there were at least "stems" or individual elements of the studio recording being used as a backing/basis for the live performance of that one single song, "Isn't It Time."

There are other "field recordings" I've heard from the tour where a similar effect can be heard. I don't think they just cued up the CD copy of "Isn't It Time" and played and sang along to it; it sounded like they were using individual tracks or stems of the studio recording to beef the song up.  

Pretty much every recording from the actual concert tour that I've heard of the two tracks off the new album, from audience recordings on up to the official DVD/Blu-ray releases and the CD, have sounded like those two songs are always fudged with somehow. They always sound kind of murky with elements of the studio recording bleeding in and out of the recording.

I suppose that could indeed be true, despite what Scott said, in that it's pretty common for bands to often include, at the very least, pre-recorded rhythm pads, percussion bits, keyboard "washes" and such from time-to-time. Even sequenced backing vocals at time to help thicken things up a bit. Don't know for sure if that's the case here, in that the "as-it-happened" Mermaid version sounds pretty real to my humble ears, as well as some of the live TV versions being pretty shambolic, but...

Though, I still think in the case of this concert broadcast, there's enough evidence that post-production work was done. Some of Brian's lead vocal work being a prime example (e.g. H&V, the double-tracked vocals...and probably studio version-embellished bridge of DIA, etc.), and perhaps more importantly, the fact the "IIT" has that a capella, multi-tracked Brian studio intro thing tagged on -- when I never heard that being sequenced/"faked" on any of the audience recordings I have (over the dark, nothing-actually-happening onstage, wide shot to boot). 

As I also mentioned in another thread, and even though they obviously remixed the respective Chiba tracks that ended up on the 2-CD set, in the case of "Then I Kissed Her" there's a backing vocal bit that appears right before the bridge that wasn't on *any* of the tour audience recordings I heard. So, either they did that in the studio, or they skillfully flew that (repetitive) vocal figure in from somewhere else. Sweetening far beyond just tuning and such, that is!

On a related note, I've also said before that it's the mixing of the 2-CD set that bugs me as much, if not more than any of the processing and fixes. Jeff's falsetto is mixed up way-too-much and naked at times for my tastes (e.g. compare the same performances of TLGIOK-Dallas from the NPR broadcast and Marcella-Phoenix from the tour DVD, respectively. Night and day mixing for identical performances.). That, and that whole sterility thing again.

 (IMHO of course). 

Such a fascinating track to hear, because of Brian's vocals. One second you'd swear he could still nail Surf's Up, and the next his voice sounds so darn close to the 15 Big Ones one.

The interesting thing -- to me anyway -- is that I'm now pretty much convinced that Dennis was worse off for wear in late '74, vocally, than Brian was, and using these precious morsels such as CF, Child Of Winter and Rollin' Up To Heaven vs., say, Barnyard Blues and a few live audience recordings of Dennis from that era as the litmus tests (I guess the jury is still out as to when *exactly* that vocal for My Love Lives On was done). That is, perhaps surprisingly, I think Brian was still closer to his "younger self," with the better potential of "turning back" than Dennis was had things turned out differently. On the other hand, it really wasn't a case of just a straight spiral downward for either of them in the immediate years to come. There were moments of peaks and valleys as we already know (though there was also an obvious point of no return for Dennis just a few years later).


I'll also say this much: Even if the CF demo had zero musical merit, it's an amazing piece of the puzzle, and it's the best example we have yet from that era. The one we've all been waiting for -- for about as long as internet message boards and mailing lists have existed -- and the real dead sea scroll of BW vocals. Now...if we can only hear that In The Back Of My Mind remake! 


(Mind you, this is just my own personal opinion. FWIW.)   

Unlikely it was broadcast live but can't say for sure.

Scott Totten stated that no way, no how did the band use any kind of pre-recorded parts on stage, yet, IIT, for example, has the studio vocals flown-in in places for this airing (the studio single a capella  intro as well). So, it couldn't have been live. There's a few other moments as well ...Brian's aforementioned lead on H&V for one.

Yes but live on stage and a live (yet delayed broadcast) TV concert a two different beasts.

I'm not catching your drift here. Or...maybe we're simply misunderstanding one another.


There was post-production work done to the concert, so my point is simply that it wasn't broadcast live, as-it-happened.

Unlikely it was broadcast live but can't say for sure.

Scott Totten stated that no way, no how did the band use any kind of pre-recorded parts on stage, yet, IIT, for example, has the studio vocals flown-in in places for this airing (the studio single a capella  intro as well). So, it couldn't have been live. There's a few other moments as well ...Brian's aforementioned lead on H&V for one.

And IIT is strangely sped up...

It's the single version.

