Live in London CD/DVD boot

[Bicyclerider]

I haven't seen any mention of this here, so I thought I'd make some observations for those interested.  This comes with a small hardcover book that reprints Badman's entries on the 68 European tour, with some photos.  The CD is essentially the same as Dumb Angel Rarities Vol 11, with the Palladium Dec 1 and Astoria Dec 8 shows, but with some significant differences.

First, the Dec 1 show.  This is the show that "All I Want to Do" from the vinyl (and Japanese CD) Beach Boys Rarities is sourced from.  On Beach boys Rarities the intro is cut ("this is a new one we finished just before coming here" etc.) and, as we hear on Dumb Angel and the new Live in London, after Mike says "Are you ready" someone answers "I'm ready" but that's cut out of the BB Rarities version - just about a second is edited out.  Both Dumb Angel and Live in London have an extra second or two of playing during the fade after the final "cmon cmon cmon baby" from Mike.

Comparing the Dumb Angel Rarities Vol 11 version of this show with the new Live in London, the first thing immediately noticeable is a marked improvement in sound quality.  This has to be at least a couple of generations closer to the master tape.  The vocals are clearer and sound more upfront, the bass is more defined and less distorted, the stereo soundstage is wider, the musical backing is more detailed.

In addition, there's 3:22 of preshow chatter and warmup missing from the Dumb Angel, including a theremin test, some British guy going over the setlist ("Aren't you glad is out entirely") with someone named Ralph, and the piano intro to Wouldn't It Be Nice.  The distortion and volume fluctuation at the beginning of WIBN is still present and presumably is on the master tape - the engineer must have been fiddling with the sound at that point.

Even more interesting are comparisons between the released Dec 8 show between BB '69, Dumb Angel, and Live in London.  First of all I hadn't noticed before I did this comparison that the mix on Dumb Angel and Live in London is completely different than on BB '69.  The vocals are more upfront in the mix, the lead but especially the backing vocals, where they are turned down and even off at times in the official mix.  The vocals are also bone dry - I can hear some reverb/echo applied to the vocals on BB ' 69, like on Mike's vocal on Do It Again for example.  As a result vocals are clearer.  The music is still powerful however and not placed in the background.  The bass is more prominent than on BB ' 69.  I actually prefer this mix - it gives you the feeling of being right there at the front of the stage.  I would guess this comes from a rough two track mix done back in 68/69, or whomever liberated this tape did their own mix from the multitracks much later.

Comparing the Dec 8 show on Live in London vs. Dumb Angel, the vocals are clearer with less distortion, the bass more defined and less distorted, the drums sound more distinct.  Again, probably a generational difference, although not as much a difference as with the Dec 1st show.  The intro:  Live in London has a 36 second intro to the first show before Darlin' with chatter and warm up sounds - someone (Al?) sings "Don't go near the water" and someone whispers "I love you" into the microphone (Dennis?) and someone says "Stevie" - Stephen Desper?  BB '69 has a 7 second intro, Dumb Angel a 1 second intro.

Their Hearts Were Full of Spring - on both Dumb Angel and LIL, the volume drops suddenly as this song starts, with more tape hiss.  I suspect they were all singing around one microphone and standing back.  This is corrected on the official release.

At the end, after the last "good night" after Barbara Ann, the official release goes on for about 6 seconds.  LIL and Dumb Angel last about five seconds longer - nothing exciting, just crowd noise, but I guess it's nice to have.

The DVD is the film of the 68 tour - I don't have this in any other form, but it's in good quality and has the original soundtrack, unlike some recent releases of this that were supposedly silent!

[Fall Breaks]

- someone (Al?) sings "Don't go near the water"

Thanks for the detailed description of the differences! I love reading about stuff like this.

So, was "Don't Go Near The Water" written as early as late 1968? In that case the Beach Boys turned ecological before Jack Rieley came along, right?

[The Shift]

Many thanks for the description, good that others have ears keener than mine as I haven't had chance to do comparisons yet and, thanks to the arrival of the baby, perhaps never will!

Couple of my own observations though -  the DVD is NTSC so won't play on region 2 players unless it's a multi-region.

Also some traders are selling this as a 2CD &1 DVD - it's NOT -  it's ONE CD, One DVD.

The booklet is quite nice -  I don't know whether Badman's entries on this stuff can be trusted though; I'd treat it as nice merchandise rather than an authoritative piece of research!

[Rocker]

Did I miss something ? Haven't heard anything about this....

[The Heartical Don]

Did I miss something ? Haven't heard anything about this....

Same here. Can anyone over there shoot a few copies into the general direction of Europe with a huge cannon?

Thank you.