Sunday, January 23, 2011

JW - 1984-04-03 - Toronto, Ontario

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2 comments:

Dr. Forrester said...

Johnny Winter at El Mocambo, Toronto, Ontario, Canada - April 3, 1984

Watcha your step folks, this is a BIG one! You won't be sorry about this torrent.

This JW performance is one of the best ever, IMHO, over almost 500 I have. Unreal, call it "magic". Seems "El Mocambo" is a special place, where everybody's on, everything does work out. Just remember your other fave artist playing this venue and you'll know what I meant.

Guitar Slinger, the first Alligator Lp was just released and on drums is Moe Potts (real name is Mark Potowsky). He played with Johnny for one year and so, from last days of April 1983 till first days of June 1984. Here you can hear his trade mark, some "scat singing" during the drum solo.

Some time ago, was told me from an internet contact that this El Mocambo recording was captured by a VHS camera. A backstage interview before jumping the stage circulates out there and its about 25 minutes long. The performance plus the interview summed in 2 hours, and also the sound quality indicate this premiss shall be correct. I've been looking forward this video or even a better audio source.

And last but not least, if we can't have Allman Brothers here on DIME, Duane himself left his heaven's throne and near embody Johnny for awhile, to blown everybody away, take a look on the set list.

To wrap the packet with a beautiful paper, I've included two SUPERB fillers. Also I will satisfy those ones that don't live without soundboard recordings - hey kids, audience recordings are the Real Thing, with capital letters.

The first one is a radio show in studio, the DJ says this is "Mixed Bag Radio Show". Need helping to clear the place and radio station. This is a real treat, Johnny on guitar and Jon Paris on acoustic guitar, two songs sandwiching an interview. Johnny's voice is crystal clear, his accent doesn't hurt my untrained ears. Uncertain date, on the interview Jon states he's with Johnny for 7 years. Actually he'd started with Johnny on early 1978, so we have 1985 as the year of this recording. Almost unplugged, is another MUST HEAR set.

The second filler is the performance's final song and the encores. An awesome performance with high energy renditions driving the audience absolutely crazy. Rare songs too. MUST HEAR!!!

And hang on, the very best performences (as this one is) are still ahead.

The El Mocambo set I received in a cdr trade from Jeff James (roryglzep, many thanks to him) and I can say nothing about the lineage. The Mixed Bag set came also from a cdr trade from another pal, again nothing about the lineage. The 1980 recording came from a 2nd generation tape from a JW friend, Steven Pearl (http://filmwisela.com/steven_pearl.htm) who kindly gave me together with those tapes with the Botton Line 1978 (http://www.dimeadozen.org/torrents-details.php?id=138154) recording. The quality is not the same of the Botton Line recording but still excellent. For the tape I used my Sansui Deck D-95M and Creative Live! 24 bits sound card to transfer the analog sound to digital format. And Cool Edit Pro software was used in all sources to edit the blancs, fix some minor flaws and index the tracks.

January 23, 2011 at 11:05 PM
Dr. Forrester said...

Set List:

disc 1 (about 79 minutes):

1. succotash
2. don't take advantage of me
3. mad dog [a marvelous slide guitar solo in the "quiet" section, in the middle of the song; in the Duane Allman style, as it reminds me the first time I had heard it]
4. I smell trouble
5. boot hill [small cut in the middle]

medley:
6. highway 61 revisited
7. slide guitar jam [masterful solo, including "3rd stone from the sun" again makes me remember Duanne Allman; beautiful!!]
8. done somebody wrong [great! As the Allman Bros. arrangement]
9. dust my broom
10. black cat bone

11. johnny b. goode [with the well known gimmick: Jon Paris plays on the Johnny's guitar while Johnny stands behind Jon and reach thru his arms and Jon reach backwards]

disc 2:

the encores, played as a medley (about 15 minutes):
1. it's all over now 
2. jam intro to... [another masterful guitar solo]
3. okie dokie stomp
4. drum solo by Moe Potts
5. jam intro to...
6. jumpin' jack flash [unfortunetaly cut short in almost 4 minutes]

first filler (about 19 minutes) from "Mixed Bag Radio Show":
7. boothill
8. interview
9. kiss tomorrow goodbye

second filler (about 28 minutes) from April, 1980 at J.B. Scott's, Albany, New York:

10. New York, New York
11. 1st encore: day tripper
12. 2nd encore: stranger
13. 3rd encore: like a rolling stone
14. 4th encore: wildwood flower

sources (MP3 samples will be provided):

1- El Mocambo: a solid VG+ audience recording, with minimal channel separation, almost a mono recording. The instruments are OK but Johnny seems a little raucous. Likely due to captured by VHS camera.

2- Mixed Bag: excellent FM.

3- J.B Scott's: excellent soundboard, I believe from a "live microphone" very near the audience.

January 23, 2011 at 11:05 PM

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