It's faster than the single version on 50BigOnes. The YouTube version [Mine] is also a Radio Rip likely sped up incase you were referencing that.

Note: Somewhat strangely, the version on 50 Big Ones wasn't sped-up (even though it was the single version). At the time, only the iTunes version, the CD-single and radio promo single got the speed-up (e.g the BBC, when they debuted the song, probably played it from the latter).

Joe Thomas: Mix Producer

And the plot, she thickens. Perhaps the autotune on the C50 release wasn't Joe's call after all ...

Concert broadcasts in Japan seem to be kind of like the cases of the Hollywood celebrities that never do TV commercials in the US, but do them in Japan. Despite how everything shows up everywhere now due to the internet, etc., it seems like sometimes it is seen as a more lowkey situation with less of a spotlight.

I would guess they didn’t fudge as much with this Japan footage because it was simply going to air once on TV, and only there. There are a bunch of artists who have had Japan-exclusive concert specials and whatnot. Even the Beach Boys’ 1991 Japan tour was shot and aired on TV, and I believe maybe even released on Laserdisc and/or VHS over there.

Yep. I can think of countless classic rock acts that have done the "concerts for Japanese TV" thing. Some of those performances have circulated over the years and are truly wonderful. Often surpassing "official" domestic product.

As far as the Joe Thomas-less autotune thing here. I wouldn't read too much into it all. There's still some post-production and fixes that occurred here (discussed in other threads), and any lack of a complete overhaul is probably simply due to the fact that he/they only had so much time to get this thing up and running...probably luckily for us. Several of the tracks from this performance made it to the live CD (e.g. WDFFIL, Then I Kissed Her, When I Grow Up To Be A Man, etc.) but like others, I actually prefer most of the mixes here. Less sterile. More alive.

I agree with Wirestone .. There is a message being sent.. And the comparison to YES is very good.. I just wish BB would grow up... Time is short.. Even if they all live to be 100 yrs old.  How much longer are you all gonna be able to sing like that..  Kiss + make up please..

As do I. Even the least cynical of persons would probably find it a bit of a coincidental stretch that Blondie is now joining the tour for a few dates (and obviously the album). A not-so-subtle message -- whatever the intent -- is most likely being sent.

Though, the exact nature of that intent is still the million dollar question? That long, soap opera saga that we affectionately call the Beach Boys.........carries on. If they call up Ricky next (or Glen Campbell!)...it's game over...lol.

In any event, what a rich time, musically and historically, to be a Beach Boys fan -- whatever one's "poison." So many different flowers in the garden to pick from. Who could've ever imagined any of this 10 years ago? I can't wait for the upcoming "solo" album.....could be something really special. Would I rather have M&B involved as well? Probably. But, at the end of the day, this might be an even better artistic setup. More Al leads, Blondie vocals, etc. That is, the guy with currently the best voice was almost an afterthought on TWGMTR.

Flac snobs!!!! 

Pretty hilarious wanting to preserve music in the best quality that's out there, innit?

I have many many FLAC files and many Mp3 320's and 256's. To these ears, I can't tell the difference. And If I convert 'em to .wav, it dudn't make any difference anyway.

Hi Mikie,

I don't think it's so much a matter of whether or not someone can detect a difference with the naked ear (so to speak), but rather, the notion that the pool has now been forever polluted. That is, once people start transcoding things, who's to say this won't happen several times within the lineage of something and with god-knows-what bitrates or encoders. And, that will definitely be noticeable to the naked ear. Even more so, if someone takes it upon his or herself to "remaster" something, and throw it back into the circulating pool as well, now we're getting even further and further away from the original. All this is fine and dandy if someone simply wants to do it for their own personal use (IPods, etc), but all it takes is one person to convert it back to FLAC and upload it somewhere, with those files then being propagated like wildfire. There could be 15 transcodes within, even though the resulting file is being moved around as a "FLAC." It's like playing "telephone" with digital files....lol.

And that's the nice thing about having a virgin FLAC file with known and verifiable lineage (i.e. MD5 files, etc.). In the case of a ripped CD, it's a pristine clone of the original (assuming correct offsets, etc.). Or, in the case of a simple (preferably lossless) recording, an unscathed, pure original. It can stay that way forever.

Very close to his old range!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a17cUFGkBbE

Oh yeah...I think he could still pull WH off...easily. Hell, give him Darlin' while he's at it!


Leaving This Town...Let The Wind Blow...YNAMOHTSA...Funky Pretty?    


(Truth be told, he'll probably see 2, 3 leads at most. Maybe a few partials. But...you never know...)

All things (and box sets) considered, any takers that they might be adding "Wild Honey" back into the setlist for those dates...?


What kind of range does Blondie still have?