Segment 135

Long time listeners know that every now and then we like to go live here in the Way Back Studios. That’s not to say I have a satellite uplink that allows me to do the show live live which would be fun except I don’t really have the room for one of those thirty foot NT-7 Satellite trucks here in the back yard. And you know how the neighbors get when you raise one of those 2.5 meter, four-port AVL satellite dishes. No, when I say we like to go live, it just means that we pull out the concert albums and do our segues during the applause. Long time listeners might also remember that story I told about that Dave Mason and Poco concert I didn’t get to attend back on July 22, 1975 owing to an encounter with a vigilant member of the Mississippi Highway Patrol. By the way I found the ticket for that show and posted it on the Way Back Studio Facebook page for your amusement. Anyway, after telling my story, a few folks wrote in with their own. Craig in New Jersey confessed that he was about sixteen years old and had tickets to go hear Lynyrd Skynyrd opening for The Who at an unnamed venue in Pennsylvania. But instead, he ended up being grounded for (and here he was a little vague) for “getting in trouble with the law.” Well, that covers a lot of ground and we don’t really have time to speculate on what sort of illegal activities Craig might have been involved in. But then Craig suggested another category of concert-related stories, namely, those you went to, but can’t remember. For example he says he knows he saw Buddy Miles and The Allman Brothers at a hockey rink in New Jersey but that’s all he remembers. Now my only point here would be to say that that’s not a story. A story has a beginning, a middle, and an end. All we have here is evidence of drug use. Well, they’re dimming the lights. (sniff) Hey, Craig, what’re you smoking? Here’s Bruce Springsteen.

Recorded in November of ‘92 for his first live album, that’s James Taylor with “Steamroller Blues.” The album was the result of a three week tour specificially designed with a live album in mind. They played fourteen different venues and picked the best performance of each of the songs, but the liner notes don’t say where any given track was recorded. Otherwise, I’d tell you. And yes, that was on CD since that wasn’t released on vinyl. Before that, on vinyl, some blues from Pete Townshend, a cover of Sonny Boy Williamson’s “Eyesight to the Blind.” That’s from the Deep End Live album, recorded in Brixton, England. Also recorded in England, Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers did “Even The Losers.” At the top of the set, “Bishop Danced” That’s early and relatively rare Bruce Springsteen. Recorded live at Max’s Kansas City in New York on January 31, 1973. You can find that on the four CD set called Tracks, but here we played it off vinyl because that’s the only version I’ve got. From New York we headed out to Max Yasgur’s farm for that big hippie festival they had in 1969. The fourth track on side three of Woodstock II, Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young doing “Marakesh Express.” Seven years later and on the other side of the country, we found ourselve at The Winterland Ballroom for The Last Waltz and a great track from Neil Diamond called “Dry Your Eyes.” And in the middle of the set, the only other song we played off CD, “Splendid Isolation.” The late great Warren Zevon recorded at Bogarts in Cincinnati, Ohio. Listen, if you’ve got a concert story you think the rest of us would like to hear, shoot me an email. There’s a link on my website, billfitzhugh.com or you can go through the Way Back Studios Facebook page. I’m Bill Fitzhugh. Thanks for listening. I’ll have another batch of All Hand Mixed Vinyl next time and I hope you can join us, right here in the Deep Tracks.